Dear Hiking & Nature Meetup members,

This Saturday, 13 of us are going to the North Cascades in Washington State for 5 days of hiking. And the weather forecast is sunny and zero chance of rain for each of our 5 hiking days!!! Yay! I?m so excited! If you?d like to join us last minute, we have one empty bed, just email me ASAP ...

While Andre, Susanna, Alex Dillon, and I are in Washington State, Liz is going to lead hikes this and next Saturday, with the help of Ralph and Rob. See listings below. Just keep in mind that the RSVP and payment deadlines for dayhikes are on Fridays at 2 pm.

If you like Kurt Vonnegut, please join the New York Kurt Vonnegut Meetup Group of which I am an assistant organizer. The group meets in a very nice penthouse on the Upper West Side to discuss Vonnegut and his books and watch movies based on his novels. You can find it here: http://vonnegut.meetup.com/36/


FUTURE EVENTS

August 2:
Liz and Ralph are going to lead a HIKE & SWIM while Andre, Susanna, Alex, and I are flying to Seattle. 12 people have committed so far. A couple of them are planning to leave earlier (4 and 6 pm), so if you need to be back early, you can skip the swimming and hike back with Joy or MiaMia. Info and RSVP (until Fri 2pm) here: http://hiking.meetup.com/362/calendar/8441107/

August 2-9:
I have one bed left for our weeklong WASHINGTON STATE HIKING TRIP and the weather is going to be gorgeous!!! Info and RSVP here: http://hiking.meetup.com/362/calendar/7269739/

August 9:
Liz and Rob are going to lead a HIKE & SWIM while Andre, Susanna, Alex, and I are still out of state. Info and RSVP here: http://hiking.meetup.com/362/calendar/8429067/

August 16:
Probably a HIKE AND SWIM IN HARRIMAN PARK. Not posted yet.

August 17:
Probably a DAY ON THE BEACH with Suzanne. Not posted yet.

August 23 and 24:
More hiking and swimming. Not posted yet.

August 30 to September 1, Labor Day weekend:
We'll have two trips for Labor Day weekend:
1. Andre will make another attempt at conquering MT. MARCY IN THE ADIRONDACKS, New York's highest mountain. Only fast and very fit hikers who have hiked with Andre before will be invited to this trip. Info and RSVP here: http://hiking.meetup.com/362/calendar/8271170/
2. WEEKEND AT THE MANSION in Pennsylvania where we'll spend the weekend kayaking, hiking, and whitewater rafting. Info and RSVP here: http://hiking.meetup.com/362/calendar/8437542/

September 5 to 7:
We are going to a SUMMER CAMP FOR ADULTS called Club Getaway. It's in the Berkshire Mountains. You can book it directly through their website, or through a couple commercial outdoor groups, but if you go there with the Hiking & Nature Meetup, you'll pay a smaller amount of money and be in the best group with the nicest members :-) Will be posted soon.

September 13:
We'll probably do another HIKE AND SWIM IN HARRIMAN PARK while we still can :-) Last year we were still swimming in October, but we can't rely on that.

September 27 or 28:
A hike & swim, rock scramble, or kayaking trip, we'll see.

October 4 to 5:
We are going to OUR LODGE IN VERMONT TO SEE THE FALL FOLIAGE. The foliage promises to be at its peak that weekend, which is why I reserved the lodge for those two days. Not posted yet.


EVENTS OF LAST WEEK

Susanna decided to cancel Sunday?s hike & swim in Harriman Park on the morning of the hike, because of the weather forecast. It was a good call because there was indeed a severe thunderstorm on Sunday around 3 pm when the hikers would still have been in the forest. We cancel hikes very rarely and only if it really seems necessary. Indeed, I believe that this is the first time this year that we had to cancel a hike because of the weather and we have never had any regrets about the decisions we?ve made.

The beach day on Sandy Hook on Saturday was great. The traffic was a bit dense, it took us 2 hours to get there, because everyone was going to the beach that day, but it was well worth it. The beach is beautiful, the waves were harmless and fun (less than 5 feet high), and we had a really cool group. Several members (and yours truly) decided to bare it all, two female members took off their tops for the first time ever, and it was a wonderful experience how relaxed and natural everyone was about it. I felt like a hippie. It was a very relaxed day, just hanging out in the sand, doing nothing except chatting and eating. This is what life should always be like :-)

Speaking of hippies and nudity, I saw the musical HAIR In the amphitheater in Central Park on Tuesday. It was really good. At the end of the musical, I got on stage with the cast and about a hundred other audience members and sang "let the sunshine in", waving my arms above my head while holding a stranger's hand and then hugging her. What can I say, I'm a flower-child at heart :-)
Let the sunshine, let the sunshine in, the sunshine in...

Interestingly, when the audience was asked who had seen the original production (1969), perhaps a quarter of the people raised their hands! Wow!

HAIR is produced by the same company that does "Shakespeare in the Park". Tickets are for free, but you usually have to stand in line in the park for hours. However, this year you can also win them in a daily lottery online. They call it a "virtual line", but they say: "People are chosen at random, not in the order requests are received", so it's not really a line. Info here: http://www.publictheater.org/content/view/128/223/


Hope to see you soon,

Suzanne