Over Cardigan and Through the Woods - Day 1
September 25, 2016
By Emma H.
Yellow Group D2 B3
Day 1
Movement
 |
 |
This is a picture of the Cardigan Lodge with a few stray backpacks left behind on the grass in front of the lodge. The lodge is portrayed with many windows as well as being three stories tall. | This picture of one of a fern and wood sorrel. The fern has spores on it's underside and the wood sorrel leaves are shaped like hearts. This wood sorrel looks exactly like the one we ate. |
It was Sunday morning and I was waking up at 7:00 am; something just wasn't right. Then, I remembered, it was the morning I was leaving for the school trip to Cardigan Mountain. I arrived at the school at about 8:00, with my bags packed from the previous night, and loaded them into the trailer, trying to stuff them towards the middle in fear that they might fall out. With a quick goodbye to my parents and sister, I climbed onto the bus. The First Student Bus headquarters are in Cincinati, OH, and then the bus came to New Hampshire and we are now riding on it. Before sitting down at the window seat next to Chloe, I survey the bus in hopes of connecting with some of my friends before I had to sit down for an hour. After introductions to the chaperones and the bus driver and a thorough attendance call, there is much pleading for some music. As everyone starts to sing along to the music blasting through the speakers, the bus slowly starts to inch around the school towards the road in pursuit of Mr. Woolner's car.
Once we are pretty far into the wooded areas of Northern New Hampshire, the bus pulls to the side of the road. If you didn't already know, the name Hampshire comes from a town in England, which the colonists came from. Suddenly, there are voices, each trying to get across the bus driver, asking if we have broken down or something of the sort. After minutes of waiting by the side of the road, the message is finally relayed that we have lost track of Mr. Woolner. A phone call is made and we are finally on our way, until of course we lose him again. This time, the reason for stopping can be inferred as we stare at a man on a tractor, anticipating what is to come. All this driving is an example of movement of the students, or people on the bus from school in Hopkinton to Alexandria, New Hampshire.
The arrival at the AMC Cardigan Lodge has been anxiously awaited. In a hurry, everyone ejects from their seats as soon as the bus pulls up, only to be told to sit down and let the driver turn around and park. Finally, the bus doors open and it is a mad rush to feel the cool mountain air. As soon as we have exited the bus, we are told to set our things down and circle up in a field.
We play a few games based on predators and prey, then we get into our hiking groups, but not before the question of when we are going to get to see our rooms has been asked a hundred times. Our stomachs growling, we dig our bagged lunches from home and settled down with friends to eat. When the news arrives that we may be able to see our rooms sooner than we thought, everyone briskly shoves their remaining food into their mouths and stuff the empty bags in their backpacks.
Before long we are herded into the lodge and up the stairs to the girl's floor. It was hard climbing the narrow staircase with three bags on one shoulder, but I persevered and made it to my room, but not before my bunkmate Livvie. She escorts me into the room as we call our bunks. My L.L. Bean sleeping bag I have lugged to the room was made in Brunswick Maine and then moved to the store in Concord, New Hampshire. From there I bought it and brought it to my house and finally on this trip. We then change into hiking boots, pack our hiking bags and use the bathroom before heading back outside to meet with hour hiking groups. Our group, which consists of Francie, Natalie, Emily, Riley, Aidan, Brendan, Owen and Andrew, make up our collective name of "Sassy Squirrels." Then, we make a contract and learn a few basic trail rules specific to the trails themselves and our group leader Kristen, or Fern, as we liked to call her. Fern is from New York, and has now moved to the AMC Cardigan Lodge. Eventually though, she will move from Cardigan back to New York. This is an example of a person moving to and from Cardigan. Before long, we are on our way to hike the Nature Trail Along with the chaperone, Natalie's mom. In failed attempted to find Campsite 2 for a nature scavenger hunt, we give up and go to Plan B, which is just to hike part of the Nature Trail. After about 20 minutes of hiking (people moving from the lodge to our different stops) and some red and yellow lights (which mean to stop and slow down so we can hike as a group) we stop and are partnered up to do an activity where our partner leads us to a tree while we are blindfolded. We then feel the tree and try to guess which tree we were lead to. I was partnered with Riley and was lead to a tree with much peeling bark. Sketching was something that was required to do, so we sat down and did our second of the tree we were lead to, after sketching the AMC Lodge itself.
