February 28th 2009 marked the Silver Anniversary of our annual Armadillo X-C Ski Tour du Pemigewasset. First, I provide a little history. Our first attempt to ski north to south through the Pemigewasset occurred in January 1982 and ended with the three of us retreating from Thoreau Falls with our ski tails between our legs, so to speak. After getting a not-so-early start and breaking some fairly deep snow through Zealand Notch on a sub-zero degree F day, upon our arrival at Thoreau Falls the debate commenced about what to do. I was in favor of continuing south given the stiff tail winds that we had most of the day, but my two companions wished to retreat, which is what we did. Fortunately, the strong NW winds had diminished, but by the time we got back to Rt. 302 well after dark, the temperature had dropped to -30 F and my car’s engine would not start. Luckily, we were able to hitch a ride into Twin Mountain and talk a guy who was closing up his service station to drive us back out and jump start my car, which required a long push on Rt. 302, a bargain at $25 without AAA membership. About an hour later, we found that our other car spotted at the Rt. 112 (aka Lincoln Woods) would not start either, but this time we were able to jump start its engine with cables from my vehicle.
After a three-year recovery, primarily mental, we made our next attempt at a Pemi ski-through on 9 March 1985, which was a success via the Shoal Pond Trail, in about 8 hrs. Since that trip, 68 different humans and one canine have completed our Tour du Pemi via either the Shoal Pond Trail (about 22 miles, 12 trips) or the Thoreau Falls Trail (about 20 miles, 11 trips). Total individual completions number 174, along with 15 half completions, credited for turning back from the Zealand Notch area, which has happened 12 times to individuals since the three of us turned around on the first attempt. Participants have numbered between two and 15 each year (because of wilderness regulations, we split into smaller groups when numbers exceed 10). In 1989 we made a clockwise circumnavigation of Owls Head because of too little snow at the northern end of our usual routes and in 2006 we cancelled our event outright because of the sparse snowpack. Our times have ranged between 6.5 and 10.5 hrs for the Thoreau Falls route and between 7.0 and until this year 11.5 hrs for the Shoal Pond route, depending on snow conditions and other factors.
This year we established our new record of 14.1 hours via the Shoal Pond route. Although we would like to blame our slow time on the angry moose, we never saw him or her, although we did see voluminous evidence in the manner of a carpet of pellets all over the well-trodden path near the AZ Trail junction. After getting tipped off by a group of boy scouts heading out from Zool hut, we were prepared for a tedious 30-minute detour upslope to avoid a flooded side-valley stream on the west side of the Zealand Trail just north of the AZ Trail junction. In sum, after our 8:10 am departure from the Rt. 302 parking lot, we arrived at the Ethan Pond Trail junction at 11:15 am, about a half hour behind our usual schedule.
The route was no longer broken out after our departure from the Zealand Trail onto the Ethan Pond Trail through Zealand Notch, although the rain had consolidated the most recent snowfalls and we made decent time arriving at Shoal Pond about 1:00 pm, still only about a half hour behind schedule. While the other seven stopped for lunch, I scouted out the route south from the pond, initially losing the trail but then relocating it within couple hundred meters. Although the trail breaking was now more onerous than it had been, we were still making decent time until we were stopped dead in our tracks at the second crossing of Shoal Pond Brook (we did not have any problems with the first crossing that was buried under snow just south of Shoal Pond). The snow bridges were underlying 2-3 ft deep fast-moving water as far as we could see up and down channel. The links to two USGS hydrographs tell the story; note that the East Branch record from Lincoln was lost for a couple of days just before the peak discharge on Friday the 27th, whereas the Pemigewasset record from Woodstock caught the entire flood event (stage height, but not discharge, as ice covered).
http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/uv?c...format=gif_default&period=28&site_no=01074520
http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/uv?c...format=gif_default&period=28&site_no=01075000
At this point, Pemi ski-through veterans Lyons Witten and Laura Fitch (VftT George’s sister) decided to turn back, arriving at the Rt. 302 parking lot at 6:30 pm (they found that the flooded side-valley stream near the AZ Trail junction had dried up sufficiently to step across, thereby avoiding the long detour, and again did not encounter the irate moose on their way out). I am using real names here, as none of my Pemi ski-through companions post on VftT. The remaining six of us (Pemi ski-through veterans Anton Gulovsen, Gary Newfield, Stroker Rogovin, and myself, along with ski-through newbies Ron Adolf and Heather Belcourt) decided to continue south by bushwhacking the west side of Shoal Pond Brook until we could find a safe route across to regain the trail on the east side.
