DreamFarmer
Active member
Friday morning my son Zack and I left Boston, NY and headed for the Adirondacks.
Tyler couldn’t make it because of work . We decided along the way to skip doing the Sewards and take a shot at Redfield , Cliff, and maybe Skylight and Gray.
We arrived around 2PM at the Loj and checked the register to see if we could make a guess at getting a L/T, preferably Avalanche L/T. It was looking good since most of the people who registered appeared to be day-hikers.
We took a little while to get loaded up, but I think we made the vacant Avalanche L/T about 5 PM .
We set up camp and started “dinner”. Two hikers showed up but declined our invitation to share the L/T with us. They pitched their tent back in the woods for both nights.
We were both tired and were looking forward to “hitting the bag”. Zack had a new “0 degree” bag made for people up to 6’8” and I had my 10lb behemoth rated to -30.
By 8 PM we were in our bags, snuggling our hot water bottles and basking in the anticipation of a good nights sleep.
Beneath our bags were foam pads and air mattresses. My air mattress leaked and I began bottoming out to the foam pad about 1:30 AM …oh well….at least I was warm.
It was somewhere in the teens (both nights) and a deep frost covered everything in the morning . We had oatmeal, coffee and some trail mix and got going by 8AM, heading for Redfield first. I guessed this would be the easiest and safest one to try first having to work with the icy conditions. It took us until 10:30 to get to Uphill L/T. Then we headed up Redfield which took about 4 hours round-trip because of the ice on the rocks along the water. It’s a tough little hike ,ice or no ice.
We cooked up a hot lunch and had some hot drinks at the Uphill L/T where we left our packs and headed up Cliff (about 3:30PM). The round trip took about 2 hours and then we returned for another break and grabbed our packs. You really do a full body workout heading up the cliffs on Cliff. The top section is nice though.
It was a great day for views and very calm.
From Uphill L/T back to our camp was mostly done with headlamps and flashlights. The temperature was dropping and things were beginning to get slippery. We were moving slower and slower as the time wore on. By 8PM we were “home” to our camp where dry clothes, hot food and warm sleeping bags awaited.
We had a bit of a scare when our neighbors started yelling and making a bunch of noise.
I figured, uh-oh, here we go with a bear visit. I readied my little “stadium horn” posied to
lay waste to mammalian ear drums throughout the valley.
Our neighbors were in their tent and there was something large circling around their tent.
It wouldn’t go away and finally it yelped.
It turned out to be a dog belonging to some other campers, farther back in the woods.
We “hit the bag” around 10PM and slept well. Sunday morning was leisurely because all we had to do was break camp and head out to the Loj. When I “checked out”, I counted 260 parties had signed the register after us.
Tyler couldn’t make it because of work . We decided along the way to skip doing the Sewards and take a shot at Redfield , Cliff, and maybe Skylight and Gray.
We arrived around 2PM at the Loj and checked the register to see if we could make a guess at getting a L/T, preferably Avalanche L/T. It was looking good since most of the people who registered appeared to be day-hikers.
We took a little while to get loaded up, but I think we made the vacant Avalanche L/T about 5 PM .
We set up camp and started “dinner”. Two hikers showed up but declined our invitation to share the L/T with us. They pitched their tent back in the woods for both nights.
We were both tired and were looking forward to “hitting the bag”. Zack had a new “0 degree” bag made for people up to 6’8” and I had my 10lb behemoth rated to -30.
By 8 PM we were in our bags, snuggling our hot water bottles and basking in the anticipation of a good nights sleep.
Beneath our bags were foam pads and air mattresses. My air mattress leaked and I began bottoming out to the foam pad about 1:30 AM …oh well….at least I was warm.
It was somewhere in the teens (both nights) and a deep frost covered everything in the morning . We had oatmeal, coffee and some trail mix and got going by 8AM, heading for Redfield first. I guessed this would be the easiest and safest one to try first having to work with the icy conditions. It took us until 10:30 to get to Uphill L/T. Then we headed up Redfield which took about 4 hours round-trip because of the ice on the rocks along the water. It’s a tough little hike ,ice or no ice.
We cooked up a hot lunch and had some hot drinks at the Uphill L/T where we left our packs and headed up Cliff (about 3:30PM). The round trip took about 2 hours and then we returned for another break and grabbed our packs. You really do a full body workout heading up the cliffs on Cliff. The top section is nice though.
It was a great day for views and very calm.
From Uphill L/T back to our camp was mostly done with headlamps and flashlights. The temperature was dropping and things were beginning to get slippery. We were moving slower and slower as the time wore on. By 8PM we were “home” to our camp where dry clothes, hot food and warm sleeping bags awaited.
We had a bit of a scare when our neighbors started yelling and making a bunch of noise.
I figured, uh-oh, here we go with a bear visit. I readied my little “stadium horn” posied to
lay waste to mammalian ear drums throughout the valley.
Our neighbors were in their tent and there was something large circling around their tent.
It wouldn’t go away and finally it yelped.
It turned out to be a dog belonging to some other campers, farther back in the woods.
We “hit the bag” around 10PM and slept well. Sunday morning was leisurely because all we had to do was break camp and head out to the Loj. When I “checked out”, I counted 260 parties had signed the register after us.
