H
HikerBob
Guest
Where do you go when the day promises no views?
To a summit with no views, of course
My original plan for the day was to climb Moriah via the Stoney Brook trail and meet up with Farmer Bob et al who were to ascend via the Carter Moriah trail. Hope you guys had a good day.
Any way, the forecast was for mostly cloudy with snow showers so I said to myself "Self, go hither to a mountain with no view and it won't matter that there be no view."
So Waumbek it would be. Picked up Karen for company and headed up later than my usual time, arriving at the trailhead around 9:30.
OK - Whine alert. I was ticked off to find that someone had parked a truck in the last, unplowed section of the access road to the parking lot. A TRUCK. My old Camry would have had no trouble with the two inches of snow on the road. A TRUCK. <sigh>
There being no other place to park I had to back down the road, go out onto Rte 2 and park at the memorial down the road. This would add another mile to the days trek. Whine over.
The day was grey to start although the sun did peek through a couple of times. We bare booted most of the way to the summit of Starr King but donned snowshoes for the last stretch. Although never really steep this trail goes on, and on and on. Seemed like we would never make the turn leading to the summit, but of course we finally did.
The sun was long gone and it was snowing on the summit as we had a gorp and glug break. Of course we ignored the polite tweeting of the Canadian Jays... Oh, OK. We gave them just a little, but I told them that they had got me into trouble and they had better be nice to other folk. These were indeed very polite and patient.
Looked at the watch to find it was 1:45. Still a good 2 miles out and back to Waumbek and then the return trip. We decided to head on but would turn back if we hadn't made it to Waumbek by 3pm. I figured we should be able to do the ridge in that time fairly easily.
We had met the truck guys on their way back down and they said they had tracked out the route along the ridge. I didn't pay this much heed but as we made our way across we came to a spot where two trails diverged. One following the blazes, the other off to the left, more on the ridge. I decided we would follow the blazes. It was snowing quite a bit and I preferred having some additional way markings.
The blazed trail dips down the side of the ridge giving us much more of a climb up to Waumbek. We made it to the summit by 2:30. Well, I never found an actual summit sign only a trail sign pointing back the way we had come. This was also the spot that everyone else turned around at and the trail did descend from that point on so I'm assuming it was the summit!
It was snowing quite heavily by then and getting much colder. Despite the calendar it was still winter up there. Took a couple of pictures and then we headed back. On the return leg we followed the ridge bushwack and found it to be much less of an elevation change but a little less packed out. Snowshoes were necessary.
Got back to the old fireplace on Starr King and had a quick gorp and glug break in the persistant snow and then headed on down. At least it would be all down from now on. The trail wended its way down and down and our legs got more and more tired. We kept our snowshoes on all the way to the parking lot. They saved us from many a hidden post hole and afforded the opportunity for a little powder surfing on the steeper spots.
Got back to the car at 5:15. Seven hours for an eight mile round trip including stops, about right for my pace. A long day and a viewless day but a fun day all the same. Any day in the mountains is a good day
Pictures start here
Bob
To a summit with no views, of course
My original plan for the day was to climb Moriah via the Stoney Brook trail and meet up with Farmer Bob et al who were to ascend via the Carter Moriah trail. Hope you guys had a good day.
Any way, the forecast was for mostly cloudy with snow showers so I said to myself "Self, go hither to a mountain with no view and it won't matter that there be no view."
So Waumbek it would be. Picked up Karen for company and headed up later than my usual time, arriving at the trailhead around 9:30.
OK - Whine alert. I was ticked off to find that someone had parked a truck in the last, unplowed section of the access road to the parking lot. A TRUCK. My old Camry would have had no trouble with the two inches of snow on the road. A TRUCK. <sigh>
There being no other place to park I had to back down the road, go out onto Rte 2 and park at the memorial down the road. This would add another mile to the days trek. Whine over.
The day was grey to start although the sun did peek through a couple of times. We bare booted most of the way to the summit of Starr King but donned snowshoes for the last stretch. Although never really steep this trail goes on, and on and on. Seemed like we would never make the turn leading to the summit, but of course we finally did.
The sun was long gone and it was snowing on the summit as we had a gorp and glug break. Of course we ignored the polite tweeting of the Canadian Jays... Oh, OK. We gave them just a little, but I told them that they had got me into trouble and they had better be nice to other folk. These were indeed very polite and patient.
Looked at the watch to find it was 1:45. Still a good 2 miles out and back to Waumbek and then the return trip. We decided to head on but would turn back if we hadn't made it to Waumbek by 3pm. I figured we should be able to do the ridge in that time fairly easily.
We had met the truck guys on their way back down and they said they had tracked out the route along the ridge. I didn't pay this much heed but as we made our way across we came to a spot where two trails diverged. One following the blazes, the other off to the left, more on the ridge. I decided we would follow the blazes. It was snowing quite a bit and I preferred having some additional way markings.
The blazed trail dips down the side of the ridge giving us much more of a climb up to Waumbek. We made it to the summit by 2:30. Well, I never found an actual summit sign only a trail sign pointing back the way we had come. This was also the spot that everyone else turned around at and the trail did descend from that point on so I'm assuming it was the summit!
It was snowing quite heavily by then and getting much colder. Despite the calendar it was still winter up there. Took a couple of pictures and then we headed back. On the return leg we followed the ridge bushwack and found it to be much less of an elevation change but a little less packed out. Snowshoes were necessary.
Got back to the old fireplace on Starr King and had a quick gorp and glug break in the persistant snow and then headed on down. At least it would be all down from now on. The trail wended its way down and down and our legs got more and more tired. We kept our snowshoes on all the way to the parking lot. They saved us from many a hidden post hole and afforded the opportunity for a little powder surfing on the steeper spots.
Got back to the car at 5:15. Seven hours for an eight mile round trip including stops, about right for my pace. A long day and a viewless day but a fun day all the same. Any day in the mountains is a good day
Pictures start here
Bob
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