Rocks and Roots

We did 2 episodes (so far!) in a 7 month period!  We’re amazing and we will be back for more!  Enjoy our review of Fir Mtn. 

Tumbles and Cranky finally did it. They hit the big 1000 miles of their 8 year Appalachian Trail journey. Only 1200ish miles to go! Western Virginia provided this trip with trails, mills, and Buc-ees. 

Tumbles and Crank are back in PA for a local gem of a hike.  The Lehigh Gorge State Park near Jim Thorpe, PA is a lovely spot to enjoy a little bit of everything hiking wise.  The hike that we did is hike at your own risk!  It has been technically closed since 2019, however we needed to sneak a peak at some lovely waterfalls.   We also learned that one impressive waterfall is better than 26 waterf...

It was actually like 26 or so but we realized when you have too much of a good thing, the appreciation starts to dwindle!  Crank and Tumbles talk waterfalls in PA all while heading to a Metallica concert. This episode is a month behind so I (Tumbles) sincerely apologize for the tardiness. Expect a double episode today! 

Happy Easter, Happy Greek Easter, and a Happy Passover to those who celebrate!  Crank and Tumbles return to the trail (even though we have done some hiking between August and now…). Some can say the podcast has been risen from the dead.  Hallelujah.  Go visit Neversink State Park NY.  Nice wee watering holes.  We love you guys! ❤️

Today we tackled Friday and Balsam Cap Mountains in the Catskills and boy was it awesome. A fun and challenging bushwhack for all levels, This is a perfect one to dip your toes in if you were thinking about trying out a bushwhack. Tumbles goes over the hike as well as has a mini TED talk on the importance of strength training.  Enjoy!

Hey R&R friends, we decided to head north this time and do a small section of Vermont!  Were there rocks?  Yes. Roots?  Yes. MUD?!  Oh hell yes.  We also caught the thru hiker bubble and chatted with some awesome humans. Enjoy!

Hello intrepid listeners!  A full report on the beauty of southern Virginia on the AT!   We saw ponies, longhorns, highlands, untrained dogs, and much more on this episode!

Hi friends!  We’re happy to be back and talking to you about the small but mighty Bull Hill Loop in Cold Spring, NY! A great after work uphill and downhill trail that has fun for everyone.  Have you been here?  Let us know!

Hey friends and a happy belated New Year. We missed you and hope you missed us.  We have been working hard training for our redemption ultramarathon taking place in less than 2 weeks!  Check out our adventure running Manhattan. Mucho mucho love. 

Heyo!  The duo discusses one of Tumbles’ favorite sections of the AT and its historic impact on the Appalachian Trail.  Crank goes into an unknown trail near the Zoo and Tumbles tries to not get sick.  Enjoy and thanks for listening!

Hey y’all!  We got our booties out and traveled down to Virginia for some AT/Mau-Har Trail action!  It’s the height of foliage in western Virginia and we were blessed with great weather and even a rainbow!  Come check out the 3 Ridges Trail on this episode, known as one of the most difficult in Virginia!

Barefoot Ken joins us once again for a fantastic chat on his Ultra/Half Marathon run, the Shawangunk Ridge Trail Run!  We get into the logistics of this trail and what made him decide to co-race direct this awesome race!  We also go into some of Ken’s recent and upcoming races as well as New York/New Jersey Trail Conference updates. Thanks, Ken, it was fun to catch up!   We’re signing up. Are you?...

The lovely Tina Merritt joins us once again to talk all about her journey to the Grand Canyon. Not only that but Tina went to hike one of the most difficult trails out there, the R3 or Rim to Rim to Rim. That’s going from the south rim of the Canyon to the North Rim and back to the South Rim. Just shy of 50 miles, Tina talks about her experience with Project Athena, heat induced hallucinations, an...

And they said it wouldn’t last, but we’ve reached 100 proper episodes on the Rocks and Roots Podcast!  We are thrilled to chat with ultrarunner and author Catra Corbett!   We hear about Catra’s start in the ultra running world in the mid-90s after a battle with substance abuse.  Her determination on the road and then trail gives her an edge that not many possess; the ability to conquer very hard t...

What a fun chat we had with Kate Cloud (Feathers)!  Kate has years of trail miles under her belt as she’s an AT alum class of 2018 and a PCT alum class of 2019.   Her life took a fun turn with the adoption of her goat Little Leaf and her trail experiences in 2020-2022. The journey continues with Kate’s recent acquisition of a laundromat-turning-hostel in Rawlins, Wyoming. Kate’s energy and joy is...

We’re thrilled to welcome back 46 of 46 Podcast host James Appleton to the show to speak to us about his half marathon experience with minimal running training (but a bunch of hiking training).   Along with that, we learn about James’ decade long passion for lifting and how the sport of Powerlifting has strengthened not only his body but his mind as well.  As a well-rounded student of exercise, Ja...

We had the pleasure of chatting with Mike of the popular Adirondacks-based Instagram handle @ADKFunPolice.   With a passion for the park and a sense of humor, Mike has made it one of his missions to bring up-to-date trail news and trail memes to his followers… with some light prodding in there too.  We also spend some time talking about the ever popular topic of registration and permits to hike th...

The deluge hit the High Peaks with many hours of rain, thunderstorms, bugs and unnerving river crossings.  Cranky and Tumbles took a few days to bag some peaks only to find that it wasn’t as easy as they thought.  A trying expedition up to Nye Mountain would make or break the aspiring 46er along with bagging another orphaned peak we left behind a few weeks ago made it one for the books.  Honestly...

Finally coming out of the busy season of spring, Cranky and Tumbles bring you the latest trail related news including…. FIRES, PRIDE MONTH, ESG SCORES, and more.  We are going a bit out of order since we did do Whiteface in the ADK Memorial Day weekend but we figured this is current events and we’ll post the hike AAR next week.  Enjoy the episode, dear friends. 

It’s Trail Talk day with Cranky and Tumbles!  We catch you up on a couple of trail news reports as well as dive into the importance of resistance training and why we’ve been slacking.   We’ll be back on Trail soon with a surprise trail coming up that we are excited to start.  Stay tuned!

We have a very special guest who combines several of our passions,running, hiking, and books. Ken Posner is an ultra marathoner, hiker, and author. He has completed 100 marathons/ultras, the ADK 46, the Catskills Grid (35 peaks each month for 12 months for a total of 420 summits), he has hiked the Long Path in NY and John Muir Trail. Ken has also completed 51 races barefoot including 13 marathons...

We don’t know whether to call this a proper hike or just a jaunt in the woods (a la John Muir), but the Rocks and Roots crew have filled in their 3.16 mile section to connect their miles from central Virginia to Bennington, Vermont.  It was a gentle start to the AT hiking season.  From there, it all went to the #glamplyfe where there were cabins and campfire pizzas for dinner.  Some Harper’s Ferry...

We welcome back Frankie Wilde to continue talking about his 2022 bike tour of Colorado!  While it has been a hot minute (5 months to be precise) since we last spoke to Frank, he jumped at the chance to relive his adventure once again.   We covered the rest of his trek including visiting ancient Puebloan ruins at Mesa Verde, skinny dipping in hot springs, experiencing scree fields for the first tim...

Well kids, another DNF in the books and I have to say we learned a lot about our training and endurance during our 50k attempt this past weekend.  We both made it to mile 21.  Cranky’s ankles literally seized up at 19 and Tumbles’ time was increasingly getting longer and longer where she would have definitely be DFL (dead freaking last, by a long time). Not that would have been the worst thing in...