Continuing hiking, we take in the beautiful scenery. Then we stop to play Steal the Bacon with leaves we just learned to identify. During this game we moved from behind our starting line to the place where the leaves were placed. We do another sketch there, and I ended up sketching and comparing two different leaves. Our next stop was a place called Bailey Brook.
To the group's delight, there is a wooden bridge across the drying stream, our first we have encountered. Francie and I walk a little ways (movement of people from the bridge down the stream, but not very far) up the brook before I decide to sketch a mini waterfall that made a wonderful trickling sound.
 |
This is my sketch of the mini waterfall we encountered at Bailey Brook. Where the water ran down the rock, there was moss coating it as well as some hanging down into the small stream below leading to Bailey Brook itself. |
We then sat down on the bridge as the rest of the group played around in the stream, lifting rocks and such. Sadly, Francie dropped her sketchbook in the stream before leaving, but luckily it landed on two rocks so it didn't get too wet.
A wood sorrel bunch was our next stop-and-sketch. Since Fern was an expert on edible plants, we eat something called wood sorrel, which was quite bitter. It stood out so much to me that I decided to sketch it along with a fern.
Our last stop was at a very cool place with tree benches and a stone lined fire pit. There was a dry stream beneath fallen trees, almost like balance beams, slanting over to the land across from the site.
The way we got there in the first place was by crossing a typical bridge. After the "only one person on each tree at a time" rule was broken, our whole group lined up on the log for a picture. Before this though, we were handed paint samples and were to find and sketch something in nature of that same color. My color was orange and I found a leaf which I kept tucked in my sketchbook. My sketchbook was the Mead brand and had been made and Vietnam. From there it had moved to the Target store before my mom picked it up for me to take on this trip. The notebook is an example of things moving from a store to Cardigan. Before leaving, I then made another sketch of the site itself before leaving to go back to the lodge for quiet time. During this whole hike, we moved along the nature trail and eventually back to the AMC Lodge.
Our group was the last one back. During free time we played outside or relaxed in our rooms. I decided to do a combination of both, play cards with friends outside. I learned to play a game called "spit." This game has followed me from Cardigan Lodge to my house where I want to teach it to my sister. It is an example of a thing moving from Cardigan back to my house. Then it was dinner time. We sat down at a table with friends as spaghetti and meatballs were served along with a caesar salad, which originated in Mexico and eventually moved to the United States of America, as did spaghetti moving from Italy. It is an example of things, namely food moving from Mexico and Italy to the US and then to Cardigan Lodge. After we filled our stomachs with the delicious meal, we were served a dessert of a brownie and vanilla ice cream. We had learned about ORT earlier today, and in case you didn't know, it stands for Our Remaining Tidbits. Bottomline is that you don't want any waste left on your plate. We did a pretty good job with about 5 pounds of ORT. The idea of ORT moved from the lodge back to my house where I told my parents about it and thought about it when I ate dinner.
After dinner, our group's job was to clean up from dinner. We swept the floors and unset and washed the tables. Work went fast when you had 20 hands. Then we had a little time to get ready to go on a night hike. During this hike, we learned owl calls, followed in a line blindfolded, and star-gazed. In fact, it is believed constellations originated thousands of years ago from farmers. After the trip, I am sure the idea of constellations moved from Cardigan Mountain all the way back to our families and to school. I saw three shooting stars that night as well as the Big Dipper. Briskly, we hurried inside to shower before Mr. Woolner was to read a story to us. It was a mad race to claim one of the showers, and then we got into pajamas and headed down stairs to the living area next to the dining room. We all sat on the couch and the floor, and we listened to a story about Blackbeard. After the story, it was pretty late, so we went upstairs to go to bed. We settled in and were given candy once we had done so.
Within these paragraphs, you may have seen me mention about the movement of people, things and ideas. Well, there are some basic things at Cardigan that are example of movement, including the name. The item of clothing called a cardigan originated from a man named James Brudenell who led the Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava during the Crimean War. The idea of the cardigan was moved from Wales to New Hampshire, and a mountain was named after it. Also, there is a bay surrounding Wales called Cardigan Bay as well. Plus, at Cardigan were some apple trees that were planted by humans. Originally, apple trees were from Central Asia and then moved from there to United States by European colonists. Finally, they were moved planted up near the AMC Cardigan. So, if you ate an apple from one of those trees, you could say you were eating an apple from across the world. These are some more examples of movement from Mount Cardigan.
Back to the Index Page.
Onto Day 2.
Postcard Image by E.H. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.