Rhody Seth
Active member
I took my daughter Ezri on a fun overnight as she wanted to continue to chip away at her NH48 list. It was tough to fit in between other plans but found a window where we'd drive up Sunday night to Concord and then finish the drive up to Franconia Notch on Monday morning. This worked out well. As a bonus, there was time to swing back by the Beaver Brook Trailhead. I had left one of the side shields to my new sunglasses in the woods where I camp a few weeks back. Thankfully it was easy to find the spot and 15 minutes later I was back at the car with my missing piece. Hooray!
The plan was to stay at Kinsman Pond and I wanted to try some new trails so we parked at the Basin and took the Basin Cascade Trail. I really enjoyed this trail - it climbs steadily but never too steeply and there are lovely cascades along the entire thing. Twenty groups could head up and they could all probably find their own swimming holes. Then we were on the Cascade Brook Trail briefly before peeling off onto the Kinsman Pond Trail. Here we started off in some pine forests before it began to climb steeply. Dank boulder fields covered in wet moss made for slow going and we were both relieved when the trail leveled out just before the pond.
There was only one person at camp, someone deep in the shelter with a barky dog. We set up our tent on one of the platforms and with a light pack set off for the Kinsmans. The weather was clear and lovely up high and the views from N. Kinsman were excellent. We were tired and tried to enjoy a snack on the throne just past S. Kinsman but the bugs had other ideas and we soon had to retreat. The climb back up North is never as bad as it looks and soon we were back at camp which was now alive with activity. A couple families had arrived and taken over several platforms and the caretaker had returned. I learned the person in the shelter was an AT hiker who had sprained their ankle up on the Kinsmans. Now she was looking at a tough hike out the next day.
Ezri immediately crashed in the tent to nap but I was determined to have a swim in the pond. Several kids had found their way to a rock out in the middle and the caretaker had told me to follow the path in the lilies he cut. It was deep enough but the bottom of the pond felt like giant fuzzy spaghetti - an unpleasant sensation. I found a rock amongst the goo and perched on it for a few minutes. We had dinner in the kitchen area and chatted with the injured hiker Fishtank. A couple other thruhikers rolled in - funnily enough they didn't know each other but they were all flipfloppers who started in Shenandoah.
I didn't sleep well in the tent with my basic pad. A sporty thunderstorm came through around 1 AM. By morning everything was in the fog. We took our time packing up and hit the trail around 9 AM. We decided that Fishin' Jimmy might be a little easier to descend than Kinsman Pond - in the end it's hard to say if it was worth it but the promise of a break at the hut motivated Ezri and that was enough reason. It was slow going down Fishin' Jimmy but the weather finally turned as we neared the hut and we emerged into a sunny day.
We had a good rest/refuel at the hut and reunited briefly with the injured AT hiker who left before us. Now all we had left to finish was the 2.5 miles. We started on the Cascade Brook Trail until it hit the Basin Cascade Trail. It was a goodly slog now but we encountered a good number of day hikers over that last mile. You get all kinds of people coming up from the Basin. Near the bottom I could no longer resist the call of the cascades and I went in shoes and all. Delightfully wonderful. By this point Ezri was underfueled and very cranky. So we got back to the car, cleaned up and made our way to Lincoln for a excellent lunch of ice cream and french fries.
The plan was to stay at Kinsman Pond and I wanted to try some new trails so we parked at the Basin and took the Basin Cascade Trail. I really enjoyed this trail - it climbs steadily but never too steeply and there are lovely cascades along the entire thing. Twenty groups could head up and they could all probably find their own swimming holes. Then we were on the Cascade Brook Trail briefly before peeling off onto the Kinsman Pond Trail. Here we started off in some pine forests before it began to climb steeply. Dank boulder fields covered in wet moss made for slow going and we were both relieved when the trail leveled out just before the pond.
There was only one person at camp, someone deep in the shelter with a barky dog. We set up our tent on one of the platforms and with a light pack set off for the Kinsmans. The weather was clear and lovely up high and the views from N. Kinsman were excellent. We were tired and tried to enjoy a snack on the throne just past S. Kinsman but the bugs had other ideas and we soon had to retreat. The climb back up North is never as bad as it looks and soon we were back at camp which was now alive with activity. A couple families had arrived and taken over several platforms and the caretaker had returned. I learned the person in the shelter was an AT hiker who had sprained their ankle up on the Kinsmans. Now she was looking at a tough hike out the next day.
Ezri immediately crashed in the tent to nap but I was determined to have a swim in the pond. Several kids had found their way to a rock out in the middle and the caretaker had told me to follow the path in the lilies he cut. It was deep enough but the bottom of the pond felt like giant fuzzy spaghetti - an unpleasant sensation. I found a rock amongst the goo and perched on it for a few minutes. We had dinner in the kitchen area and chatted with the injured hiker Fishtank. A couple other thruhikers rolled in - funnily enough they didn't know each other but they were all flipfloppers who started in Shenandoah.
I didn't sleep well in the tent with my basic pad. A sporty thunderstorm came through around 1 AM. By morning everything was in the fog. We took our time packing up and hit the trail around 9 AM. We decided that Fishin' Jimmy might be a little easier to descend than Kinsman Pond - in the end it's hard to say if it was worth it but the promise of a break at the hut motivated Ezri and that was enough reason. It was slow going down Fishin' Jimmy but the weather finally turned as we neared the hut and we emerged into a sunny day.
We had a good rest/refuel at the hut and reunited briefly with the injured AT hiker who left before us. Now all we had left to finish was the 2.5 miles. We started on the Cascade Brook Trail until it hit the Basin Cascade Trail. It was a goodly slog now but we encountered a good number of day hikers over that last mile. You get all kinds of people coming up from the Basin. Near the bottom I could no longer resist the call of the cascades and I went in shoes and all. Delightfully wonderful. By this point Ezri was underfueled and very cranky. So we got back to the car, cleaned up and made our way to Lincoln for a excellent lunch of ice cream and french fries.
