ebbinghaus
Member
Destination Dix via the north Dix slide and then Hough.
Was a great day for a hike! Met Claudia and Cliff at the Exit 9 Park & Ride off of 87 at 4am. The skies opened a bit north of Glens Falls. We consoled ourseleves with the thought that we had 70 miles more to go and that the weather *might* be very different up north.
5:50 -- Signin at Rt.73 Dix/Round Pond trail head. Well -- very gray skies, heavy mist, but no rain. We set off. Getting wetter from the brush on the sides of the trail than from the rain above (though this would alternate the rest of the day).
7:25 -- made the 4.2 miles to the Bouquet lean-to in good time. Were about 8 or 10 college students in the leanto. Seemed to be trying to decide whether to get up or not. By this time the mist had changed to light rain and back again several times. I was hiking in shorts and t-shirt. Very warm and I was getting no wetter from the skies than I would have from perspiration.
Dix slide: Our intention had been to hike up the slide that intersects the trail. We checked it out carefully. The parts without lichen and moss seemed okay. The parts with lichen and moss were slippery. Of course everything was wet. We decided to walk up it about 100 yards. We proceeded cautiously. As Claudia told us that this got steeper the farther up we went we decided it best to bushwhack back to the trail. A very short bushwhack (1/8 mi max) thru very dense spruce and blowdown. Would have been simpler and faster to head down the slide to where we had left the trail.
8:55 -- 6.4 miles from trail head at intersection with Hunter Pass trail. We stopped here to put on more clothes. Nylon shirt and Marmot Precip rain jacket went over my completely sodden EMS t-shirt. Sun hat (completely sodden) went into top of pack.
9:20 -- Summitted Dix. We were in the middle of a thick cloud with winds roaring around us and temperatures 20 deg or so colder than at the base. Ate a small snack. Got out our warm hats to either wear or keep in the outer pockets of sodden rain jackets.
Note here -- I don't completely understand how a rain jacket that gets completely saturated, inside from sweat and outside from rain, can act as a wind jacket. But they do. Layers, even wet layers work as insulation. At this point I wished I had worn my Smart Wool t-shirt rather than the synthetic one from EMS. Would have been nice to have one piece of clothing that retained heat -- especially as "wicking" away moisture is not an option when the outside is wetter than the inside. Indeed, wicking works in reverse then!
We did get cold. Our hands tingling. As all of us were experienced hikers we knew that the only thing to do was to hike immediately for Hough!!
Trail to Hough from Dix via Beckhorn was fun. This was only my 2nd time on it and my first time going in this direction. The herd paths are many. Without any visuals on left and right the walk thru the cloud continued. Claudia pointed out to us that although the entire world was wet, somehow the wetness was not very deep. There were patches of ground that were bone dry (all is relative here to the ADKs!). So it seemed as if most of the moisture was dripping sort of stuff from spruce and bushes, rather than due to a steady, pounding downpour.
10:55 arrived and left Hough -- view was exactly the same as from Dix. We were still in that cloud. No point staying around and cooling off. Back to Dix and that nice sheltered place off the ridgeline.
Going back we tended to get a bit more spreadout and realized that this was a mistake. There are simply too many herdpaths between Hough and Dix. As we were good about waiting for each other when we realized that the guy behind was no longer in sight, we never really got lost. But it was sobering to realize how what looked like the right trail to one person looked like the wrong one to the next.
12:15 -- back to Dix. To the sheltered spot. Lunch time and dry socks time for me. I had not stepped into any water the entire trip, but my feet were sloshy. I think this was from the exposed socks wicking the water down to the only semi-dry spot around, i.e., my feet. So much for technology that is supposed to wick water away to dry spots from wet spots. Worked exactly as planned, only the plan did not consider conditions in the ADKs!!
12:30 -- Dave showed up! Dave was to have been the 4th member of our party but he overslept. Apparently he hit the rt 73 trailhead at 9:00. Made about the same good time we did in getting to Dix. "Hello Dave. Time to go leave."
12:35 we left Dix
14:10 -- back to LeanTo do do a partial striptease. Off goes the rainjacket, shirt is unbuttoned. Nice and warm down here. It has even stopped misting.
16:10 -- back to car. Of course the sun came out for a 1-min as we hit Round Pond. Looked as if the clouds had lifted a bit as well. Though did not seem that they had lifted enough to the summit of Dix to be clear.
