Cathedral Ledge and The Wildcats, 10/9/2010

[BIGEarl]

October 9, 2010: Cathedral Ledge and The Wildcats

Trails: Two Hikes…

Cathedral Ledge: Echo Lake Trail, Bryce Path, Cathedral Ledge Spur

Wildcats: Lost Pond Trail, Wildcat Ridge Trail, Nineteen Mile Brook Trail

Summits: Wildcat “A” peak, Wildcat “D” peak

Hikers: Trail Trotter (Sue), KPMMBM (Keith), Peakbagger, OG Rob, Petch, and me



This Hit & Run was a little different. A friend of Sue’s named Ivy has visited Cathedral Ledge a number of times years ago. She often talks about the place from memory and Sue can only imagine the things Ivy describes. Sue wanted a visit to Cathedral Ledge on our list of targets for this fall and combining it with a hike of The Wildcats made sense – it was on the way. There are two choices to enjoy the views from the top of Cathedral Ledge; drive the road to the top and walk to the open areas, or climb it. Well, we don’t need no stinkin’ road.

The plan was to enjoy the sunrise from the top of Cathedral Ledge. With an early start we set off from the Echo Lake State Park headed for Cathedral Ledge. The trails aren’t well marked at first and we managed to make a wrong turn and landed on the beach. I couldn’t talk Sue into a quick dip so we u-turned and went back to the trail. We noticed a blaze and took off in the right direction. After a few minutes I managed to jam the stub of a branch into my forehead. In no time there was steady blood heading down my nose. While Sue did the mopping I dug through my pack for my latest great buy decision – my styptic pencil. I found it, explained what I wanted Sue to do with it, and in no time the bleeding was stopped and we were hiking (not bad for someone on blood thinners).

The hike to the top of Cathedral Ledge is in fact on fairly clear trails once we left the area of the park beach. We only had two trails junctions to get through; the decision at each was easy to get right. Along the way we retired our headlights. In a relatively short period of time we arrived at the top of Cathedral Ledge near the end of the auto road. There we started to wander around to the various open areas enjoying the views. The first place we visited was on the south end with a clear view to Whitehorse Ledge. The sun was not yet up but we were happy to enjoy the views while we waited. After the sunrise we continued our exploring to other viewpoints. The middle open viewing area had a pair in sleeping bags evidently there from the night before – we quietly left the area trying not to disturb them. We found the main area with safety fencing and enjoyed the views to Kearsarge North, Carter Notch and The Wildcats, and the general area east and north of Cathedral Ledge. Since we still had a little more time to spare before leaving for Pinkham Notch Visitor Center (PNVC) we returned to the south viewpoint, which was the best of the bunch for a little time in the morning sun before heading out to the rest of our day.

I hope both Ivy and Sue have smiles on their face the next time they discuss Cathedral Ledge; it’s a nice way to start the day.

From Echo Lake State Park we made the short drive to PNVC to meet the others we would enjoy the day with on Wildcat Ridge. Everybody knew we were making an early stop on our way but expected to see us between 8:30 and 9:00am. We pulled in at 8:50am to find everybody else already there, the car was already spotted at NMB trailhead, and they were ready to hike. Sue and I grabbed our things, make a quick pit stop and we were hiking. The plan was to hike a traverse following Lost Pond Trail, Wildcat Ridge Trail, and Nineteen Mile Brook Trail. As always, there wouldn’t be any ski trails used on our hike of The Wildcats; because – that’s the way we want it.

By now everybody knows the recent monsoons left the area drenched. We ran into mud and water everywhere. And, we were generally able to get past all of it staying relatively clean and dry all day.

Lost Pond Trail is a nice warm-up. It’s only ~.9 miles and 100 feet in elevation but it gets everything ready for the climb. We made our way to the junction with Wildcat Ridge Trail (WRT) snapping pictures of terrific fall views along the way. At the trail junction we made a quick stop to adjust layers, have quick refreshment, and get ready for WRT.

According to the White Mountain Guide, from the trail junction to Wildcat “E” Peak is 2.8 miles and climbs 2250 feet. This is a really fun approach to the ridge. It’s steep with some nice viewpoints along the way to break things up. The trail in this section is clear and generally in great shape. We found places on the upper ledge sections where water flows had frozen and we needed to be careful to avoid a slip and fall; one would definitely leave a mark. Peakbagger settled into the lead and set an ideal pace for the climb (actually he set an ideal pace all day while in the lead). We made our way up the WRT, from viewpoint to viewpoint, and eventually cleared Wildcat “E” Peak and continued on to the top of the ski area and our first real break. We found a generally sheltered area and stopped to enjoy a snack.

