MattC
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- Sep 2, 2004
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After Neil and Dominic's triumphant 46er finish on Saturday Funky Freddy and I
picked up some beer (46er Ale of course!) and headed to the Ark for the celebratory dinner. After dinner everyone was exhausted so Fred and I retired to the luxurious accomodations of my EMS Starlite set up behind the Ark. Neil pointed out that we would have the sound of the Ausable East Branch behind us. It occured to me that we had fallen asleep the last two nights at Wilmington Notch with the Ausable West Branch behind us-cosmic...
We rose Sunday morning and broke camp once again, this time headed back to Lake Placid, where we had a delicious breakfast at the Downtown Diner and had great service in spite of the fact that the waitress was getting slammed. Then we headed over to the ADK Loj campsite, where we would spend our last night. After checking to make sure there were sites available, we were off on the nature trail around Heart Lake. The hardwoods were really starting to blaze-you could almost see the colors change before your eyes. Soon we were off on the Old Nye Ski Trail, which seemed to segue almost unoticeably into the herd path. In addition to the obvious nature of this trail, we had good info courtesy of the recently departed Barbara McMartin. Some nice large cedars along the trail, just like she wrote.
We had to take off the boots for a bracing crossing in the cool waters of Indian Pass Brook. After getting over and re-booting we checked out the beaver-affected area right nearby and continued on. As we began traveling again I noted an odd pain in my left toes, but it wasn't too bad. After a brief section away from the water, we picked up the little tributary and followed it for a while.
This trail has some wet areas, but overall is in pretty good shape for a herd path-big thanks to Pete Hickey and his trail crew colleagues. We were able to really appreciate the hard work they put in as we went through the blowdown areas. There's even some switchbacks and rockwork is the lower hardwood areas. There's a little flat area with a sharp turn, and just a little ways above that we had a nice view from a lookout rock. Then we slogged on to the cairn-marked junction. On the way up we saw four young guys headed down, one w/ his arm in a sling! All of a sudded, we remembered that we also had seen him the day before on Giant/RPR. Maybe he's going for the 46-w/ an injured arm patch or something.
Nye came first. We had lunch and were briefly joined by another solo hiker, a speedy guy from Vermont. On the way over to Street, Freddy stopped us for a second to listen to an interesting bird call that neither of us could identify.
As we neared the summit, my toes started to hurt a lot more. We checked out one lookout area, which was small and occupied by two other hikers, so then we found another. This one was a short ways from the summit and it had a breathtaking view of the MacIntyre Range. We sat in the sun and let our eyes follow the creases in Algonquin down into Indian Pass. With the map out, I realized that the mound over to our right was Lost Pond Peak-Rik had told us the day before about listening to Neil play flute there. Wild. Freddy had out his binocs and spotted the fire tower on Adams.
On the down side, I took off my left boot and saw that the middle toe was an interesting shade of purple and a bit swollen. I realized I had probably broken or sprained it crossing the brook earlier. My theory is that I jammed it on a rock, but the cold water had numbed it sufficiently that I didn't feel it when it happened. Anyway, anyone who's ever had a broken toe knows there's not much you can do about it, so...
After wallowing in the view a little longer we headed back down. The toe was definitely hurting, but the poles helped a lot, and fortunately it wasn't a ridiculous death march back to camp. On the way back we spotted some stuff we had missed before-the old enamel pots and cast iron stove, the rusty sled remains and the side trail that gives one a better view of the beavery area. Freddy continued to photographically document everything.
The re-crossing of Indian Pass Brook went well and we then took a short break, admiring the almost painful beauty of this place. Or maybe that was the pain in my toe... Darkness was creeping up through the forest as we got back to Heart Lake and found our way to site # 28. After a shower and dinner, I was gone. Four nights in a tent in the ADKs and not a drop of rain. Luck was really w/ us on this trip.
Monday morning we hung around Heart Lake pickin' our guitars and singin' songs and diggin' the foliage. It was hard to be there on yet another perfect fall day w/o climbing something, but I figured it was wise to let the purple toe rest a bit and Freddy was understanding. We had planned to go climb Hurricane, but it'll have to wait. After our Heart Lake jam session we checked out at noon and made the traditional trip to the Noonmark for lunch.
