Fell off a ladder last week (it tipped as I was climbing off the roof after blowing it off)- thought it was minor but now I'm thinking about having it looked at.  This sucks, especially as the weather has cooled a bit and deer season has started.  

Spread Eagle Mountain and Hopkins Mountain. Great views of the ADK high peaks. Attached File
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Owl’s Head Mtn, Keene, NY. A lot of fun and great views for a short hike.

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Hiked Mt. Garfield (White Mountains, NH) on sunday.  Views were clouded out, approx. 10 miles, 3000 feet of elevation gain.

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Moses H. Cone, to the lake. Easy trek made 10x harder with a 2 year old and 4 year old.

Hiked the Burroughs Range as a traverse, Wittenberg, Cornell, Slide, in the Catskills.

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Saturday I was going to hike up 1109m Boundary Bald Mtn north of town to do a gear test overnighter (and hopefully see the aurora), but the logging road that leads to the trail was icy with a dusting of snow and my Jeep’s front driveshaft is out. So I headed about 20 miles south to 1133m Coburn Mtn and hiked up it instead. Temp was around 25F, the overnight forecast was for clear skies, lows around 18F, and wind chill around 7F. Of course it got cloudy and stayed that way until the middle of Sunday morning. I swear everything outside a 20 mile radius from Jackman was crystal clear.

The main trail up Coburn is a snowmobile trail that goes to the summit (the highest groomed trail in the state.) It’s a short trail, only about 1.75 miles. A mile in a very primitive hiking trail branches off into the woods, cutting the length to 1.25 miles. It’s very steep, though, with 450’ el gain in 1/4 mile and 200’ in the last 1/16 mile.













One of the pieces of gear I was testing was my Marmot Hammer tent. I’d used it in sheltered locations before, but never in exposed areas like it’s meant for.





It did the job, but being a single wall tent the interior was covered with frost all night long. It’s a small tent, my NEMO Sonic 0F on my Xtherm MAX was touching at both ends and I got snowed on when I moved or the wind blew. The wind was strong enough when I got up there that I used all the guyouts, but it calmed down a lot overnight.

I’d been underwhelmed by the Sonic every time I used it before, even at 15F on an Exped DownMat 9 I was chilly. So I basically used it as a 20F bag. Part of it was due to the down being very mobile in the longer baffles, I spent about 1/2 hour spreading it out to fill the voids the other night. But the biggest factor in my being toasty warm all night was the Xtherm, it’s just a warmer pad than the Exped.

I carried everything in a Granite Gear Nimbus Trace Access 70 I got a few months ago, I’d used it a couple times just out roaming but didn’t find it all that comfortable. It swayed a lot, too. Tightening a couple straps fixed the swaying, and experimenting with packing resulted in a very comfortable pack. Weight was around 35lb.





So I had a warm, pretty comfortable night. I used a few other pieces of gear (Western Mountaineering Flight down pants and Flash down booties) for the first time but I’d end up writing a book if I started talking about them. The Flash booties are awesome, though!

When I got up in the morning everything was still clouded over.





I packed up and headed down the snowmobile trail instead of the hiking trail, due to my bad knees I went pretty slowly and took maybe 75 minutes. I found some things that didn’t work and others that did, so as soon as we get nice, cold, windy weather again I’m gonna go again. Hopefully up Boundary Bald, though! It’s a little lower but more exposed.

I went out to Boundary Bald Mountain today to get some miles in with a heavier pack and to try my new snowshoes (Atlas Range MTN 35.)



The logging road was ice in a few spots, and even in 4WD I slid at a spot that went downhill around a curve with the road banked down toward the outside of the curve. I should have brought my chains, but I’ll have them next time.



I’m glad I have a long winch cable because the nearest tree that was big enough was across the road and uphill. It turned out not to be rooted deeply enough and started tilting, but just then one of the guys I work with came by from plowing out side trails and pulled me out. I crept off in 1st gear until I reached the unplowed section of the road and picked up speed. The side road to the trailhead had 8-10” of snow, so I knew there’d be enough for the snowshoes. Once I got geared up I headed out. There wasn’t enough snow to bury all the stickers & wait-a-minute vines so I headed up the trail instead of going cross country.



I’d realized that I hadn’t put a belt on when I started gearing up, but decided to go anyway and hopefully my pack waist belt wouldn’t push them down. After maybe 1/2 mile I was tired of hitching them up so I turned around. The snowshoes worked pretty well but really weren’t big enough for my weight and the snow texture. I’ll need some hard packed snow to really try them out (they’re the same size as MSR Lightning Ascent with tails) so next time I’m bringing a different pair. Right now one thing I don’t like is the small foot opening, regular uninsulated hiking boots with gaiters barely fit in.



We’ll have more snow next weekend so I’ll make sure to wear a belt and hike up to the summit to camp.

Last weekend I started flagging a bushwhacking path up Boundary Bald Mountain that I began making this past Feb/Mar. I never made it to the summit due to poor snow conditions, so this winter I’m starting early.