Needless to say, we never found a place to get across Shoal Pond Brook, missing the lower three crossings as we bushwhacked through some fairly thick spruce traps, some of which really sapped our energy as we attempted to extricate ourselves, much more difficult on skis than on snowshoes. I seemed to sink the deepest given my choice of track skis rather than back-country skis this year. Anton and Ron did a superb job in picking a route, such as it was, which eventually dropped us onto an old logging road near two topographic bumps that show up on air photos but not on topo maps. The partially overgrown logging road, which was easy to follow, brought us out on the north bank of the East Branch, about a half mile west of Stillwater, where we were able to scoot across a tenuous wide snow bridge as darkness was encroaching at about 6:00 pm. If we had not been able to cross the East Branch at this location, we would have been facing another couple miles bushwhack along the north side to the Thoreau Brook Trail where there is a bridge. Perhaps because of its greater channel width, the East Branch had not flooded as had Shoal Pond Brook from the intense rainstorm the day before. We estimate our total bushwhack distance, including the old logging road, at about 2.5 miles, thus our speed was barely over 0.5 mi/hr for this stretch.
The upper part of the Wilderness Trail includes some nasty side-hilling and steep drops into side-valley gullies such as Crystal Brook (a few years ago one of our participants brought a sled that became a nightmare for hauling along this stretch), which had not been broken out since the last snow and heavy rain. So, this stretch also was slow going, especially for me with my skinny edgeless skis sinking deep into the snowpack. Stroker and I finally reached the lower terminus of the Thoreau Brook Trail at 6:40 pm, where the other four were waiting for us. From here out, the WT had been broken out the previous weekend (see recent VftT thread started by Becca Monroe); we reached the suspension bridge at the Cedar Brook Trail at 8:00 pm (much slower than usual), the Franconia Brook Trail at 9:30 pm (I was much slower than usual on both of these sections, but the others waited for me), and the Lincoln Woods parking lot at 10:15 pm (we finally approached our usual speed of 4 mi/hr for the last 3 miles).
One of my take-home messages from this trip is that b/c skis would have been a better choice this year, which might have shaved a couple hours off our overall time; many years our group breaks up and individuals ski at their own pace, or some times race, the last 5.5 miles, but this year everyone waited for the slowest (me). Second, knowing how difficult the 2.5 miles of bushwhacking is on the west side of Shoal Pond Brook, I will probably turn back if stopped by a flooded crossing so high up in the drainage on future trips. Going into this year’s Pemi ski-through, I felt much better physically than last year, when I was dogged by an injured left hip. I would like to have one more shot at our Pemi ski-through next winter, to see if indeed it was my poor choice of skis the past two trips that slowed me down, or rather simply age. Although one of our Pemi ski-through participants, Hans Bengtsson, founder of the North American Orienteering Association, was in his late 60s and still near the front of the pack at the end in 2005, I am beginning to feel that this event is a “young person’s game,” and I “ain’t no” Hans Bengtsson!
After a three-year recovery, primarily mental, we made our next attempt at a Pemi ski-through on 9 March 1985, which was a success via the Shoal Pond Trail, in about 8 hrs. Since that trip, 68 different humans and one canine have completed our Tour du Pemi via either the Shoal Pond Trail (about 22 miles, 12 trips) or the Thoreau Falls Trail (about 20 miles, 11 trips). Total individual completions number 174, along with 15 half completions, credited for turning back from the Zealand Notch area, which has happened 12 times to individuals since the three of us turned around on the first attempt. Participants have numbered between two and 15 each year (because of wilderness regulations, we split into smaller groups when numbers exceed 10). In 1989 we made a clockwise circumnavigation of Owls Head because of too little snow at the northern end of our usual routes and in 2006 we cancelled our event outright because of the sparse snowpack. Our times have ranged between 6.5 and 10.5 hrs for the Thoreau Falls route and between 7.0 and until this year 11.5 hrs for the Shoal Pond route, depending on snow conditions and other factors.
This year we established our new record of 14.1 hours via the Shoal Pond route. Although we would like to blame our slow time on the angry moose, we never saw him or her, although we did see voluminous evidence in the manner of a carpet of pellets all over the well-trodden path near the AZ Trail junction. After getting tipped off by a group of boy scouts heading out from Zool hut, we were prepared for a tedious 30-minute detour upslope to avoid a flooded side-valley stream on the west side of the Zealand Trail just north of the AZ Trail junction. In sum, after our 8:10 am departure from the Rt. 302 parking lot, we arrived at the Ethan Pond Trail junction at 11:15 am, about a half hour behind our usual schedule.