Then it was drive like the wind...sigh...farewell, High Peaks, until we meet again...
Matt
picked up some beer (46er Ale of course!) and headed to the Ark for the celebratory dinner. After dinner everyone was exhausted so Fred and I retired to the luxurious accomodations of my EMS Starlite set up behind the Ark. Neil pointed out that we would have the sound of the Ausable East Branch behind us. It occured to me that we had fallen asleep the last two nights at Wilmington Notch with the Ausable West Branch behind us-cosmic...
We rose Sunday morning and broke camp once again, this time headed back to Lake Placid, where we had a delicious breakfast at the Downtown Diner and had great service in spite of the fact that the waitress was getting slammed. Then we headed over to the ADK Loj campsite, where we would spend our last night. After checking to make sure there were sites available, we were off on the nature trail around Heart Lake. The hardwoods were really starting to blaze-you could almost see the colors change before your eyes. Soon we were off on the Old Nye Ski Trail, which seemed to segue almost unoticeably into the herd path. In addition to the obvious nature of this trail, we had good info courtesy of the recently departed Barbara McMartin. Some nice large cedars along the trail, just like she wrote.
We had to take off the boots for a bracing crossing in the cool waters of Indian Pass Brook. After getting over and re-booting we checked out the beaver-affected area right nearby and continued on. As we began traveling again I noted an odd pain in my left toes, but it wasn't too bad. After a brief section away from the water, we picked up the little tributary and followed it for a while.
This trail has some wet areas, but overall is in pretty good shape for a herd path-big thanks to Pete Hickey and his trail crew colleagues. We were able to really appreciate the hard work they put in as we went through the blowdown areas. There's even some switchbacks and rockwork is the lower hardwood areas. There's a little flat area with a sharp turn, and just a little ways above that we had a nice view from a lookout rock. Then we slogged on to the cairn-marked junction. On the way up we saw four young guys headed down, one w/ his arm in a sling! All of a sudded, we remembered that we also had seen him the day before on Giant/RPR. Maybe he's going for the 46-w/ an injured arm patch or something.
Nye came first. We had lunch and were briefly joined by another solo hiker, a speedy guy from Vermont. On the way over to Street, Freddy stopped us for a second to listen to an interesting bird call that neither of us could identify.
As we neared the summit, my toes started to hurt a lot more. We checked out one lookout area, which was small and occupied by two other hikers, so then we found another. This one was a short ways from the summit and it had a breathtaking view of the MacIntyre Range. We sat in the sun and let our eyes follow the creases in Algonquin down into Indian Pass. With the map out, I realized that the mound over to our right was Lost Pond Peak-Rik had told us the day before about listening to Neil play flute there. Wild. Freddy had out his binocs and spotted the fire tower on Adams.
On the down side, I took off my left boot and saw that the middle toe was an interesting shade of purple and a bit swollen. I realized I had probably broken or sprained it crossing the brook earlier. My theory is that I jammed it on a rock, but the cold water had numbed it sufficiently that I didn't feel it when it happened. Anyway, anyone who's ever had a broken toe knows there's not much you can do about it, so...
After wallowing in the view a little longer we headed back down. The toe was definitely hurting, but the poles helped a lot, and fortunately it wasn't a ridiculous death march back to camp. On the way back we spotted some stuff we had missed before-the old enamel pots and cast iron stove, the rusty sled remains and the side trail that gives one a better view of the beavery area. Freddy continued to photographically document everything.
The re-crossing of Indian Pass Brook went well and we then took a short break, admiring the almost painful beauty of this place. Or maybe that was the pain in my toe... Darkness was creeping up through the forest as we got back to Heart Lake and found our way to site # 28. After a shower and dinner, I was gone. Four nights in a tent in the ADKs and not a drop of rain. Luck was really w/ us on this trip.
Monday morning we hung around Heart Lake pickin' our guitars and singin' songs and diggin' the foliage. It was hard to be there on yet another perfect fall day w/o climbing something, but I figured it was wise to let the purple toe rest a bit and Freddy was understanding. We had planned to go climb Hurricane, but it'll have to wait. After our Heart Lake jam session we checked out at noon and made the traditional trip to the Noonmark for lunch.
Then it was drive like the wind...sigh...farewell, High Peaks, until we meet again...
Matt
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