buckyball1
New member
edit--i have no clue if one can edit a title 
--Horseshoe Pond Peak is Peak 2620+ (Lake Parlin), not Boundary Marker 381
As we winged our way home thru Jackman yesterday afternoon from a relaxing few days in Quebec City, it felt odd knowing i'd be back in about 12 hours...burning the candle at both ends these days--the weather is so much better this year than last May/June (i was really soaked on most whacks early in 2009 season) that i feel the need to "go" whenever possible.
Sure enough, i passed through Jackman about 5AM today and was soon near
Sandy Stream-2910'--I had several possible routes scoped out for this, but intended to try it from the south using the Dummus Rd off Rt 201. The route looked OK, but there appeared to be some cliffs higher up so i decided to take the "sure thing" route (thanks Herb F for beta) and approached the mountain from the north side on an OK logging road off Rt 210. I couldn't get quite as close as planned (pulled culverts/big rocks), but found a good parking area and off i went.
As Herb told me, the route was through fairly open woods with ugly hobblebush here and there (and lots of deep purple trillium)--being "Spring", it was pretty wet. Fast going, got a bit steeper/thicker and then turned "humpy", but no real issues-small, isolated pockets of snow. I reached the open, but very limited view top and there was no jar-only a ginger ale bottle stuck on a limb at the high point. I forgot Herb had suggested i take a new jar: I still did a pretty thorough jar search, but of course came up empty.
Descent was rapid; headed out toward Rt 201 and ran into the Border Patrol-yikes . No big deal, just had a good chat with the agent who i suspect had scoped my car (i always leave a "this is who i am/what i'm doing" sign). I drove south on RT 201 to Dennistown (nothing there), turned west onto the Holeb Rd for 6 miles (good dirt) and worked my way north off the Holeb on some lesser logging roads toward the Swath
Boundary Marker 381-2670' I had planned to work my way in another 6 miles off the Holeb Rd, park as close to the Swath as possible, bushwhack to the Swath and head for "381". Unfortunately the last road was "rocked" (too bad, excellent drivability), so i parked and walked toward my planned start point. After about a mile, i knew i was walking "past" the straigth shot line to the top and decided to head into the woods and "up" rather than loop around on my original route....probably not a wise choice as i could see it was steep and it was not on my potential route plans i leave at home for every hike.
The new plan worked fine-route a bit steep here and there and a lot of "high bog", but not too bad. I crossed a number of old skid roads as i ascended, but none went my way and they were all pretty ugly. I hit the Swath east of BM 380 (it's a ground level disc marker) and found the Swath heavily overgrown, harder going than some of the ascent. There was a very steep section right after BM 380 and a few quick up/down places. Boundary marker 381 is a mini-Washington Monument type.
So where's the "jar"? I was pretty sure it's there, but had no clue as to location. Of course being alone all day makes me a bit crazy now and then and i didn't have the best search pattern/thought process. I tried along the Swath til it turned sharply west. I searched several "ribs" radiating from the Swath on the US side. I even considered it might be in Canadian side woods-really stupid idea, but i told you i can get a bit loony. After too much thrashing, I found the JP pill bottle---as expected, only his signature in the register. Let's just say it's within hailing distance of BM 381 and is relatively "new". The rest i leave to the reader as an exercise. The black flies were terrible....then back to Rt 201, pretty tired, but decide to try south thru Jackman, almost to Lake Parlin and
Horseshoe Pond aka Pt 2620+ 2630'-I figure this is the "easy" one for the day-possible routes from North or East. After scoping the peak yesterday, i choose North side-and i will be sorry. The road in is decent dirt/rock-parked almost as far in as i hoped. I thought i could find an old log road, followed by a skid road and then a relatively easy whack to the top. I won't belabor all my bad choices, but i ended up just going straight for the top through the woods-OK for about 1/3 of the way, but then very thick, very hot and clouds of black flies-slow, tortuous going; wished i were anywhere else. It thinned a bit higher up, became non-directional "rolling" (would have been a bit hard to find top easily w/o a GPS spot) and again very wet/boggy.
Imagine my surprise as i neared the top to find there were fresh skid roads all over the place from the East approach leading almost to the summit The top is heavily wooded, filled with downed trees with NO views. This time i conducted a systematic search for the jar i hoped would be there. There were a few candidate humps close to one another, one almost surely "it" (GPS and altimeter reading). I'm familiar with how the person who places most of these "lower than 3k" "jars" does it (type/tree choice/location) so i'm pretty sure the jar is gone if it was there. Vanished jar seems a frequent occurrence when logging activity comes close enough to a secluded top to make "accidental discovery" feasible. Descent was a bit better than "up", but i wished i had chosen "South"
a quick thanks to the handful of people who periodically help me with beta/thoughts on some of these peaks (along with all the strangers i call)-i really appreciate your advice
thoroughly whipped tonight
jim
--Horseshoe Pond Peak is Peak 2620+ (Lake Parlin), not Boundary Marker 381As we winged our way home thru Jackman yesterday afternoon from a relaxing few days in Quebec City, it felt odd knowing i'd be back in about 12 hours...burning the candle at both ends these days--the weather is so much better this year than last May/June (i was really soaked on most whacks early in 2009 season) that i feel the need to "go" whenever possible.
