Easy Trails Are Hard This Year

[DayTrip]

Is it just me or are some of the normally most tame trails in the Whites nasty tricky and dangerous this year? About a month ago I did Carters and coming out on 19MB the last mile or so was bullet proof ice with a glaze of powder that I had trouble walking on it even in microspikes. You could see the slip and slide marks from everyone's tracks in the powder. A few weeks back I did Moriah via Stony Brook and the last section before parking lot, although nearly level was so similarly slick I actually found myself clinging to trees and going off trail to avoid falling. And the icing on the cake yesterday was Gale River Trail. The last mile, virtually flat, had wet snow and was balling so badly on spikes after just 2-3 steps that I was rolling ankles on the resulting ice clogs so badly that I decided to bare boot. Big mistake. The ice under the fresh snow was so slippery that after some unplanned dancing I wound up taking a hard fall and wound up walking in the woods alongside the trail on the way out. It was either that or crampons, which I couldn't bring myself to do despite the obvious need.

Pretty wacky after a 10-15 mile hike over rock scrambles, deep snow and ice bulges without incident to be struggling to avoid major injury on some of the tamest trails in the woods. Normally you're kicking in the afterburners and cranking back to the car in these stretches. This year, timidly walking like an old man with cane in hand crossing a busy street. Another symptom of the mild Winter I guess.

 

[peakbagger]

Funny, I expected that on the approach via Sawyer River road on Sunday to Carrigan but instead had great walking. We used snowshoes as there was enough fresh snow to make them the preferred equipment but many had microspikes. It was like that all the way with the exception of two ice bulges.

 

[skiguy]

When it's time for crampons it's time for crampons.......and antibots! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKTuT3fcdKI&feature=player_embedded