Missing hiker

[carole]

WMUR - Hoping for a good outcome.

 

[RoySwkr]

found OK, see above

 

[audrey]

I've heard a number of stories about people getting confused in that area (not sure if that was his problem).
One day we came back down to the Wonalancet parking lot to find a young couple wandering around...seems they got turned around and descended the wrong side, their car being parked at the Oliverian Brook Trail. They showed us the stupid tourist map they had gotten from somewhere along the Kanc. It showed the trails on the north side of the Sandwich Range stopping short at the height of land as though they were dead ends.

 

[Amicus]

I climbed the Kelley Trail two weeks ago, for the first time, for red-lining purposes, as the first leg of a loop to Square Ledge that included also part of the Oliverian Brook, Square Ledge Branch, Square Ledge and Old Mast Trails. The Kelley Trail climbs from near Ferncroft to Paugus Pass, where it joins the south end of the Oliverian Brook Tr.

The article says he was found 2 miles from the trailhead and the Trail is only 2.3 miles long, so I gather he was in the steep upper section, which actually follows Kelley Brook. The Brook is small but its ravine disproportionately steep, as it was the outlet for enormous, glacial Lake Albany for a while about 10,000 years ago, until enough glacial ice melted for the Swift River to form. There was no ice two weeks ago, and for the last half-mile I was glad of that. Here is a photo I took a little below that stretch:

It is good to hear that he declined a trip to the hospital. I hope we hear more about what happened. (The Trail was well marked with the blue blazes of WODC.)

 

[carole]

I hope we hear more about what happened.

Perhaps he ran into the same problem as this hiker on the Hancock trail.