"Escape the Escarpment" TBTS fundraising event '05

[frytz]

Maybe!

Whee, pretty large turnout so far, thanks for those who have replied to me personally and stuff. If you are interested in joining us merry band of hikers, could you also PM or email me your email address?

So far I have about 18 members interested. Hopefully by the end of the year, I'll pick some kind of date, it might be in May, it might be in June.

Jay

Since I will have weekends free by then, and could do a big chunk of the LP in "one swell foop", I will consider it! The elevation profile looks a lot easier than the Devil's Path and it's shorter than a marathon!

Fred

 

[Warren]

I would seriously advise against June. The Escarpment is a dry trail and all approaches will involve trail hiking (for the support team). Logistics to get water to the hikers will be more difficult and if we get a hot, humid June day....

 

[frytz]

Date!

I would seriously advise against June. The Escarpment is a dry trail and all approaches will involve trail hiking (for the support team). Logistics to get water to the hikers will be more difficult and if we get a hot, humid June day....

Would rather do earlier than later! Can carry enough water, but I'd rather try to beat the peak blackfly season!

Fred

 

[Rivet]

I would seriously advise against June. The Escarpment is a dry trail and all approaches will involve trail hiking (for the support team). Logistics to get water to the hikers will be more difficult and if we get a hot, humid June day....

May I suggest a water stop at Ducher Notch. From the map there is a good spring about 0.35 miles away. This is also the approximate mid-point of the ES trail and a possible bail-out point.
I may be able to volunteer for an aid station at this location. Too soon to know for certain.

 

[Jay H]

Right now, I'm leaning towards Middle May as a time frame.

As far as water, there is a trail that goes about 1.1 miles up to the junction between Acra Point and Burnt knob. that would make a good resupply. If so desired, we could also put a small resupply at North Point but I think one resupply point half way is good.

We could also cache water/supply at the leanto by Peck Rd (heck, folks wanting a short hike to WindhamHP could camp there and simply do a short hike in the morning before we would even be there.). Yeah, the leanto is only a mile or so before the end of the trail, assuming we do South to North, but it would be later in the day when it might be warmer and folks drinking more. And it is also a nice walk in from Peck Rd there.

Thanks Rivet, we could use some volunteers for the hike too, hiking dogs welcome too.

Jay

 

[Rik]

The spring that Rivet refers to is an easy walk from the Escarpment trail on a fairly flat old road. Hardly out of the way.

 

[amstony]

Jay,

Keep us posted on the date. I have the Big Lakes Half Marathon around Lake Winnepasauke in NH on May 7th and my daughter graduates college on May 21st, with all the attendant hoopla!!

What amazes me is how a calendar can fill up, and your event is still 5-6 months away!!!

 

[Jay H]

Sure Fred, put you down on the list.

As far as dates, go, I know Sherpa said June is out... I got an email from Snowshoe saying May is bad..

I just read (and in another thread) that the BTS bike ride is May 15th, AMStony says May 7th and the 21st is bad.

I did this last year and I'm not (that) stupid to think that I'm going to get a date that is good for everybody....

I'm really not trying to do this on Memorial day weekend when folks (and I) may have grandeous plans...

The weekend of May 21 might be the best date to try to do this.

Jay

 

[snowshoe]

If it is the end of May I may be able to make it. As of now I wont be out of the police academy until June 6th. It also depends on how much the academy kicks my ?#$. If I do make the hike, it will be a last minute plan. I would have to come up that morning and leave that night. But be prepared I might have to do this one even faster.

 

[frytz]

If it is the end of May I may be able to make it. As of now I wont be out of the police academy until June 6th. It also depends on how much the academy kicks my ?#$. If I do make the hike, it will be a last minute plan. I would have to come up that morning and leave that night. But be prepared I might have to do this one even faster.

No doubt you will be even faster - it's a lot easier! I might even be able to keep up with you on this one!!

Fred

 

[Jay H]

A Date..a Date

I am going to schedule this for the weekend of May 21st with a raindate of May 22nd. May 15th happens to be BTS's ride for research which I know a couple of you have planned on going and I'm trying to see if I can go right now. I'm kind of leery of anything earlier just in case we get a nice snowfall this winter...

I will email folks that I have put on my distribution list, if you do NOT get this email and read this, I either have your email address wrong or have fogotten to add it or I don't have your email address so could you email or PM me with your email address. I have checked my calander and I have that friday, May 20th off from work so I can get there a bit early.

Mark your calenders!

