king tut
New member
I decided to do baldpate from the parking lot in grafton notch shared w/ old speck today. The morning was rather ominous, as i did not feel too great and it rained on the entire 2 and a half hour drive. Luckily just as i was pulling into the parking lot, it stopped raining. The hike was 7.8 miles roundtrip and about 3,000 vertical. So it was definitely a good workout, but a lot easier than my sunday trek up Katahdin.
The temp was only 60-70 degrees today, but the humidity must have been near 100%. I packed my fleece in my backpack thinking it was going to be cool on top, but about 10 minutes into the hike, the sweat glands started kicking in, and by the time i got to the top I was soaked. It didn't help either that I was walking straight up into the clouds all day, the foggiest day i have seen in quite a while. While on top of the mt, you could actually see the clouds flying by you as the wind whipped. Needless to say the views were nil today. There was a sign to tablerock(normally great views) that said "extraordinary views", but not today.
The actual climb itself is steady uphill for the first 2 miles, then levels out and then ascends pretty steeply to west baldpate. From there, you descend maybe 300 feet and then climb up to east baldpate which is around 3900 feet high. There was quite a large rock slab to climb up to get to the final summit, and the rocks were quite slick today. On the way down the rock slab, my feet gave out from under me and i think i was parallel to the gound in mid air before i threw my arms out to brace my fall. I ended up being ok, but i wacked my wrist pretty good on the rocks. This could make my golf game even worse, if that is indeed possible.
So the hike took a little over 4 hours today, going at a steady but not too fast pace. Saw at least 15 people out on the trails today, including some college kids overnighting, and several day hikers. Overall, it was a pretty good hike but if there were some views and some sunny skies it would have been better. OH! one other thing, no bugs today?? I don't know where they went, but i am not complaining at all, after giving several pints to the katahdin flies of death last sunday. Well i guess that's bout all of it.
The temp was only 60-70 degrees today, but the humidity must have been near 100%. I packed my fleece in my backpack thinking it was going to be cool on top, but about 10 minutes into the hike, the sweat glands started kicking in, and by the time i got to the top I was soaked. It didn't help either that I was walking straight up into the clouds all day, the foggiest day i have seen in quite a while. While on top of the mt, you could actually see the clouds flying by you as the wind whipped. Needless to say the views were nil today. There was a sign to tablerock(normally great views) that said "extraordinary views", but not today.
The actual climb itself is steady uphill for the first 2 miles, then levels out and then ascends pretty steeply to west baldpate. From there, you descend maybe 300 feet and then climb up to east baldpate which is around 3900 feet high. There was quite a large rock slab to climb up to get to the final summit, and the rocks were quite slick today. On the way down the rock slab, my feet gave out from under me and i think i was parallel to the gound in mid air before i threw my arms out to brace my fall. I ended up being ok, but i wacked my wrist pretty good on the rocks. This could make my golf game even worse, if that is indeed possible.
So the hike took a little over 4 hours today, going at a steady but not too fast pace. Saw at least 15 people out on the trails today, including some college kids overnighting, and several day hikers. Overall, it was a pretty good hike but if there were some views and some sunny skies it would have been better. OH! one other thing, no bugs today?? I don't know where they went, but i am not complaining at all, after giving several pints to the katahdin flies of death last sunday. Well i guess that's bout all of it.