Back on the hike we continued to Wildcat “D” peak and the old, rotten, closed observation deck. When we arrived we found it was gone. Not all of my prayers have been answered, not even the big ones, but the one concerning the Wildcat “D” observation deck has been met. The observation deck has been rebuilt and re-opened. Nice! I noticed some of the nearby trees that were always a nice background in pictures from the old observation deck were also cut off to open the view. I’m not sure that was really necessary.

After getting the usual pictures we continued. The hike to Wildcat A involves a good amount of work. The trail drops into Wildcat Col giving up quite a bit in elevation along the way. We needed to re-climb everything we lost. As we passed over Wildcat “C” and “B” peaks we also passed through lots of mud. There are a few bridges along the way that helped but Sue took a pretty good slip on one and quickly bounced back up in good shape, and smiling (Sue has a nice smile). We also noticed a fair amount of work has been completed in opening the trail. On past visits we have noticed this section of the trail to be extremely tight but it is generally open now. Part of the brushing job was done in-line with the approach I’ve noticed everywhere else; the brush was cut and disposed of off-trail. In some sections the branches were cut and left where they fell turning the trail into a huge mess and leaving it littered with brush. I hope the ones responsible for creating the mess will have the good sense to go back and clean up what they did, but I have my doubts it will happen.

We hit Wildcat “A” peak and made the usual stop at the summit and viewpoint for more pictures before the descent to Carter Notch. While we were there we also managed to get pictures south to Cathedral Ledge, the reverse of the pictures from earlier in the day.

The descent from Wildcat “A” is steep, wet, and in some places near the top – icy. We were careful, took our time, and all made the descent without a problem. Soon we were in Carter Notch enjoying a snack and getting ready for the final 3.5 miles to the trailhead.

More mud and more water on the exit walk. The Nineteen Mile Brook trail is soaked for the full distance. There are enough high spots, rocks and such to stay clean and dry but it takes a little more concentration. We all were moving at a pretty good pace. Keith and Sue were out front on their “comfortable” pace which was giving some of us in the back a pretty good workout. No problem, we were generally able to stay close and made pretty good time on our exit run. We passed the Carter Dome Trail junction with a brief pause to delayer and kept moving.

A couple hours after leaving Carter Notch we were standing in the NMB trailhead lot having enjoyed a very nice hike of Wildcat Ridge. We loaded our things into the back of Keith’s car for the return to PNVC.

Thanks to everybody for a really fun day on Wildcat Ridge. And, thanks to The Presidentials for the fine blocking job they did all day keeping the strong northwest wind sheltered from our hike. We enjoyed a strong breeze at times, but that was about all there was to it.

It was a good day; there’ll be more.





I’ve posted some pictures from the day.


BIGEarl's Pictures


Straight to the slideshow

 

[KPMMBM]

thanks for letting me tag along on this fun day!

 

[BIGEarl]

thanks for letting me tag along on this fun day!

Are you kidding?!?

When you said it was going to be just like the New Years Eve hike I was really looking forward to an interesting October day with lots of ice on the climb to Wildcat E.

It was a fun day but we actually had very little ice and we had a trail to follow on the way down from Wildcat A (we didn't have that before).

I agree, a fun day for sure.

 

[peakbagger]

Thansk for the open invite Earl, great day for a hike once we got moving. As usual, this time of year, the coldest part of the hike is in the parking lot!

 

[PETCH]

Thx for having me along as well. It was great to finally hike with BigEarl and Sue, along with Keith, Dennis and Rob. It was a good day to be sheltered in the trees. Nice report and pics!

Petch

 

[BIGEarl]

Thansk for the open invite Earl, great day for a hike once we got moving. As usual, this time of year, the coldest part of the hike is in the parking lot!

Hey Dennis,

Thanks to you for taking the lead for much of the hike and setting a great pace. Clearly, you and I enjoy the same speed. As it turned out we were just about on “book time” as advertised. When you add in the breaks we might have been a little ahead.

Sorry to keep you guys waiting for us to arrive. My handy mapping program claimed it was roughly 45 minutes from Echo Lake State Part to PNVC. We were able to hook up with a fast moving train on West Side Road, and Route 16 was really moving when we made the turn. We completed the short drive in roughly 20 minutes.

Once we got started it didn’t take long to come up to temperature.

Thanks again, you did a great job out front.

Thx for having me along as well. It was great to finally hike with BigEarl and Sue, along with Keith, Dennis and Rob. It was a good day to be sheltered in the trees. Nice report and pics!

