Our outdoors adventures and our parenting are so intertwined, it’s hard to pull them apart. Every outing is an opportunity to teach or guide, whether it’s a lesson in perseverance or a demonstration of how a snake eats a frog. Sometimes the lesson is as simple as taking things one step at a time.
For years, the state of New York employed fire tower observers to watch for suspicious smoke every day during fire season. On isolated mountaintops, the observers would climb flights of stairs up high towers and watch over the wilderness from a small cab at the top.
As a parent, I sometimes feel like a fire tower observer of old. I watch over our child and look for smoke — signs of trouble — and try to head off the fire or throw water on it before a small problem becomes a big problem.
Our daughter’s first fire tower peak was a doozy. Just after school let out in 2016, when she was 6, we climbed Hunter Mountain. At 4,040 feet, its summit is the second-highest in the Catskill Mountains and the fire tower is higher in elevation than any other in the state.
We had done a lot of smaller hikes before attempting Hunter, but that was her first real mountain. Little Wren, as we call her here, handled the climb like a champ. There was a little complaining and a lot of hand-holding, but the reward was the tower on the summit. While I lounged at the observer’s cabin, our energetic soon-to-be first-grader zoomed up and down the stairs of the 60-foot tower over and over again.
The Glens Falls-Saratoga Chapter of the Adirondack Mountain Club offers a Fire Tower Challenge. Hikers who climb 18 of 25 fire towers in the Adirondacks and all five towers in the Catskills can earn a patch from the club.
We thought tackling the challenge would be motivational for Wren, encouraging her to see mountains as a fun goal instead of just not-always-exciting family time. But, truthfully, the challenge, which would take us years to complete, was too nebulous to be appealing. The years it would take to climb all 23 mountains were just too long to expect a 6-year-old to wait for a reward. So we worked in small bonuses, like a stop for ice cream after every mountain we climbed.
And we stuck with it. The fire tower hikes ranged from short and easy (Belfry) to not so easy (Spruce in the winter).
Many towers and hikes blend into each other, but there were a few standouts. Hunter is remembered fondly because we got to spend the night in the cabin as volunteer observers. We went up a second time the following year to see a ceremony honoring the tower’s observers, a list that includes my husband’s mother and grandfather.
Another of Wren’s favorites was Mt. Arab, where the volunteer observer had brought his two Newfoundlands. She sat on the porch for a long time with one dog’s massive head cradled in her lap and was reluctant to leave.
During one rainy week a few weeks ago, we wrapped up the last four of Wren’s fire towers: Cathedral Rock, Owl’s Head, Stillwater and Wakely.
Wren, who had been napping in the car, seemed unenthused as we started up the trail to Wakely, her final tower. But by the time we neared the summit and the tower came into view, she whooped with excitement and ran ahead to be the first to its base. Then she and my husband scrambled up the many flights of stairs. From my perch at the bottom, I drained my water bottle and listened to her alarmed squeaks as they got to the final flight — not stairs but a steep, narrow ladder leading to a small hole in the floor of the tower cab.
With my husband’s reassurance, her confidence resurfaced and she scrambled up into the cab. I followed soon after, climbing just high enough to see over the tops of the trees on the summit and to take in the views of the surrounding lakes and peaks. There was no smoke to be seen.
Back on solid ground, Wren marveled at her accomplishment. “I can’t believe I did it,” she said. “I never thought I could do it.”
“One hike at a time,” we reminded her. It was impossible to resist a little parenting advice, and I pointed out that many challenges we face in life can be overcome when broken down into smaller pieces. Every hiking challenge is finished one hike at a time. Every hike is finished one step at a time. We just need to keep walking and we’ll get there.
By the time we got back to the car, Wren and my husband were busy discussing the next challenge. Should we tackle some High Peaks? Maybe. One goal, Wren insisted, was to climb all the fire tower peaks again … in winter.
gvscott.gvs@gmail.com
Outdoor writer Gillian Scott and her daughter in the cab of the fire tower on Stillwater Mountain in Old Forge several weeks ago. (Herb Terns / Times Union)
Herb Terns / Times Union
Outdoor writer Gillian Scott's daughter descends the steps of the Hunter Mountain fire tower in the Catskills in 2016. (Herb Terns / Times Union)
Herb Terns / Times UnionIf you go
Learn more about the Fire Tower Challenge at www.adk-gfs.org/firetower.challenge.php
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Outdoors: Goals accomplished one hike at a time - Times Union
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