Adventurous
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Day 6 (final day) of my peakbagging vacation
I decided that I would stay at Lafayette Place for a couple of days as a base for Cannon and the Kinsmans and then the Hancocks for Friday. I spent the previous afternoon tending to my wounded toes. I felt a lot of pressure under my toenails so I clipped them a bit shorter. Well (don’t read if you’re squeamish)…this released the pressure alright…there must have been blisters under 3 of the nails because liquid came out and 2 of them fell off. I cleaned all of the blisters and the places where toenails used to be, applied Neosporin to the nails and tried new skin on the blistered areas since the blisters were now open. By the time I went to bed, my toes felt pretty good. I was still planning on doing Cannon and the Kinsmans (although I had been warned by Nif that this is a harder hike than I might expect because of the Cannonballs).
I woke up early and hit the trail at 7:10am because I knew booktime was about 9 hours. My shoes weren’t bothering my toes at all, I had plenty of energy, and it was a beautiful day. I started up Lonesome Lake Trail to the Hi-Cannon trail. I knew it would take me a few hours to reach the ridge because of the steep climb. There were great views along the way – the only part that I didn’t like about the trail was the noise from route 93. There is one section with an old ladder. At the top of the ladder, there is a board to the left that is bolted to the rock. My legs turned to jello as I exited the ladder to step onto the board. Glad that was the only section like that. I arrived at the summit – 2 hours after leaving my campsite. I had the tower to myself and wouldn’t see a single person until the ascent of North Kinsman. I climbed to the top of the tower and absorbed the views of the Franconia Ridge while having a snack. #27/48 NH and #82/115 of NE111.
I headed back to the junction with the Hi-Cannon Trail. On one of the trail signs, somebody wrote something like “it’s suck – no joke” referring to the Kinsman Ridge Trail over the Cannonballs. I thought…yeah sure, we’ll see about that. They weren’t joking!!! The trail is bouldery, steep in sections, and goes over 3 cannonballs. It did suck and I have no plans of returning if I don’t have to. I reached the junction with the Kinsman Trail 5 hours after leaving my campsite and this wasn’t even the halfway point with miles. I debated heading down the Fishin’ Jimmy trail and calling it quits but the Kinsmans were so close I just couldn’t bail. It’s a quick hike up to North Kinsman from this point and I was happy to find that it wasn’t anything like the cannonballs. #28/48 NH and #83/115 of NE111. I took a summit picture and immediately headed over to South Kinsman. The trail is easy to moderate with good footing and doesn’t take long to get from one summit to the next.
I reached South Kinsman in an hour after the Fishin’ Jimmy junction. The views were amazing but there were dozens of people on the summit. I opted to take a picture and go back to North Kinsman for lunch. #29/48 NH and #84/115 of NE111. I went back to the summit rock only to find that the best lunch spot was a perch right before the summit. I went back to the perch for lunch and started talking someone else that had the same idea. It turns out that it was Bunchberry – my first encounter meeting a fellow VFTT’er on the trail. She was supposed to meet Brian and Seema and been waiting for a few hours at this point. Since I had reception up there – she checked her e-mail to see if they had left her a message – no messages. We talked for 30 – 45 minutes before I decided to head down.
I’ve heard a lot of people complain about the Fishin’ Jimmy trail but I really enjoyed it. It was a nice combination of steep sections, bog bridges, some views, and a few very minor climbs. I made it to Lonesome Lake Hut in about 1.5 hours. I stopped at the junction with the Lonesome Lake trail for a snack before finishing the last 1.2 miles. I made the mistake of sitting down for a few minutes to eat and had a really hard time getting up. I had to pry myself off the log and convince myself to start hiking the last 30 minutes back to camp. Well…kudos to the chocolate covered espresso beans once again because after 10 minutes, I was running down the trail and jumping over rocks, passing people and telling them that food and flip flops were calling. I reached camp after a long but beautiful 10 hour day. I immediately took off my shoes to assess the damage. The bandages didn’t hold and the “new skin” rubbed off leaving one of my toes in really bad shape. I decided that I would do the Hancocks on Friday if my feet felt OK when I woke up. Well…they didn’t. One toe was very close to being infected to I packed my stuff and called it a week…16 peaks later.
