Welcome to the woods! My name is Natalie and I'm from California (3035 miles away from Dartmouth)! I'm a political science and crossword puzzle nerd who's excited to dive into the millions of activities we have on campus. I'm a Politics, Philosophy, and Economics major at Dartmouth, and am considering both a History and Human-Centered Design minor. I'm also the President of the Parliamentary Debate team! Go Big Green!
Between classes and extracurriculars, the life of a Dartmouth student is a busy one! However, there is always time for fun activities with friends, even during the school week! The nice thing about college is you don't have to wait until the weekend to have fun — if you structure your time right, you can do something fun with your friends every day!
I got up to two fun activities this week that I think are pretty unique to Dartmouth and want to share with you all, to give you a better sense of what we get up to for fun in the Upper Valley.
On Monday afternoon, I rented a ZipCar with some friends and drove 10 miles to Gile Mountain, a famous hike in Norwich, Vermont. Though it's traditional to "sunrike" (hike to the summit at sunrise and watch the sun come up from the top), none of my friends are particularly early risers, so we opted to "sunsike" Gile, watching the sunset from the top of the tower.
On the trail up to Gile!
The appeal of Gile is that it's a relatively easy hike (just under 2 miles) up to an abandoned fire tower in the middle of the forest. When you scale the fire tower, you can see the foliage in a 360-degree unobstructed view. It's unlike anything I've ever seen before. This California girl was SHOOK, lol.
Sunset at Gile! Look at those colors!
As is customary, we took soooooo many photos at the top of Gile, marveling at the beauty of the changing leaves. There was recently an article in the New York Times that there was no better place to experience fall than New Hampshire. Though I don't have much to compare it to, I have to agree so far! The trees are beyond anything I ever dreamed of.
Ok golden hour! Look at the leaves (and us) glow!
The second fun thing we got up to this week was located directly on Dartmouth's campus this time. Dartmouth's Programming Board, a student-run group that brings tons of different activities to campus, brought a full petting zoo to campus!
I'm adding in a bunch of pictures of cute animals now — it was so nice to take a break studying from midterms to pet the animals and be silly with my friends.
Oh hey there, alpaca!
Rabbit, Rabbit!
My personal favorite, the miniature pig
From hiking Gile to the petting zoo, it was great to get out of the classroom and enjoy all the Upper Valley has to offer. See you next week?
It's easy to forget how easy it is to access walking trails during the hustle of a Dartmouth term. As graduation nears, I am reminded of how special it is to step off campus and enjoy quiet moments in nature.
With a solar eclipse sweeping across North America for the first time in nearly seven years on April 8th came a road-trip with hundreds of other Dartmouth students to a zone of totality near campus: St. Johnsbury, Vermont!
