Algonquin, Presidents weekend

[sleeping bear]

Jessbee and I had been planning this trip for a while and were pretty excited about it. Even though the temperatures were supposed to be pretty brutal (-10 for Saturday night) we weren't going to let that deter us.

We drove to New York bright and early on Saturday morning. There was no snow to speak of until Keene! Fortunately, there was just enough on the trail to pull our sled. With two sleeping bags each, there was no way we were going to fit everything into our packs.

At Marcy Dam we set up camp and made dinner. The temp hung on to about -2 all evening. Amazingly, there were quite a few others braving the frigid temps and camping as well.

Sunday we got out at about 8 on an ambitious plan to hike Iroquois, Algonquin and Wright Peak, back to Marcy Dam for a second night. With the temperature still about zero, it was a real challenge to move at a decent speed, stay warm, and not sweat to death. Once above treeline, we started looking for the trail to Iroquois, and found two Canadians. They were headed there too, so we all went together. I fell in a huge spruce trap, which took much effort and some help from jess to get out of. We got to the first bump we had seen, where the two Canadians began celebrating having summitted Iroquois. Hey guys... Neither Jess or I wanted to be the one to tell them we were on Boundary Peak. We could see Iroquois, but it was cold so we opted just to head back to Algonquin. Algonquin was a serious sheet of ice being blasted by some serious wind. My goggles had fogged and then frozen, rendering them useless. The wind made my eyes water, which then tried to freeze my eyelashes together. I had to stop and pull the ice off of them.

There weren't really any views from Algonquin, so we took some photos and quickly went down the other side. Below treeline the trail was prefect for sliding, so we shed the crampons. At a nice wide steep spot, we stopped and got in some self arrest practice. Then we put our packs back on and continued sliding down, it was fun.

At the junction for Wright Peak, we opted to skip it and continued down. Back at Marcy Dam we were beat, and cooked dinner quickly. The plan for the morning would be to book it out and get breakfast in Lake Placid.

Monday morning, we did just that. The Adirondack Breakfast at the Downtown Diner in Lake Placid, yum.

Awesome trip! Photos are here

 

[spaddock]

The Adirondack Breakfast at the Downtown Diner in Lake Placid, yum.

Nice trip report. Glad the cold weather didn't keep you in. The butt slide from Algonquin to Wright is supposed to be one of the best in the park.

We had the same breakfast Saturday, it's a classic.


-Shayne

 

[dr_wu002]

Great Trip!

Wonderful Trip! I see you went past Lake Avalanche! That's one of the coolest places in the North East, I think. Too bad you didn't have views from Algonquin... Iroquois, in my opinion, has one of the great expansive views in the NE. Go back some time!

-Dr. Wu

 

[jessbee]

Nice trip report and great pictures! This was a fun adventure for sure. I was really impressed by Avalanche Lake, the rock slabs and icefalls were so beautiful. I only wish the sky would have cleared for more views. Oh well, that just means I'll have to go back! The breakfast at the diner was enormous and really hit the spot...will have to return there as well.

You forgot to mention all the uses we had for the ice axes...tent stake, tool for climbing up steep ice and for climbing down (backwards--very helpful), practice self-arrest, real self-arrest, opener for hand-warmer packets, did I miss anything?

 

[sapblatt]

Excellent report and pics - sure looks like winter!

 

[giggy]

wow - nice trip - looks like ya had a bit of it all - even had the sled going

jess - your really trucking along in building some good skills this winter!!

 

[sleeping bear]

You forgot to mention all the uses we had for the ice axes...tent stake, tool for climbing up steep ice and for climbing down (backwards--very helpful), practice self-arrest, real self-arrest, opener for hand-warmer packets, did I miss anything?

Yeah, we did get lots of axe use in. They were probably most usefull going up Boundary Peak, used more as a handtool on the steep crusty snow.

Also when I got sliding a little too fast for comfort and had to make a very unorthadox arrest!

Did you seriously use your axe to open hand warmers?? I must have missed that one!

Used as tent stakes, our campsite looked pretty hardcore that's for sure. (see photo)