Rob, cool, keep in touch, Re: the pledge forms, sounds good, I've got a minor modification to improve them I think, but I'll pm or email you offline.

Jay

 

[mtn.goat]

This sounds like a great hike. Count me in. As a new member to this forum it would be great to meet some people with similar interests. Plus it seems like a great training workout for the 50k ultramarathon I plan on doing this summer .
-Dave

 

[askus3]

Well now that you are on your third page of posts, I will pipe in and save the weekend and commit myself. This year I hope i can make it. Somewhere closer to the time I will make up a schedule for myself to keep to in completing this hike. I hope we are doing it north to south. I will keep an eye on the thread as we continue to get closer, getting a pledge sheet, pledges, seeking accommodations, car transportation and finally hiking!

 

[Jay H]

Hi Folks, Thought I'd update this thread now that we have a pledge form and some more details:

Pledge form is here:

Escape the Escarpment PDF Pledge form

Hike is scheduled for Saturday, May 21st, pretty much rain or shine unless we're talking hurricane or something torrential. We'll camp at North South Lake Campsite:

http://www.dec.state.ny.us/website/do/camping/campgrounds/northsouth.html

and gather around on Friday May 20th, we'll do the hike and we'll figure out another good place to eat afterwards, and camp out til Sunday morning where we'll get breakfast somewhere. Then we can informally part ways or go for another hike for those local.

For those who do not want to camp or perhaps do what we did last year was camp the friday night before but stay in a hotel afterwards to get a nice hot shower and a bed to sleep in, here is a list of various hotels around the area. Thanks to Mountain Trails XC Ski area for letting me steal their groundwork!

http://www.mtntrails.com/lodging.html

Tannersville would be slightly west of North/South Lake on Rt 23A for those of you trying to figure out where the hotels are.

North/South Lake itself and the start of the Escarpment Trail would, I believe be in the town of Haines Falls so if you're curious to where it is, you can probably mapquest Haines Falls, NY and use that.

If you know you want to camp on friday, let me know and I can get a headcount. I can go ahead and figure out reservations and all that.

Warren has suggested a place in Tannersville that I went by last weekend, would work, probably need to find parking cause it looked like the place was in a row of stores. (Tannersville is fairly popular town due to the proximity of Hunter Mountain Ski resort)

As far as pledges, what I've done in the Devil's Path thing is you can collect pledges however you like, checks can be made out to The Brain Tumor Society and you can either give them to me at the event or you can mail them in to BTS directly after the event. TBS (www.tbts.org) also has an online pledge thing that you can tell your donors they can use. They should put down in the comments section that this is for the "escape the escarpment hike" or so and I can contact TBS to tell them about my hike this year. Just for bookkeeping and tracking reasons and how much money we've raised.

Hope to see all of you there or so. Feel free to send me email if you have any more questions..

Jay

 

[SherpaKroto]

May 20th is my daughter's b'day, May 22nd is my wife's. You do the math. Can't make it, but will send some sponsor money to "Team Angels"

As amstony said - it's amazing how fast a calendar can fill up! I'm well into September already!

 

[sli74]

This "Angel" will make it and I am more than happy to accept donations

Maybe this time I will actually make the entire thing . . .

sli74

 

[Jay H]

SherpaK.. Sorry that you can't make it... May 20th is my birthday too, it's a good day!

I think I learned last year that it is impossible to try to figure out a date that works for everybody so might as well set a date.

The escarpment trail is a great hike and different than the Devil's path in that there are not so much crazy notchs and stuff to descent and ascent to and there's some interesting history on the trail too.

Seema, hey, after Katahdin, this will probably be cake! As the term "escarpment" suggests a cliff at the end of a plateau, it's a nice ridge walk with fantastic views towards the Berkshires and points north and views south towards the Blackhead Range and the Devil's Path at Acra Point and Burnt Knob.

Jay

 

[hermit]

What ever the date is ,count me in.I had a great time last year on the Devil's Path fund raiser.I wish that I had stuck around to party with everyone,but I had to be somewhere that night.

 

[MattC]

I'm in for this Jay. I don't need to camp since I live an hour away, but I'm sure I'll up be up for some of the "hang."

Matt

 

[Panama Jack]

We're in

Going to a different mountain range will be like going to a foreign country. Do they hike on the left side of the trail there? Is passing gas on the trail a faux pais there?

We Mass & NH types should probably look into carpooling as it gets closer. I can fit 6 in the cab and 4 in the cabin