The Wilderness Program.

First off, I can't believe how fast this semester is going by. Every time I go to write a post I'm amazed at how long it's been since my last! Time certainly does fly when you're having fun.

And speaking of fun, you know what's lots of fun? The Wilderness Program (WP) at SMC, of course! If you know what WP is; awesome, cause it's one of the best programs on campus. If you don't know, get ready to get told!

Here at SMC, we like to be outside. We like to hike things, and climb things, and paddle things and ski things. So one day (in the third century BC, I believe), it was declared that SMC should probably have a program to facilitate all of these outdoorsy endeavors. And so it began.

Sort of. I'm not actually sure when WP began, but I'm assuming my story isn't too far off. But in all seriousness, Wilderness is great. They offer hiking, climbing, paddling and skiing trips, as well as extended trips (like climbing in Acadia, Maine over the long weekend in October), and a bunch of outdoor certifications. All this stuff is subsidized for students, and they have an outfitter to go with it! So like their site says, all you need is a sense of adventure.

Another cool thing is that the trips are led by students; one of my good friends who's been really into the program since the beginning of last year started to apply right off the bat and was accepted as an instructor first semester. And this semester, I'm applying! I've already passed through the first round of the process, and the next step is a training weekend hike at the beginning of October. So hopefully I make it! I'd really love to do some back country ski instructing ;)

But before that, this weekend I'm going on an overnight trip to Mt. Washington (via WP, obviously), so my time until then is going to be saturated with studying and other homework things so I can enjoy my time off campus. Watch out for a post about it this Sunday! Til next time ;)

Thanks for reading!