Snow and sand — lots of Thacher students and faculty sped off to mountains or seashore (or points slightly closer by) this past Friday and Saturday for a night or two away. Thanks to the efforts principally of Joe Bell, School Chair 2011-12, it was a rare no-homework weekend given over to the thing we all need more of: the great and good outdoors.

Delighted to unplug in youthful company, Michael and I headed to Patton’s Cabin with sophomores Wesley and Sarah and three freshmen, Kat, Sammie, and Ellie. As cheerful as they were quick studies of the box hitch, they rode their own horses (or loaners from the home herd) and ponied pack horses Pablo and Timber; our dog Guilla and I walked in to facilitate the next day’s return of the Suburban to campus. The Sespe was running low and slowly–on-going drought spelled clearly in the completely exposed stepping-rocks.

Though the time was too short–a little over 24 hours for me, five more for the Ridge-riders–it was studded with beauty at each waking hour: bluebird skies and clear pools on our way in and stars white-bright against the cold, black night sky;  the laughter and singing of happy voices returning from a long roughride along riverbed and trails; girls napping in the afternoon sunshine, pleasure-books laid open across their faces or on the ground beside them; the jostle and nicker of the horses, woolly-coated and whisker-rimed, backlit by morning rays.

As Environment Action Committee Co-head Julianna reminded us today at Assembly, channeling Edward Abbey, “Wilderness is not a luxury but a necessity of the human spirit, and as vital to our lives as water and good bread.”

We’ll raise our Sierra cup to that.