By the time I was about thirteen, I was allowed to strike off alone out through the hills. I usually had a purpose in mind; like walking from our house in West Topsham, up over Sanborn Ridge, to see my cousins in Waits River. From our house, I would follow the roads to the bottom of West Topsham hill and cross the Waits River on a wooden bridge that collapsed under me when I was driving across it with a tractor some years later.
On the other side of the river was a meadow where we cut and baled hay for our farm. After the hayfield I had a steep climb up through some hardwoods and came out to a clearing on top of Sanborn Ridge.
From the top of the ridge, I could look right down the valley and see the two room schoolhouse where we attended first through fifth grade and the white church steeple of the Waits River church. A little further down I could make out where the slope of the ski tow was on Gene Eastman's farm in East Corinth. Way beyond that I could look down to Wright's Mountain in Bradford.
There was so much open land back then that it was much easier to find your way around. A lot of the high pastures hadn't grown in yet so you could look to where you wanted to go and head in that direction. If I wasn't sure where I was on a wooded ridge, sometimes I'd have to climb a tree and look around to figure out which way to go.
Another frequent hike that I did, was up over some ridges from our house to East Orange village where my Grandpa and Grammie Johnson lived. From the top of a hill on the way I could look down and see our farm, West Topsham village and Waits River village in the distance. There were some beautiful views back then, but over time as there were less and less farms, the woods grew in obscuring most of the views.
As I got older I started exploring new territory and going much further distances. I actually enjoyed getting lost in the woods and finding my way out. Of course, a real Vermonter never gets lost, they just get "turned around."
There's a big chunk of mountains and woods between the towns of Orange, Groton and Plainfield that contain the Knox Mountains, Butterfield, Signal and Spruce Mountains. From my house I could be climbing up into the Knox Mountains within a couple hours. On the back side of the Knox was an old beaver pond and an old cabin that was in pretty rough shape. I camped there with some friends a few times, but we slept outside on the ground rather than in the cabin. One night I heard a large animal shuffling through our campsite. By the sound of the heavy breathing and sniffing, I figured it was a bear so I laid real still and quiet. It eventually moved along and I went back to sleep.
When I was in the Army, the O'Meara boys, Steve Hatch and a few others built a new cabin deep in those woods. They made it with materials at hand and even put in a wooden floor. They put in a wooden platform on each side to sleep on, made a crude wooden table and hauled in a small wood stove and metal roofing. I camped there several times with friends and I spent three days and three nights there alone. It is back far enough that you can't hear any highways. The only sounds of civilization is an occasional airplane going overhead. It's very calming and peaceful.
One night I was alone and just about ready to drift off to sleep when there was a loud thump that shook the ground and cabin. I went outside with a flashlight and looked around. Everything was quiet. No animals moving around and no wind. The trees are pretty short up that high and it was mostly thick spruce trees, so I ruled out anything falling out of a tree. My guess was that it was a small meteorite, but I'll never know for sure. Just another one of life's mysteries.

Ken Batten grew up on a small sheep farm in West Topsham VT. He was a logging contractor, soldier and rural mail carrier. He now lives in North Hyde Park VT with his wife Tina-Marie. You can contact Ken at kenbatvt@gmail.com or PO Box 5 N Hyde Park VT 05665

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