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Watatic: Wat A Time!

October 17th, 2013 apcook15

Happy Fall Break, loyal readership! To those of you who don’t quite understand what that means, yes – we of a Crusader disposition enjoy both Fall AND Spring vacations to compensate for our starting a week earlier than most other colleges & universities. It always seems to come at exactly the right time in the semester; the freshmen have been away from home long enough to miss it at this point, and the other three classes reached the bottomost depths of their closets to still be considered socially acceptable. Everyone will be back on campus next week relaxed, well-fed with home cooked meals, and with enough clean laundry to last until the next trip home.
The break is well-timed for other reasons too: for those of us fortunate enough to hail from the New England area, this is peak Fall foliage season, never a thing to be missed. Holy Cross’ campus is famously picturesque, no time more-so than when the walls of ivy begin to change color, but oftentimes it’s hard to enjoy the scenery from between the pages of a textbook in the inner bowels of Dinand Library. This week is the perfect opportunity, then, to get out and take in the Fall sights!
A nature nut, I took full advantage of Columbus Day and went for a jaunt up Mount Watatic, out in the northwestern part of the state. Just consider this: drive an hour in one direction from Holy Cross, you’re in Boston; an hour in another, you’re in Hartford; an hour in another, you’re at the Atlantic Ocean; an hour in another, you’re in the mountains. The campus, and even Massachusetts in general, is an incredible central point to easily access any number of great places. If you’re someone like me who lives for daytrip adventures, this is the place to do it my friend.
In today’s day and age, great photographic evidence of these kinds of adventures is never further away than your pants pocket in the form of your smartphone (because we all know, pics or it didn’t happen), and in this case, the pictures really are worth a thousand words and more. Up high on Watatic’s summit, it felt like the entire state of Massachusetts and a good deal of New Hampshire was laid out like a Fall-colored carpet at my feet. I could actually see the Boston skyline 50 miles away ON THE DOT, as googlemaps has just informed me, so, yes, in a manner of speaking, I could actually see my house from up there!

The path up!

The path up!

 

Somtime's, when a rock's in the way, you just gotta show who's boss.

Sometimes, when a rock like this is in the way, you just gotta show who’s boss.

Just think of the poor guy who had to carve all this...

Just think of the poor guy who had to carve all this…

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11

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I spy, with my little eye, something Massachusetts

I spy, with my little eye, something Massachusetts

 

Rugged mountain men!

Rugged mountain men!

 

This shmuck's ruining the scenery!

This schmuck in front is ruining the scenery!

An utterly fantastic Columbus Day, and the kind that can only be experienced in the Massachusetts hereabouts. It was harder than you’d believe walking away from the summit with those kinds of vistas in absolute peace and quiet. A nice step away from it all, that made me more than ready to dive back into the thick of it next week when classes start up again. Campus is about to get creepy, since Halloween is right around the corner! By the time the next blog rolls around, I’ll have been up to investigate the 5th floor of O’Kane and the ghosts said to haunt it; if I don’t report back soon, they’ve got me, please send help!!

 

 

 

 

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