Woodstock School has a pull on its alumni that goes beyond the usual old school tie. Much of this has to do with the physical setting in the first range of the Himalayas, but there’s more to it than spectacular views. There’s the way the campus feels–you don’t just visit it, you practically wear it.

You move through it–and I mean move. To get from the dormitories to the classrooms–from the auditorium to the lunch room–from the library to the music cells–you go up and down and up and down and up and down, scrambling over a network of ramps and staircases.

Photo credit: Betsy Woodman

Photo credit: Betsy Woodman

When I visited this fall, it all came back. My muscles remembered: Oh, yes—here’s where your legs have to work harder and you have to lean into the incline…here’s a downhill part where you brake with the knees…here’s a level stretch where walking suddenly seems ridiculously easy.

My classmate Esther Jantzen seems happy to have reached some relatively shallow steeps.

Photo credit: Betsy Woodman

There are outdoor steps–for example those leading to a courtyard where the students have their elevenses.

Photo credit: Betsy Woodman

And indoor ones.

Photo credit: Betsy Woodman

My classmates and I huffed and puffed a bit on “Jacob’s Ladder.” (Blame it on the altitude of roughly 2,000 meters/6,500 feet.)

Photo credit: Betsy Woodman

Within a couple of days, however, the old “Woodstock legs” were—to coin a phrase—kicking in. With all that exercise, so were the endorphins!

Photo credit: Esther Jantzen