A brisk Christmas Day hike satisfies

Robin Ames of Coram made her first Christmas Day hike because "I celebrate Hanukkah and I'm usually bored to tears on Christmas and looking for stuff to do."

Susan Kwah of Southampton made her first Christmas trek because her family is scattered across the country and "I had nothing to do over the holiday weekend."

And Tom Lewis of Commack took his first Christmas hike because "It's a beautiful day and I want to work off those holiday calories."

They and 15 other newcomers and veterans joined Long Island Greenbelt Trail Conference hike leader Shari Zagorski of Oceanside for the group's third Christmas Holiday Ho-Ho-Ho Hike.

The participants, ranging in age from 16 to 74, set out Sunday morning from the Pine Barrens Trail Information Center in Robert Cushman Murphy County Park in Manorville to hike briskly for 10 miles.

The seed for the holiday event was planted five years ago when a friend who did not celebrate the holiday asked Zagorski to take her out for a day in the woods. After the pair repeated the outing the next year, Zagorski approached trail conference leaders about making it an organization event.

The first sanctioned hike the next winter brought out 28 hikers. "My first presumption was that we were going to get all the Weinsteins and Goldsteins and Goldbergs," Zagorski said. "But we got a lot of people who had family members who were working Christmas morning, like police officers or retail people. We get a lot of Asians, and people who have no family in the area. Or people who celebrate Christmas Eve and a bunch of people who want to work off the eggnog."

Marie Vecere of Moriches was the oldest participant. She took her first Christmas hike because "I don't have to be anywhere till later this afternoon."

The youngest member of the group was Brandon Magliola of Shoreham, who came with his father, Mike. Both are longtime hikers.

"We got up early and celebrated this morning," Mike Magliola said, "so we figured, 'Let's go do something outside and get some exercise.' "

Only thunderstorms or hazardous driving conditions would cancel a hike, Zagorski said. "Last year there was two feet of snow here. We had about 10 people and we just traipsed through the snow," she said. "We did about six miles round-trip because of the fatigue factor and had a blast."

The hikers considered yesterday's conditions perfect: no rain and dry ground; 37 degrees and no wind.

Zagorski, who works in a podiatry office, led the group into the locust, red maple and evergreen trees that had grown up on previously cleared fields, maintaining a fast, aerobic pace that left some of the hikers struggling to keep up.

After a mile, the sounds of traffic on the Long Island Expressway were left behind, replaced by the thump of hiking booths, sounds of breathing and excited conversation.