Grandfather and Sugar, March 27th

Grandfather Mountain, March 27th

There are many, many descriptions of Grandfather Mountain out there, so I'll just plug here that I traversed the ridge from the Linville trailhead and found it to be challenging and enjoyable. It felt like the cliffside trail on Mansfield with the popularity of Monadnock for you northeasterners - or Old Rage for you Virginians. Anyhow, here's a photo dump

Sugar Mountain, March 27th

Sugar Mountain is a ski mountain with a lot of development on top of it. I was originally planning on biking up and down one of the runs, but I was surprised to find that the runs were still operational into late March - good for them. Instead I drove to the col between Sugar and Flattop and biked to the summit. Since I was parked totally illegally I didn't linger long, and although the summit itself was rather nice, it was right next to housing for rich assholes. The photos I got were fantastic though, and I made the rather difficult decision to post some of the ones that make my body look not the way I've always wanted it to. It can be really hard to look at a photo of yourself and see an image you don't love - I experience it all the time with gender dysphoria. And given that I've struggled with issues of weight in the past, many of those memories are unlocked. And honestly, it's probably body dysphoria at that point because I am objectively not-fat. And even if I was, why would that be a bad thing? Hating your body because of how it's meant to be is just a tool of the fucking patriarchy to gaslight us into internalizing bullshit gendered stereotypes. Hell, just existing as a trans woman already defies these stereotypes, and that's before I get covered in mud all the time and swear like a sailor - not very "lady-like" qualities. And even if some fucking chud out there says being slim is good for "health and fitness reasons", they can go fuck themselves, cause I just climbed 9 mountains in just over 48 hours, and I'm about to do another two hundred before the end of the spring - plus, I've seen people of all body types deep in the backcountry on some fucking hard hikes. Who the fuck cares how people are built? Apparently fucking losers who have nothing better to do than get off on putting others down. God, I fucking hate people like that