When the days start to get a bit cooler and summer fights the good fight but eventually loses to autumn (my favorite season), the trail comes a calling and I can't fight it...
until hunting season starts.
Even when the laws state very clearly that there is no hunting on state land on Sundays in Massachusetts and Connecticut, I still get the heebiejeebies going out there. There have been more than a few times I have greeted people just out for a walk...and they are carrying a loaded rifle.
Then I run at a *much* faster pace, looking over my shoulder, bobbing and weaving until out of sight.
But until the end of September, I enjoy the trail again and dream of actually doing a few trail races this autumn even though my training base absolutely *sucks* right now.
Sunday, my friend Jim and I hit Shenipsit for anything from a 4 miler to an 11 miler. We'd decide on what we were doing as we felt like it.
We hit the 2-mile out point and felt barely warmed up. So, we went farther down to the 3-mile out point and reorganized. It was a stellar day - low dew point, moderate temps. So, we went out further to basically mimic the western side of the Soapstone Trail Races course. We were scooting right along looking for a possible turn around at 5 miles out or so and across the trail was clearly marked "NO TRESPASSING" signs. As we turned around to head back up the yellow trail (meeting some bikers) was two large signs that stated "hunting is permitted on state lands".
Jim was bummed because he was feeling good enough for the full 11 mile course and couldn't do so without trespassing.
But you know, you have to respect someone's land especially around hunting season. If I purchased a big track of land and allowed people to use some of it most of the year, but had little children (who can easily fool a hunter into thinking that they are small game), I would hesitate to allow hunters onto my property also.
So, as we plodded along, we decided to take a non-blazed trail in an effort to go from the yellow to the blue trail and take that back in.
Needless to say, we got (temporarily) lost. We thought we had hit a spot that we knew and then went further down the trail, but turned around to headed down a third new trail.
Two new (unblazed) trails later, we ended up exactly where we wanted to, albeit not from the direction that we though we would ~ but it was really a bit of a rush anyway.
Along the way, we came right back up a trail we had just come down. On the way back, we saw the bobbing white tail of a full-grown doe bouncing not 15 feet away from us.
At least for now, we didn't have to keep our heads on swivels looking for a tree stand.
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