Our 2017

Hey everyone! I did this post last year and really loved it so I'm doing it again this year.

I'll forever be thankful that 2017 was so mellow after having the two years before that be so jam packed. I will admit that it took me a little bit of effort to chill this year. Thankfully whenever I suggested buying plane tickets or taking off on some long weekend Michael would bring me back to earth and remind me why we decided to take it easy this year. We already know 2018 is going to be full of a lot of changes and fun trips for us. We already have our first vacation planned for March and I'm SO EXCITED! We'll be crossing off another bucket list item. I will say that taking it easy in 2017 was so worth it because instead we saved up some extra money for trips in 2018!

Cheers everyone and Happy New Year!!

The highlights from our year outdoors is below!

I caught an epic sunset with my little brother on the first snowboarding sesh of the year at Wintergreen Resort in Virginia.

Michael and I spent the long MLK weekend in Stowe, Vermont with Emily and Ian. We went snowboarding at Stowe Mountain and got to try Heady Topper, along with some other brews, from the Alchemist.

We flew in and out of Boston for our trip to Stowe so we got to explore a little bit of the city as well. We got some Trillium beers which I thought were SO good.

In April we road tripped down to the Great Smoky Mountains for five days of fly fishing and hiking. We stayed in Bryson City in a really sweet cabin and didn't catch a single fish haha. We hiked up to Mount LeConte from Alum Cave and it was such a fun hike!

In May I took my brother on his first backpacking trip along the Appalachian Trail in southern Virginia. We hiked from Elk Garden to Buzzard Rock.

In July we spent three weeks out west. We started in Glacier National Park where we backpacked then stayed in a little cabin and did some fly fishing. Then we drove up to Canada and spent a week in Banff & Yoho National Parks with my parents. We then drove back down into the states and went through Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks before ending in Denver, CO. We ended up driving over 3,000 miles on the trip!

In September Devils Backbone hosted Michael and I for their music and beer festival, Hoopla. Our friends Dee and Baxter came with us and we had an awesome time. The beer was great and the music was fantastic. We had perfect weather and camped out all weekend!

In early October we spent some time in the Adirondacks fly fishing, camping and backpacking to see the fall foliage. I've always wanted to be in the Adirondacks during peak fall foliage and we were not disappointed, the colors were absolutely beautiful! My favorite part of the trip was waking up early in the morning and listening to loons singing on a lake outside our tent.

We went on a little backpacking trip with Mel and Will down in the Grayson Highlands to see if we could find some fall foliage in Virginia. To our surprise the fall foliage was basically gone but the sunsets and sunrises were amazing!

For the rest of the year Michael and I a bunch of hikes in Virginia. The solitude and quietness was so wonderful after a year full of crowded trails and campsites!

Our families are celebrating Christmas together this year and we're all SO excited! Then, we'll be spending NYE at the beach with our friends Ian and Emily. We had orginally planned to go to Cuba, but after the travel restrictions were reinstated it was too difficult and too constricting to plan a trip. It ended up working out though because that money is now going to a new vacation next year!

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We hiked (and fly fished!) well over 200 miles throughout the states of Virginia, North Carolina, New York, Maryland, West Virginia, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado and the Canadian Rockies.

Some of my favorite shots from this year: