Flume 9/20/09

I had a day to do whatever I wanted so I decided to Hike Mt. Flume. It would get me some good mileage and another 4,000' peak. I hiked over the suspension bridge at the Lincoln Woods Visitor Center over the Pemigewasset River and made quick work of the first mile and a half of he Lincoln Woods trail and took the Osseo trail up to the Summit of Mount Flume.

The Osseo Trail was fairly easy but there were many sections of ladders along the way. I didn't bring my good camera today so I was taking pictures with my little Point and Click but they came out pretty good considering. It was early fall and the leaves would be starting to turn soon.

I was able to get this picture of the Bonds on the way.I soon reached the summit of Mount Flume. This is my 26th 4,000' peak. Only 22 more to go to hit the magic number of 48. The peaks are going to be harder to get to though going forward though with life being busy.

I ate a long lunch on the summit and debated on hiking Liberty Picture below but decided against it. Another hiker offered to give me a ride back to my car if I followed him and his friend over to Liberty and down the Liberty springs trail. The mileage would have been the same but I would have had more elevation gain and I didn't think my legs could take it. Combined with the fact that this guy probably thought I was cute and I was going to put him out of his way I decided to Solo back the way I came to the car. About 5.5 hours after I started, I was back at the car. I made really good time and I felt in pretty good hiking shape. We'll see if I can get back out there again soon.

Franconia Loop 9/7/09

Today we're going to do our favorite hike. We're going to do the Franconia Loop hitting the Summits of Lafayette, Lincoln, Little Haystack and North Lincoln.

We arrived at the parking lot early and in a little under 2 hours we had our picture taken in the spot where we always have our picture taken. We absolutely love this spot and it's a great place to see the entire range from.


We took off again shortly and soon enough we were at the Greenleaf Hut enjoying a Cookie. We soon took off after about a 20 minute break for the Summit and we couldn't believe how much easier it was from 2 years ago when we did this hike. Last time it seemed like there was one false summit after another and it felt like the summit was never going to show itself. This time we just kind of arrived like "we're there already?" We couldn't believe it.The summit was alive with people and it was a beautiful day. We hung out for a bit eating lunch and taking in the vast views of the Pemigewassett Wilderness area. We then took off towards Mt. Lincoln. We made our way over and the hike still felt easier than last time. We are both in much better shape than we were 2 years ago and have much more hiking experience.
We summited Lincoln and only stopped for a second and kept going. This ridgewalk is full ov views and we really just kept stopping the entire time anyway. Every few tenths of a mile we would stop and look around.

This area is one of the most spectacular ridgewalks around that I can tell. I like it better than Washington because even though there can be a lot of people, you know they hiked there and appreciate what they are looking at and the work it took to get there.

We then took our time down the South side of Lincoln towards Little Haystack which was the final peak of the day. We always pass by this one rock outcropping which we have to take a picture of because we never know if it's going to fall before we come back.Pretty much right after I took this picture, I took a header after losing my footing for a second and I hit my shin on the way down pretty good which made a welt as big around as an egg appear. I continued on though up to the summit of Little Haystack.On the Summit of Little Haystack I wrapped up my leg to try to keep the swelling down and I was able to smile about it. I didn't actually hit my head so I was good to hike.
A few hours later we hit the car and hit the highway back to Maine. Another successful trip in the Whites completed.

Piper & Whiteface 9/5/09

Today I was on a mission to finish my Belknap County Sportsman's Association list of peaks. I only had Piper and Whiteface left.
I took the trail from the end of Belknap Mountain Road which was quite deceiving to find. The map I had didn't have the entire road on it so finding the right parking area was difficult. I hiked up the trail to a junction where turning left would bring me to Piper and right to Whiteface. I decided to summit Piper First.

It was a nice little summit with good views. I would say it was definitely the better of the two summits today.

Once on top I fiddled around with my new camera for a while. Still learning with it but it is definitely fun.

I decided to head down and soon enough I realized that I could see my next destination, Mt. Whiteface. Little did I know that the view from here was deceiving. You'll see what i'm talking about in a minute.

I continued on down the mountain back to the junction and continued on to Mount Whiteface. The trail soon turned into a dirt road with obvious signs of recent use. There were broken taillights and flat tires and pieces of vehicle everywhere, lots of beer cans and it soon became apparent that this is a local party spot for the youth.

Due to the recent rains however there were many patches of much which the frogs/toads (I'm not sure how to tell the difference) seemed to like.

I kept moving after taking numerous pictures which all came out terrible except for this one of the frogs. I continued the littered road up to the summit and found that the summit wasn't much better. There was a fire pit with all kinds of garbage in it, a stove in the woods all rusted out with pots and pans hanging from a tree and just a general amount of trash everhwhere. There were two older gentleman on the summit as well who seemed equally unimpressed. I don't know how people could do this. There was even a rusted out exhaust system on top.

I definatly will not be hiking this mountain again. I will probably tackle Piper but not Whiteface. On a brighter note though, I sent in for my Patch and should receive it soon.