Petch

Thanks Petch,

It was fun to hike with you and the bird that was riding your back all of the way. I’m glad you were able to retrieve the pole you accidentally tossed in the drink. When we left I mentioned to Sue that I expected to see one or both of you at the trailhead drenched after taking an unplanned swim. It was nice to see you with two poles and dry.

I hope we all get together again soon; it was a fun day for sure.

 

[Dr. Dasypodidae]

On past visits we have noticed this section of the trail to be extremely tight but it is generally open now. Part of the brushing job was done in-line with the approach I’ve noticed everywhere else; the brush was cut and disposed of off-trail. In some sections the branches were cut and left where they fell turning the trail into a huge mess and leaving it littered with brush. I hope the ones responsible for creating the mess will have the good sense to go back and clean up what they did, but I have my doubts it will happen.

I finally got back to Wildcat Ridge on Sunday and spent 4+ hours brushing the trail between Wildcat D and the first deep col to the north, so less than a quarter mile (I hiked up and down Polecat ski trail as I knew that it would be late and I would be in dark trying to hitch a ride on Rt. 16 from 19MBT back to Pinkham).

To take a break from brushing, I hiked over to Wildcat A to complete my 17th round and noticed the fine brushing work that Rocket 21 and company had accomplished between B and A Peaks the previous weekend. I also noticed that they left a lot of smaller clippings in the mud puddles on the trail, but that the larger branches and sapling trunks had been removed. Leaving the smaller clippings on the trail was standard practice by the AMC trail crews (paid) in the 60s and 70s.

Quite a few folks hiking north to south on Sunday also complained to me about the clippings left in the trail between A and B peaks, as if I had left them there and was not doing my unpaid volunteer work correctly. I just smiled and replied that they could remove them if they found them offensive, to which I received some harsh words in reply.

I spent another 2+ hours clipping some of the smaller branches that Rocket21 and company had missed between A and B peaks on my return to D peak, leaving the 1.5 miles or so between B peak and the saddle just north of D peak for others to tackle. My guess is that this section will require somewhere between 20 and 30 person hours of brushing work to bring up to AT standards.

 

[loanshark]

Wildcat Ridge

Liz, James and I hiked the Ridge from D to A and back on 10/3. During the week we had some substantial rain. We really expected some adverse conditions as we new this trail tends to get some large mud pits and had not been brushed in quite some time. We were all pleasantly surprised by the overall condition of the trail. We had no issues with any trimmings and brush being left on the trail. The only trimmings we found on the trail were a small number someone left on a couple of the mudpits. Maybe they didn't want to get their boots dirty. And it may have been done by a random hiker, not even one of the many people who have made an honest attempt at some long overdue trail maintenance. We even met the trail adopter coming down off the steep section on D peak She was a very nice lady from the area who stated this was her second recent trip to the ridge. She was carrying a nice big pair of trimmers. We thanked her for her efforts and parted ways. During the following week that area experianced hurricane force winds. Maybe that much wind blew some of the trimmings back onto the trail. Who knows? Who cares? The fact is the trail is in much better shape now than before and as a snowshoe hiker I am going to be greatful to all who have widened the trail corridor.

 

[BIGEarl]

.......
I also noticed that they left a lot of smaller clippings in the mud puddles on the trail, but that the larger branches and sapling trunks had been removed. Leaving the smaller clippings on the trail was standard practice by the AMC trail crews (paid) in the 60s and 70s.
.......

Your comments do not seem to agree with the conditions we experienced. The pictures I have, some of which are posted, are clearly not consistent with your story (or is it the other way around? ).

Justifying behavior because it was once acceptable 40 or 50 years ago seems questionable.

Liz, James and I hiked the Ridge from D to A and back on 10/3.
.....

I understand the condition was created after you hiked the area (at least that is what you had previously stated).



As reported elsewhere.....

I have been in contact with the AMC concerning the condition of the trail. We had a very good conversation concerning the matter. I was told they would do a couple things. First, they’ll contact the USFS and make them aware of what has been done. Then, the USFS and/or AMC will arrange for a crew to go there to clean things up.

Just my opinion of course but they probably have more important and better things to do than clean up the mess left by others, no matter how well intended they may be.

 

[cooperhill]

The standard practice is to clip and toss the brush in butt-end first - they're easier to toss that way anyway.

I think they meant well and did hikers a favor by doing some much needed maintenance. I place the blame with the AMC. I believe this is an AMC trail. If there is an adopter and he or she isn't stepping up, the AMC should replace the adopter and/or have the crew come in. AMC's signed the maintenance agreement after all on the trail with the FS - they are responsible.

It may have only looked ugly because it was fresh or maybe some hikers came by and moved the brush into the pits as others have said. I don't think it will be noticeable next year - certainly not in the winter.