The route was no longer broken out after our departure from the Zealand Trail onto the Ethan Pond Trail through Zealand Notch, although the rain had consolidated the most recent snowfalls and we made decent time arriving at Shoal Pond about 1:00 pm, still only about a half hour behind schedule. While the other seven stopped for lunch, I scouted out the route south from the pond, initially losing the trail but then relocating it within couple hundred meters. Although the trail breaking was now more onerous than it had been, we were still making decent time until we were stopped dead in our tracks at the second crossing of Shoal Pond Brook (we did not have any problems with the first crossing that was buried under snow just south of Shoal Pond). The snow bridges were underlying 2-3 ft deep fast-moving water as far as we could see up and down channel. The links to two USGS hydrographs tell the story; note that the East Branch record from Lincoln was lost for a couple of days just before the peak discharge on Friday the 27th, whereas the Pemigewasset record from Woodstock caught the entire flood event (stage height, but not discharge, as ice covered).
http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/uv?c...format=gif_default&period=28&site_no=01074520
http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/uv?c...format=gif_default&period=28&site_no=01075000
At this point, Pemi ski-through veterans Lyons Witten and Laura Fitch (VftT George’s sister) decided to turn back, arriving at the Rt. 302 parking lot at 6:30 pm (they found that the flooded side-valley stream near the AZ Trail junction had dried up sufficiently to step across, thereby avoiding the long detour, and again did not encounter the irate moose on their way out). I am using real names here, as none of my Pemi ski-through companions post on VftT. The remaining six of us (Pemi ski-through veterans Anton Gulovsen, Gary Newfield, Stroker Rogovin, and myself, along with ski-through newbies Ron Adolf and Heather Belcourt) decided to continue south by bushwhacking the west side of Shoal Pond Brook until we could find a safe route across to regain the trail on the east side.
Needless to say, we never found a place to get across Shoal Pond Brook, missing the lower three crossings as we bushwhacked through some fairly thick spruce traps, some of which really sapped our energy as we attempted to extricate ourselves, much more difficult on skis than on snowshoes. I seemed to sink the deepest given my choice of track skis rather than back-country skis this year. Anton and Ron did a superb job in picking a route, such as it was, which eventually dropped us onto an old logging road near two topographic bumps that show up on air photos but not on topo maps. The partially overgrown logging road, which was easy to follow, brought us out on the north bank of the East Branch, about a half mile west of Stillwater, where we were able to scoot across a tenuous wide snow bridge as darkness was encroaching at about 6:00 pm. If we had not been able to cross the East Branch at this location, we would have been facing another couple miles bushwhack along the north side to the Thoreau Brook Trail where there is a bridge. Perhaps because of its greater channel width, the East Branch had not flooded as had Shoal Pond Brook from the intense rainstorm the day before. We estimate our total bushwhack distance, including the old logging road, at about 2.5 miles, thus our speed was barely over 0.5 mi/hr for this stretch.
The upper part of the Wilderness Trail includes some nasty side-hilling and steep drops into side-valley gullies such as Crystal Brook (a few years ago one of our participants brought a sled that became a nightmare for hauling along this stretch), which had not been broken out since the last snow and heavy rain. So, this stretch also was slow going, especially for me with my skinny edgeless skis sinking deep into the snowpack. Stroker and I finally reached the lower terminus of the Thoreau Brook Trail at 6:40 pm, where the other four were waiting for us. From here out, the WT had been broken out the previous weekend (see recent VftT thread started by Becca Monroe); we reached the suspension bridge at the Cedar Brook Trail at 8:00 pm (much slower than usual), the Franconia Brook Trail at 9:30 pm (I was much slower than usual on both of these sections, but the others waited for me), and the Lincoln Woods parking lot at 10:15 pm (we finally approached our usual speed of 4 mi/hr for the last 3 miles).
One of my take-home messages from this trip is that b/c skis would have been a better choice this year, which might have shaved a couple hours off our overall time; many years our group breaks up and individuals ski at their own pace, or some times race, the last 5.5 miles, but this year everyone waited for the slowest (me). Second, knowing how difficult the 2.5 miles of bushwhacking is on the west side of Shoal Pond Brook, I will probably turn back if stopped by a flooded crossing so high up in the drainage on future trips. Going into this year’s Pemi ski-through, I felt much better physically than last year, when I was dogged by an injured left hip. I would like to have one more shot at our Pemi ski-through next winter, to see if indeed it was my poor choice of skis the past two trips that slowed me down, or rather simply age. Although one of our Pemi ski-through participants, Hans Bengtsson, founder of the North American Orienteering Association, was in his late 60s and still near the front of the pack at the end in 2005, I am beginning to feel that this event is a “young person’s game,” and I “ain’t no” Hans Bengtsson!
Last edited:
What a trip! Great job!