All in all a great day in the mountains!
Was a great day for a hike! Met Claudia and Cliff at the Exit 9 Park & Ride off of 87 at 4am. The skies opened a bit north of Glens Falls. We consoled ourseleves with the thought that we had 70 miles more to go and that the weather *might* be very different up north.
5:50 -- Signin at Rt.73 Dix/Round Pond trail head. Well -- very gray skies, heavy mist, but no rain. We set off. Getting wetter from the brush on the sides of the trail than from the rain above (though this would alternate the rest of the day).
7:25 -- made the 4.2 miles to the Bouquet lean-to in good time. Were about 8 or 10 college students in the leanto. Seemed to be trying to decide whether to get up or not. By this time the mist had changed to light rain and back again several times. I was hiking in shorts and t-shirt. Very warm and I was getting no wetter from the skies than I would have from perspiration.
Dix slide: Our intention had been to hike up the slide that intersects the trail. We checked it out carefully. The parts without lichen and moss seemed okay. The parts with lichen and moss were slippery. Of course everything was wet. We decided to walk up it about 100 yards. We proceeded cautiously. As Claudia told us that this got steeper the farther up we went we decided it best to bushwhack back to the trail. A very short bushwhack (1/8 mi max) thru very dense spruce and blowdown. Would have been simpler and faster to head down the slide to where we had left the trail.
8:55 -- 6.4 miles from trail head at intersection with Hunter Pass trail. We stopped here to put on more clothes. Nylon shirt and Marmot Precip rain jacket went over my completely sodden EMS t-shirt. Sun hat (completely sodden) went into top of pack.
9:20 -- Summitted Dix. We were in the middle of a thick cloud with winds roaring around us and temperatures 20 deg or so colder than at the base. Ate a small snack. Got out our warm hats to either wear or keep in the outer pockets of sodden rain jackets.
Note here -- I don't completely understand how a rain jacket that gets completely saturated, inside from sweat and outside from rain, can act as a wind jacket. But they do. Layers, even wet layers work as insulation. At this point I wished I had worn my Smart Wool t-shirt rather than the synthetic one from EMS. Would have been nice to have one piece of clothing that retained heat -- especially as "wicking" away moisture is not an option when the outside is wetter than the inside. Indeed, wicking works in reverse then!
We did get cold. Our hands tingling. As all of us were experienced hikers we knew that the only thing to do was to hike immediately for Hough!!
Trail to Hough from Dix via Beckhorn was fun. This was only my 2nd time on it and my first time going in this direction. The herd paths are many. Without any visuals on left and right the walk thru the cloud continued. Claudia pointed out to us that although the entire world was wet, somehow the wetness was not very deep. There were patches of ground that were bone dry (all is relative here to the ADKs!). So it seemed as if most of the moisture was dripping sort of stuff from spruce and bushes, rather than due to a steady, pounding downpour.
10:55 arrived and left Hough -- view was exactly the same as from Dix. We were still in that cloud. No point staying around and cooling off. Back to Dix and that nice sheltered place off the ridgeline.
Going back we tended to get a bit more spreadout and realized that this was a mistake. There are simply too many herdpaths between Hough and Dix. As we were good about waiting for each other when we realized that the guy behind was no longer in sight, we never really got lost. But it was sobering to realize how what looked like the right trail to one person looked like the wrong one to the next.
12:15 -- back to Dix. To the sheltered spot. Lunch time and dry socks time for me. I had not stepped into any water the entire trip, but my feet were sloshy. I think this was from the exposed socks wicking the water down to the only semi-dry spot around, i.e., my feet. So much for technology that is supposed to wick water away to dry spots from wet spots. Worked exactly as planned, only the plan did not consider conditions in the ADKs!!
12:30 -- Dave showed up! Dave was to have been the 4th member of our party but he overslept. Apparently he hit the rt 73 trailhead at 9:00. Made about the same good time we did in getting to Dix. "Hello Dave. Time to go leave."
12:35 we left Dix
14:10 -- back to LeanTo do do a partial striptease. Off goes the rainjacket, shirt is unbuttoned. Nice and warm down here. It has even stopped misting.
16:10 -- back to car. Of course the sun came out for a 1-min as we hit Round Pond. Looked as if the clouds had lifted a bit as well. Though did not seem that they had lifted enough to the summit of Dix to be clear.
All in all a great day in the mountains!
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