Adventuring

George Crumb’s 90th birthday celebration concert took place this evening at National Sawdust in Brooklyn. His 90th birthday — can you believe it?

I was invited to view the premiere of a short documentary, experience the concert, and get introduced to their brand new Meyer Sound Constellation audio system.

Believe it or not, there are 102 magical speakers (86 full range + 16 subs) hiding behind those gorgeous wall and ceiling panels. Each one of them has me dreaming of possibilities…

The concert was a STUNNING success.

(I’ve been asked to mix and master the concert audio for the upcoming archival videos and I’ll update this post with links as soon as they’re available online.)

Alison wants you to know that it’s eggs y’all!

Stopped in Hartland, Vermont this morning for breakfast.

They truly ARE on a path to WORLD BREAKFAST DOMINATION.

I spent an absolutely lovely week camping at Algonquin Park in southeastern Ontario. Canada is so incredibly beautiful and Algonquin is one of Ontario’s many highlights.

While I barely scratched the surface of all that there is to see and do, I did manage to take in a few scenic hikes including: Bat Lake, Lookout Trail, Big Pines Trail, Track & Tower Trail, and I enjoyed a refreshing bike ride from the Lake of Two Rivers down to Whitefish Lake.

I enjoyed a brief visit to Wellesley Island, one of the largest of the Thousand Islands in the St. Lawrence River. Wellesley Island State Park has a fantastic visitor center complete with 8 miles of easy, well-marked trails and a butterfly house!

The Madame Sherri Forest is named after Madame Antoinette Sherri, a Paris-born theatrical costume designer who worked in New York City during the early 1900s. She and her husband built an elaborate French-inspired chateau summer house just outside Keene, NH where they lavishly entertained their New York City friends at parties during the Roaring 1920s.

All that’s left are the stone ruins, but it’s a pilgrimage every good Keener (or Keenite?) must make.

I would never call myself a hiker, but for some reason, I decided to push myself a little bit on the trails recently.

Specifically, I headed over to Grafton Notch and hit a couple of the “moderate” loop trails around Old Spec Mountain. Both trails I took joined forces with the Appalachian Trail at certain points.

Table Rock Trail

Table Rock Trail is a 7.2 mile round trip that climbs 1,964 feet to the 3,124 foot summit of Table Rock Mountain. The trail ends 700 feet past the summit with spectacular views of Raven Cliff Falls, the Table Rock Reservoir, and the Caesars Head escarpment.

Eyebrow Loop Trail

The Eyebrow Loop Trail is considered more difficult than Table Rock and rises steeply to a 2,900-foot shelf-overlook on Old Speck Mountain.

These were quite challenging trails for me, so I was glad to have a nice fire and good food at the end of each day.

Now that the Cricket has joined us in Keene, I just had to get away for a quick shakedown in Vermont’s Green Mountains. Beautiful. Relaxing. Very glad we live so close to this…

Only the coolest people with the coolest cars are allowed in Keene…

But seriously… I spent a few nights camping in the Green Mountains, exploring the forest by Jeep. How else would you do it?

This morning the last of the construction and painting equipment left our basement. (Woo!) To celebrate, we cleaned up our bikes and rode the Cheshire Rail Trail 3 miles into town where the Walldogs Mural Festival was underway.

In short, the Walldogs is a group of mural artists who travel the country creating public art murals related to local history.

One of the murals was dedicated to Miss Catherine Fiske’s Female Seminary which you can hear more about here. Most importantly, we got to enjoy a decadent food truck lunch.