I spent last weekend in New Hampshire attending the Nor'Easter put on by the good folks at Eastern Mountain Sports (EMS).

I first heard about the Nor'Easter from Aleya on Twitter. A weekend of camping, climbing, conservation, and concerts sounded pretty ideal. I knew immediately that I wanted to go. Talking to Jim from EMS (managing the @Easternmntn account) and finding out that twitter friends Patrick (aka CampTheSummit), Katie, George, and Aleya were going reinforced that desire... It was no longer that I 'wanted' to go... I HAD to go. My colleague and climbing buddy AJ agreed, and it was set.

We set out on the road Thursday morning more excited than kids on Christmas morning. The plan was to cross the border at Niagara Falls and travel through the US all the way to New Hampshire, with a pitstop at EMS in Syracuse to pick up any last minute items. Knowing that we had a planned shopping stop, I packed hastily the night before... climbing shoes - check, harness - check, gear - check, tent - check, tickets - ..... tickets? S*%T! Arriving in Syracuse, 4 hours into our roadtrip, I discovered that my event tickets were in my laptop bag... in Toronto. Immediately I tried to get a hold of Jim on Twitter, and then continued on with the drive.

The drive through Vermont and New Hampshire was breathtaking... and fun! Narrow winding roads, up and down hills, through the gorgeous New England fall foliage and 200 year old towns. I'd never been to this part of the country before. I was awestruck... double-rainbow awestruck.

We arrived in North Woodstock, NH late Thursday evening, stopped at a local convenience store and asked which campgrounds were still open. They directed to Country Bumpkins, just up the street. Country Bumpkins was already closed, but the owners live on-site. They opened up the office and got us set up with a site and some firewood. In true Canadian fashion we opened some beers, lit a fire, and then set up the tent. Read more about Nor'Easter 2010