High Tech Hiking and Herman Munster Shoes

There is a mountain in New Zealand called Mt. Cook. That's where Sir Edmund Hillary, a simple beekeeper from Auckland, got serious about learning how to climb mountains. He went on to stand at the top of Mt. Everest with his sherpa pal Tenzing Norgay. "You don't have to be a fantastic hero to do certain things - to compete. You can be just an ordinary chap, sufficiently motivated to reach challenging goals," he said after returning from great heights.

When I go to New Zealand next February, I plan to trapse about a bit, and to visit Mt. Cook. Not all the way up to the top of that mountain, as Sir Edmund has done, yet I do want to take long hikes. So I've put myself in training mode.

My hiking experiences over the last few years have been high up in the Shenandoah, treks along the Appalachian Trail, through Caledonia State Park in Pennsylvania, Glacier National Park in northern Montana, and at Georgetown University in Washington, DC.

Yes, mountains exist on M Street. I went to an interview about possibly teaching at Georgetown. The meeting was in the historic Car Barn, the place where trollies, in their heyday, would rest at night. This building has been restored, and is also next door to another famous landmark: The Exorcist Stairs.

I had to park the Mighty Bug way up the hill and over a bit, out where the athletic fields used to be, and where massive amounts of student housing now stand. I found the nearest entry to the Car Barn, and took an elevator down down down to the main floor to the interview office. When it was over, I took the nearest exit, and found myself standing in the horrid Washington humidity, at the base of the Exorcist Steps.

OK Mare, I thought to myself. Up ya go. I started climbing...and climbing...and climbing. I was passed...coming and going...by three collegiates, two young women and a man, who were "exercising" on the Exorcist Stairs, giggling and laughing, never short of breath. I reached the top, and, gasping for air in my fancy business duds, collapsed on the nearest bench.

I was not alone.

Across the sidewalk a balding middle-aged man, suit coat off, wiping his brow with a hankerchief, sat on the edge of a concrete planter. He gazed in the direction of the enthusiastic exercising trio, then looked my way and said, "If I had a rock, I would throw it at them."

Eventually I did catch my breath, the teaching stint I sought did not get funded, and life continued on. So now I am preparing myself to climb tall hills down under.

There are not many mountains in the neighborhood, so once a day I climb into my hiking boots, set the treadmill in the living room to INCLINE and walk uphill with a pack on my back. Since I have size 10 feet, this fab footwear resembles Herman Munster's shoes. And I've been adding weight to the pack as I get stronger...the "hernia" tech books I use when I teach. There are now 7 books in the pack...JSP, AJAX, PHP, JAVA, XML, Cold Fusion MX Web Application Construction Kit and the 2006 Writer's Market. The pack now weighs 35 lbs. Books can do double-time as one climbs higher and higher.

Comments

[Toni Arrington]

Keep climbing, Mary! :)

[PODO]

Wow! Great info. I wish, I could have such a writing skills:)))))