There was maybe 15-18 inches of somewhat compacted snow last weekend so I got to try out my new Atlas Range MTN 35 snowshoes, with an initial rating of 4 stars after 3 uses in the kind of terrain they’re meant for. So I headed out, following the terrain like I did last winter so I stayed pretty close to my previous route. The going was slow because I was stopping about every 50 feet and tying a 3-foot length of pink flagging tape on a tree. The weather was warming up, though, and Sunday night through Monday we had temps up to the low 50s and heavy rain.

Today I packed my pack and headed out, but the going was much slower due to the tangles of vegetation no longer being covered by snow. I’d originally planned on going tomorrow but the Christmas Eve weather forecast turned a little crappy so I headed out in early afternoon today. Too late, it turned out, since my flagging tape was hard to see as the light faded. With a path of snowshoe tracks to follow it would have been easier, but with the sun sitting right on the surrounding mountains I headed down and will go back up tomorrow, crappy-ish weather or not.

Half-assed gear loadout video.



Pack weight is 45lb and it carries extremely comfortably. After I got home I remembered that I have a pair of 28” Atlas Aspect snowshoes in my gear room, their bindings pack more compactly than the GVs I brought today. If I need to use them at all I doubt it’ll be until I get near the summit. I’m usually not a big fan of the Atlas SLS (Slings Lotsa Snow) pivot system, but there won’t be any powder to be slung up my back.

A new piece of clothing I’ve been wearing this winter, I’m not exaggerating when I say it’s revolutionized my winter hiking because I no longer have to choose between being warm and sweaty (thereby cold and wet) or cold and dry.

Marmot Olden Polartec hoody.

More Monday!

Well, the woods won, without a couple feet of snow there’s just too much undergrowth and deadfalls to get over and through without a LOT of work and a good chance of fucking up my bad knee. I’d forgotten to put my knee brace on, too, so I had to be extra careful. Though it does feel pretty good now. Maybe tomorrow I’ll just go do some conditioning on a broken trail, today’s pack was 48lb which should do fine. Though I’m not sure if walking 5 miles on a trail in 3 hours will do much more conditioning than bushwhacking 2.3 miles in 3 hours.

4 miles yesterday, 3 of them were off trail.

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Hiked two ADK mountains today, Ampersand and Baker. About 8 miles, 2600 feet of elevation gain. Clear blue skies and nice packed trails, that’s how I like winter hiking.

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Clear blue skies and no trails except the ones I make, that’s how I like winter hiking LOL

Just roaming around the woods, looking for a way around a cluster of hills but ran into impassable evergreens both ways I went.

Beautiful!

Yeah, I love it up here but I do miss the scenery like you have from when I lived in southern Maine and hiked the Whites every weekend. I need to get to the summit of Boundary Bald this winter, the views from there are incredible in the summer. I can’t imagine what they’ll be like in clear, dry winter air.

In a stark contrast to ME2112 snow covered hike, this is an AZ winter hike!! We hiked about 5.6 miles out and back to a place called "Canyon of the Waterfalls". We've both been sick, so we needed from sunshine and fresh air. The large mountains are the Superstition Mountains, east of Phoenix a ways.

This is a giant crack in the rock on top of a hill. In the second pic, you can see the size by looking at the very bottom, and you'll see my wife!!




One of the waterfalls. The black streaks are where the water flows over the rocks. The water comes all the way down from the top of the pic, thru that small canyon.



Another waterfall closer to the turn around point.



This one I'd like to see when it's flowing.



The last waterfall before we turned around. It gets a lot more rugged past this point. Also proof there's water in AZ!!




Some random pics of the terrain out here. Very rugged. You wouldn't want to lose your shit out here, that's for sure!!

About 6 miles at Oscar Scheer State Park in Osprey, FL.

Finally back up to speed hiking the local 7.5 mile loop with a 20# pack (starting weight including a full 100oz bladder).  This getting older thing sucks, I don't heal as fast as I used to.  

Hiked up Treadway Mountain in the eastern ADK.

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A friend in town has a British friend visiting for the eclipse tomorrow, and told me he’d never been snowshoeing and would like to go. Sheeit, Negro, that’s all you had to say! So I checked access for a few mountains, found one that had easily-passable roads all the way to the trailhead, and yesterday we met and I told him my plan. It looked good to him, so I picked him up at 0800 this morning, had him try out some snowshoes to see which ones he liked best, and off we went.

Our destination was Pleasant Pond Mtn in the town of Caratunk, about 30 miles south of Jackman. The AT goes over the mountain and we picked up the trail near the Pleasand Pond Mtn lean-to.



Snow conditions were very good, a little crusty at the start but once we’d gained a little elevation it was softer and fluffier. Perfect for snowshoeing. The sky was cloudy when we started but soon sun started peeking through small breaks in the clouds. The temp was maybe 25-27F at first, my glasses started fogging up pretty quickly so I layered down twice in the first mile and was hiking in just a short-sleeve synthetic T. Two people had gone up ahead of us which made our hike a little easier. There were quite a few blowdowns to crawl under and a spot where we had to climb on a fallen tree to get over the rock pile it had landed on and blocked the trail.

