Julia Dixon‘s A Coon Mountain Hike is another one of the stories entered in this round of the Champlain Area Trails (CATS) writing contest. If you haven’t yet, you should go vote in the contest!
Dixon is a freshman in high school, and every year she goes on vacation with family to Westport, NY. She gives a brief description of arriving and enjoying her grandparents summer home, but the majority of her story focuses on a hike her family takes up Coon Mountain.
There is a connection with nature and an understanding of its vastness and mysteries that Dixon manages to portray in her story. She observes the many parts of nature, and can focus on the small pieces that make up the whole.
I loved the little details and moments in everyday nature that she captured in her writing. This snippet I particularly enjoyed:
“I felt something change as we stepped out of the hot sun that was baking us in the gravel parking lot and moved towards the quiet cool forest. New sounds surrounded us and there was a new feel to the air. At about five or six steps into the forest, we were in an entirely new place; it was mysterious yet safe and open. I noticed that everyone must have felt this too as we simultaneously quieted. The slight breeze rubbed the leaves together over our heads. The filtered sunlight trickled down to our faces and added polka dots to the ground around the brown pine needles at our feet. In here, the sun hadn’t been able to evaporate the rain from the night before and the moisture refreshed us, and gave us new energy…” Continue reading the story!
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