4,000 Footer Club

I get comfortable with routine. I have found myself getting "stuck" with climbing the same few mountains over and over, same trail every time. I am perfectly happy doing that, but one of the big reasons I got back into hiking was to push myself out of comfort zone. Why do I need to push myself out of my comfort zone? Well, I write this sitting behind the computer I stare at for hours a week, alone in a room. I'm bored. Though I'm not AS bored anymore, because I got a second job at REI (WOOOOP WOOOOOOOOOOOOP!). It's retail, yes, but the people I work with are awesome and from what I've heard most of the customers are great as well. The discount doesn't hurt, either. I'm excited to be surrounded by like-minded people, and to learn more about the outdoors than I could have hoped for at a job.

Anyway, I felt that I needed to start pushing my boundaries past the usual three or four hikes I've been doing in my neck of the woods. I love you, Monadnocks, but I need to meet some new mountains, too. I had heard several people talk about the 4,000 footer club, so I decided to look into it.

The AMC 4,000 Footer Club  was formed in 1957 in an effort to get hikers to explore new mountains in the Whites. Perfect! Not only does it get people out to mountains they may not have hiked, it helps the AMC stay updated on the conditions of the White Mountain region. There are three lists that the club recognizes, and I chose to go with White Mountain 4,000 Footers. I figured this would be the most practical for me, as it's much more time consuming to travel to areas in Vermont and Maine than it is New Hampshire. Plus, I've never really had a great experience in Maine... totally unrelated to hiking but still damaging nonetheless.

I'm excited to get started on this list, though I know it'll be a marathon and not a sprint. Balancing two jobs will make it somewhat difficult to get enough time off to get up to that region, but hopefully I can knock off a few before the summers over!