In about 2 hours we reached the summit under a mostly cloudless sky, and had caught up to the people who’d broken trail for us. They’d camped at the lean-to last night, and are going up again tomorrow to view the eclipse. They’re from MA so we’re asking me a lot of questions about the area. The summit had 3 spots with views in different directions so I took a few pics at each one. Most didn’t come out very good because the sun was so bright I couldn’t even see my phone screen. I KNEW I should have brought my digital camera!





Mt Katahdin in the center distance, highest point in ME at 5270’ and northern terminus of the Appalachian Trail.



Mt Kineo at far left, an actual island in Moosehead Lake.



Snow still on the trees from our storm last Wed-Fri. It would all be dropping onto us on the way down.



Some dork who can’t smile or take a good pic if his life depended on it.



The hike down was nowhere near as good as the ascent, the snow on the trees was melting so we were getting rained on with increasingly frequent slush bombs hitting us. The snow had started to turn into mashed potatoes as well, and was almost slush by the time we got back to the trailhead. We met a group of 4 or 5 people who asked about going up, and whether they could bare-boot it or needed snowshoes, and we told them the snow was so soft and wet that we wouldn’t go up at all now. I think they were also going to camp at the lean-to, and hopefully head up early to take advantage of what little temperature drop there is overnight. I think it’s only supposed to drop to around 30F.

I know I’m looking for a different spot to view the eclipse from, most likely closer to town since the center of the zone of totality is about 1 mile north of town. There are a few candidates but it depends on trail and snow conditions. Even for a once-in-a-lifetime event I don’t really want to trudge through slush LOL

Yesterday (Sunday) morning I decided I needed to hike, so I loaded up my Osprey Stratos 24, strapped snowshoes onto it, and headed out. My destination was Number 5 Mountain, about 1/3 of the way as the crow flies to Eustis from Jackman. The trailhead is at mile 17 on Spencer Road off Route 201, there’s a small white sign with an arrow on the right at the turnoff. If you use AllTrails it’s a little inaccurate, just look for the sign. It’s easy to see. The mile 17 marker is about 50 feet past the side road to the trailhead. Spencer Rd was in great shape the whole way; the side road leading to the trailhead had a couple small snowbanks crossing it but my pickup handled them just fine in 2WD. The parking area was dry, with room for 4 or 5 vehicles.

Summit elevation is 3186’, AllTrails lists total trail length (out and back) as 5.1 miles. I tracked my route using AllTrails and it told me I’d hiked 6.4 miles. Elevation gain is 1161’, and it’s a long, gradual slope with no real steep spots.

I got to the trailhead a little after 1100 and headed right up. The biggest obstacle is the first thing you hit after leaving the parking area, a 12’ wide ditch with rocks on each side to keep vehicles out. It’s really the only obstacle. You’ll follow a very old logging path for a little less than 1/2 mile, then a small sign tells you the trail goes to the right and becomes a regular footpath. There was a little bit of running water in the logging path, along with a few muddy spots that are easily avoided.

Deeper patches of snow started appearing around mile 0.6, I put snowshoes on at 0.67 (my new favorites for spring snow, Atlas Aspect 28s) and kept them on until about mile 3.1. There were a few 50-100’ stretches with no snow, and some rocks I negotiated with them on. I’m pretty clumsy and didn’t have any problems not related to my bad knees.

It’s pretty obvious when to take them off, the trail starts getting ledgy near the summit. I stopped to strap them back on my pack but you could just leave them there as well. You’ll see the condemned fire tower and the trail is easy to follow even though there are no blazes. The views are spectacular, as usually happens with me the clouds thickened when I was about a mile from the summit but I still got some good pics. It was cold & windy, maybe 25F with a steady 20mph wind that I seem to remember was coming out of the west. It started to spit snow, as well. I spent about 20 minutes on the summit and had had enough even with my down jacket and gloves.

Heading down is just the hike up in reverse, I had to take it quite a bit slower because of my knees. A couple of rocks that were easy to negotiate in snowshoes while going up were NOT on the way down. But other than that it was a straightforward descent just like the ascent. Soon I was stopping to remove my snowshoes (I did this closer to the trailhead because I’d barebooted for a little while before putting them on) and from there it was another half hour until I got to my pickup. My knees were pretty sore but still in pretty good shape, though after sitting for the 45-50 minute drive home they were REALLY stiff when I got back to Jackman. A little I2 therapy (Ibuprofen and ice) while watching TV and they felt pretty good. Sleeping with my soft brace on does a lot of good, too.

The hike was very nice and I’m glad I made that spur-of-the-moment decision. It had been almost 3 years since I last hiked it, and doing it in snowshoes was a lot of fun.

Photos.



The Bigelows at left, Sugarloaf (I’m pretty sure) at right.





Looking northerly toward Attean Pond with its bunch of small islands. Jackman itself is just on the other side of it.