Sure enough, i passed through Jackman about 5AM today and was soon near
Sandy Stream-2910'--I had several possible routes scoped out for this, but intended to try it from the south using the Dummus Rd off Rt 201. The route looked OK, but there appeared to be some cliffs higher up so i decided to take the "sure thing" route (thanks Herb F for beta) and approached the mountain from the north side on an OK logging road off Rt 210. I couldn't get quite as close as planned (pulled culverts/big rocks), but found a good parking area and off i went.
As Herb told me, the route was through fairly open woods with ugly hobblebush here and there (and lots of deep purple trillium)--being "Spring", it was pretty wet. Fast going, got a bit steeper/thicker and then turned "humpy", but no real issues-small, isolated pockets of snow. I reached the open, but very limited view top and there was no jar-only a ginger ale bottle stuck on a limb at the high point. I forgot Herb had suggested i take a new jar:
I still did a pretty thorough jar search, but of course came up empty.Descent was rapid; headed out toward Rt 201 and ran into the Border Patrol-yikes . No big deal, just had a good chat with the agent who i suspect had scoped my car (i always leave a "this is who i am/what i'm doing" sign). I drove south on RT 201 to Dennistown (nothing there), turned west onto the Holeb Rd for 6 miles (good dirt) and worked my way north off the Holeb on some lesser logging roads toward the Swath
Boundary Marker 381-2670' I had planned to work my way in another 6 miles off the Holeb Rd, park as close to the Swath as possible, bushwhack to the Swath and head for "381". Unfortunately the last road was "rocked" (too bad, excellent drivability), so i parked and walked toward my planned start point. After about a mile, i knew i was walking "past" the straigth shot line to the top and decided to head into the woods and "up" rather than loop around on my original route....probably not a wise choice as i could see it was steep and it was not on my potential route plans i leave at home for every hike.
The new plan worked fine-route a bit steep here and there and a lot of "high bog", but not too bad. I crossed a number of old skid roads as i ascended, but none went my way and they were all pretty ugly. I hit the Swath east of BM 380 (it's a ground level disc marker) and found the Swath heavily overgrown, harder going than some of the ascent. There was a very steep section right after BM 380 and a few quick up/down places. Boundary marker 381 is a mini-Washington Monument type.
So where's the "jar"? I was pretty sure it's there, but had no clue as to location. Of course being alone all day makes me a bit crazy now and then and i didn't have the best search pattern/thought process. I tried along the Swath til it turned sharply west. I searched several "ribs" radiating from the Swath on the US side. I even considered it might be in Canadian side woods-really stupid idea, but i told you i can get a bit loony. After too much thrashing, I found the JP pill bottle---as expected, only his signature in the register. Let's just say it's within hailing distance of BM 381 and is relatively "new". The rest i leave to the reader as an exercise
. The black flies were terrible....then back to Rt 201, pretty tired, but decide to try south thru Jackman, almost to Lake Parlin and Horseshoe Pond aka Pt 2620+ 2630'
-I figure this is the "easy" one for the day-possible routes from North or East. After scoping the peak yesterday, i choose North side-and i will be sorry. The road in is decent dirt/rock-parked almost as far in as i hoped. I thought i could find an old log road, followed by a skid road and then a relatively easy whack to the top. I won't belabor all my bad choices, but i ended up just going straight for the top through the woods-OK for about 1/3 of the way, but then very thick, very hot and clouds of black flies-slow, tortuous going; wished i were anywhere else. It thinned a bit higher up, became non-directional "rolling" (would have been a bit hard to find top easily w/o a GPS spot) and again very wet/boggy. Imagine my surprise as i neared the top to find there were fresh skid roads all over the place from the East approach leading almost to the summit
The top is heavily wooded, filled with downed trees with NO views. This time i conducted a systematic search for the jar i hoped would be there. There were a few candidate humps close to one another, one almost surely "it" (GPS and altimeter reading). I'm familiar with how the person who places most of these "lower than 3k" "jars" does it (type/tree choice/location) so i'm pretty sure the jar is gone if it was there. Vanished jar seems a frequent occurrence when logging activity comes close enough to a secluded top to make "accidental discovery" feasible. Descent was a bit better than "up", but i wished i had chosen "South"a quick thanks to the handful of people who periodically help me with beta/thoughts on some of these peaks (along with all the strangers i call
)-i really appreciate your advicethoroughly whipped tonight
jim
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