I decided that I would stay at Lafayette Place for a couple of days as a base for Cannon and the Kinsmans and then the Hancocks for Friday. I spent the previous afternoon tending to my wounded toes. I felt a lot of pressure under my toenails so I clipped them a bit shorter. Well (don’t read if you’re squeamish)…this released the pressure alright…there must have been blisters under 3 of the nails because liquid came out and 2 of them fell off. I cleaned all of the blisters and the places where toenails used to be, applied Neosporin to the nails and tried new skin on the blistered areas since the blisters were now open. By the time I went to bed, my toes felt pretty good. I was still planning on doing Cannon and the Kinsmans (although I had been warned by Nif that this is a harder hike than I might expect because of the Cannonballs).
I woke up early and hit the trail at 7:10am because I knew booktime was about 9 hours. My shoes weren’t bothering my toes at all, I had plenty of energy, and it was a beautiful day. I started up Lonesome Lake Trail to the Hi-Cannon trail. I knew it would take me a few hours to reach the ridge because of the steep climb. There were great views along the way – the only part that I didn’t like about the trail was the noise from route 93. There is one section with an old ladder. At the top of the ladder, there is a board to the left that is bolted to the rock. My legs turned to jello as I exited the ladder to step onto the board. Glad that was the only section like that. I arrived at the summit – 2 hours after leaving my campsite. I had the tower to myself and wouldn’t see a single person until the ascent of North Kinsman. I climbed to the top of the tower and absorbed the views of the Franconia Ridge while having a snack. #27/48 NH and #82/115 of NE111.
I headed back to the junction with the Hi-Cannon Trail. On one of the trail signs, somebody wrote something like “it’s suck – no joke” referring to the Kinsman Ridge Trail over the Cannonballs. I thought…yeah sure, we’ll see about that. They weren’t joking!!! The trail is bouldery, steep in sections, and goes over 3 cannonballs. It did suck and I have no plans of returning if I don’t have to. I reached the junction with the Kinsman Trail 5 hours after leaving my campsite and this wasn’t even the halfway point with miles. I debated heading down the Fishin’ Jimmy trail and calling it quits but the Kinsmans were so close I just couldn’t bail. It’s a quick hike up to North Kinsman from this point and I was happy to find that it wasn’t anything like the cannonballs. #28/48 NH and #83/115 of NE111. I took a summit picture and immediately headed over to South Kinsman. The trail is easy to moderate with good footing and doesn’t take long to get from one summit to the next.
I reached South Kinsman in an hour after the Fishin’ Jimmy junction. The views were amazing but there were dozens of people on the summit. I opted to take a picture and go back to North Kinsman for lunch. #29/48 NH and #84/115 of NE111. I went back to the summit rock only to find that the best lunch spot was a perch right before the summit. I went back to the perch for lunch and started talking someone else that had the same idea. It turns out that it was Bunchberry – my first encounter meeting a fellow VFTT’er on the trail. She was supposed to meet Brian and Seema and been waiting for a few hours at this point. Since I had reception up there – she checked her e-mail to see if they had left her a message – no messages. We talked for 30 – 45 minutes before I decided to head down.
I’ve heard a lot of people complain about the Fishin’ Jimmy trail but I really enjoyed it. It was a nice combination of steep sections, bog bridges, some views, and a few very minor climbs. I made it to Lonesome Lake Hut in about 1.5 hours. I stopped at the junction with the Lonesome Lake trail for a snack before finishing the last 1.2 miles. I made the mistake of sitting down for a few minutes to eat and had a really hard time getting up. I had to pry myself off the log and convince myself to start hiking the last 30 minutes back to camp. Well…kudos to the chocolate covered espresso beans once again because after 10 minutes, I was running down the trail and jumping over rocks, passing people and telling them that food and flip flops were calling. I reached camp after a long but beautiful 10 hour day. I immediately took off my shoes to assess the damage. The bandages didn’t hold and the “new skin” rubbed off leaving one of my toes in really bad shape. I decided that I would do the Hancocks on Friday if my feet felt OK when I woke up. Well…they didn’t. One toe was very close to being infected to I packed my stuff and called it a week…16 peaks later.
If you haven't seen it already, check Seema's "Everest" thru-hiking post for the result of my efforts that day.
