Mt. Major Fire

May 3, 2008

Last week was the big fire on the Boulder Loop Trail. All I can say is, Wow. Something like 30 acres. Honestly, it looked like more.

As with anyone who sees it, this photo will be the lasting image. The fire on the summit left the trail itself alone.



It was so hot that the chunk of rock at the base of this boulder popped right out of the middle.



The downtrail terminus of the damage.















I hope this wasn't the start of something big...



Life on Mt. Major! We saw this guy (or his brother) on our last trip to Mt. Major.

East Rattlesnake Mt.

April 19, 2008

Not wanting to balance on a monorail further north we headed back to Squam Lake. The East Rattlesnake Trail was dry with just a bit of snow still on the summit. The Col Trail was very wet on the descent. We were surprised to see the extent of ice cover on the lake. Traveling by the beach heading back to town we saw kids in bathing suits on the sand as it was quite warm out. Quite a sight.



The girl of a 1000 faces...



Alone Mayflower peeking through.



The wet Col Trail.



Unidentified droppings...



Patients need healing on the trail, too.



The last bit of ice in a shaded area.



Just a bit of snow on the summit.

Piper Mt

April 5, 2008

Ooo, if there ever was an area that needs a new map like the Wonolancet map...this is it. There appears to be an abundance of trails in the area. Unfortunately, it appears that the only place you can pick up area trail maps is the Gilford, NH Library. The Library staff was very attentive when I went in...not for the lack of patrons either as the place was loaded. There are about a dozen maps of the area available. It would be great to get them pieced together on tyvek. All available maps are on paper.

The original plan was to do Belknap Mt. The access road was still closed so we opted to do Piper Mt. instead. Not a real thriller for the last snow romp of the year.

Muh shedding a layer..



Not a bad view from the top.



The best part of the day was discovering a plastic Easter Egg on the trail!

Champney Falls

March 29, 2008

We weren't really in good enough shape for Champney falls. For some reason the gym has not been calling our name! So we really only made it about half way past the fork. On the way back down we noted that someone had come up behind us and skied back down off-trail.

What killed us was that people were bare booting in front of us. Breaking this stuff out was tough.








Duh checking out what was visible of the sign at the fork.





Aye, aye, aye!

Lincoln Woods Trail

March 9, 2008

I guess the best thing I can say about the Lincoln Woods Trail is, well, not much. A flat road to nowhere. Very surprising given the good things all of the "Best in the Whites" books say. I found it hard to believe, but we cut our losses after about 45 minutes and turned around.

A good shot of "Interstate 49" in Waterville Valley.



Not a complete loss as you can see. The water was pretty neat, too.



A little fake Glissading off the side of the trail.

The saddest 9" snowman I've ever seen.

Brook Path

March 1, 2008

Unbelievable! A foot of new snow in March. Kind of stupidly we took off in the early morning for Wonolancet in really bad weather. Route 16 was about 35MPH. We will be back to this quiet area.

As we were making our way around the numerous frost heaves/moguls on 113A we saw this rafter of turkeys cross the road. Note the lower left of the snowbank...the turkeys broke out their own foot deep path over the snowbank!




The trail goes through these trees under 18-24" of powder.



Muh breaking trail for the first time. Check out the knee deep powder! Pretty tough work for a first timer.



Ha! Muh gettin a load from above...




Those same two trees after our about-face. I don't think we made it much more than a mile!



Note Duh's feet almost up to the handrail on this bridge. That's a pretty deep base.




Muh's snow trench turning a bend...



The farm's pump house.




Muh beat Duh over the snowbank...






OK. Pure envy here. Check out the view this poor guy on 113A has from his driveway!!

Artist's Bluff/Bald Mtn - 2287'

February 23, 2008

We made the trek all the way up I93 through Franconia Notch to Artist's Bluff and Bald Mountain. Since the trail takes off from the Cannon ski area's overflow lot, I would have to say this was the biggest trail head parking lot I've ever seen ;-)

This was a big step up for us on snowshoes. A little extra vertical. We stopped short of the Bald Mountain summit as it would have required us to jettison the snowshoes. After huffing and puffing our way over to the Artist's Bluff spur we were pooped and skipped the view--strapping the shoes on our packs and barebooting it down to the street over the bare sun-exposed rocks. As we were taking the shoes off a bunch of youngins bolted by us with energy to spare. Punks!

Muh getting vertical...




Cannon's summit clouded in...



Muh not very happy about the strenuous nature of today's hike...





Duh checking out the cloud-covered Mt. Lafayette' Walker Ravine and Eagle Cliff (right)





Mount Lincoln towering over the Notch.