Impromptu Honeymoon on the NPT

by Addison Wolanin

My wife, Shannon, and I got married in July 2020—and we all know what was happening then, with the COVID-19 pandemic. Initially, we had invited around 150 guests to our wedding, and as July drew nearer, we were going back and forth on whether we should postpone it or not. Eventually, we decided that we should essentially uninvite more than half our guests and make it a very small wedding.

Attached to the back end of our wedding was a honeymoon we were very excited for. It was to be an Alaskan cruise, and the most extravagant vacation we had ever taken. Alas, along with paring down our guest list and uninviting family members from our own wedding, we also had to cancel our honeymoon. But we still wanted to do something special.

An Alaska alternative

My wife and I are both very, very interested in and love the Adirondack Park. We are both 46ers, completing the challenge together the year prior to our wedding. So, the Adirondacks have always meant a lot to us.

I have also always been interested in the Northville-Placid Trail (NPT). My wife was slightly less interested in it. However, she had done sections of the trail as a student, and then as a group leader, for SUNY Cortland’s physical education program. This extension of the program is part of what made Shannon fall in love with the Adirondacks and the outdoors in general. We decided together, with admittedly a little bit more pressure from my side, that because we couldn’t go to Alaska, and because the COVID-19 pandemic was still ongoing, the best way to do something special after our wedding was to go into the wilderness and hike the Northville-Placid Trail.

We started looking at maps and figuring out the logistics—food drops and things like that. When we got out on the trail, the first two days were kind of rough. Neither of us were in really great hiking shape, and both of us were struggling. Our legs hurt, our packs were too heavy, and although we had been backpacking numerous times before, we just were not physically prepared for the daily challenges of the trail.

We covered a decent amount of mileage. We made it through the first two days. And then we started talking about what our contingency plans might be.

Turn in the trail

The second night of our trip, we met a gentleman at Hamilton Lake Stream Lean-to named Ewen. He was out there alone, hiking the trail, because, “Why not?,” in his words. We became fast friends that night, sharing stories about life and the state of the world. Meeting Ewen and hearing his story bolstered our spirits. We decided to take advantage of this. We thought, we have some time off from work. We’re enjoying the wilderness together. Let’s shift our mood. Let’s be positive about this.

After meeting Ewen and finding a new perspective, we really began to embrace the trail and enjoy every beautiful moment we were sharing together and the pure wildness of the places we were passing through. It seemed like every single place we stopped, every single viewpoint, every single backcountry lake, and every single stream we passed had its own kind of captivating aura. And it really brought us, my wife and I, very close together.

The truth of the matter is we had been together a long time before we were married. We had gone on a ton of different adventures together, but this was the first time we had really gone through an experience like this, just the two of us out in the wilderness, nobody else to rely on. It really gave me a lot of confidence in the fact that I could count on and rely on my wife in times of need.

Granted, hiking the Northville-Placid Trail isn’t exactly treacherous or anything like that. But it was a really wondrous experience for both of us. It brought us immediately closer together following our wedding. I still think about it pretty much every single day. I work in an office and one of my favorite reprieves is researching the NPT and the loops we can do to revisit some of our favorite spots. I’ve since done the 46 High Peaks again and gone on many more backpacking trips, and the Northville-Placid Trail still reigns supreme in terms of an actual wilderness adventure for me in my lifetime.

Eventually, I plan to visit the Northville-Placid Trail again, maybe with my son, who was born just recently. The trail will always have a special place in my heart. I think it will always have a special place in my wife’s heart as well.

A special spot

There are a lot of different magical places along the Northville-Placid Trail. If I had to choose one favorite—and I think it was possibly because of the circumstances—it would be lean-to number 2 at Spruce Lake. When we got there, it had been a good, fun day of hiking. It was when we really started to kind of get our trail legs and enjoy the trail.

We sat down on the edge of the lean-to, which has kind of a lawn in front of it. We were looking out onto Spruce Lake, and the sun was just starting to get ready to set. A loon floated by in front of the lean-to, and called out a little bit. It was a really, really beautiful sunset, and a gorgeous spot for a lean-to. After a long day of hiking, it was the most serene ending to a day that my wife and I could possibly have imagined.

It really, really got us pumped up for the rest of the trip and the rest of the spots we were going to see. Obviously, there are many beautiful areas. My two favorite general areas on the trail were the West Lakes Wilderness section through South Lake and Cedar Lakes. Very, very beautiful. I really liked the Cold River Valley, as well.

But if I had to choose one specific spot, it would be Spruce Lake, on that one night. Around midnight or so, it started to rain. Nothing could be nicer than the sound of rain on a lean-to roof when you’re trying to get a good night’s sleep, when you know you’re covered, when you know that you’re not going to get wet. You get to just listen to the raindrops. By the time the morning had come, the rain had stopped, cleared up. It was one of those magical, magical nights in the Adirondacks.

Addison Wolanin is an avid conservationist and ADKer, and 46er #11,683. He is based in Westmoreland, New York.

This article was adapted from an audio story submitted to Adirondack Mountain Club and published in Adirondac magazine. To celebrate 100 years of adventure on the NPT, ADK is sharing your stories online and in print. Visit bit.ly/npt-story to submit your NPT story, or head to NPT100.com to blaze a new trail.