DSettahr
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- Apr 23, 2005
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I'm not sure which mountain was my first fire tower mountain. It was either Hadley or Hurricane, both of which I'd climbed while still in High School. Hurricane I've climbed numerous times since, but I had yet to return to Hadley. Additionally, given that the date on which I'd climbed it was prior to the publication of the ADK Fire Tower Guidebook, this initial climb did not count towards the fire tower challenge, and so I had added incentive to revisit this mountain. I decided to take advantage of the opportunity to do so while driving back up north from Albany today.
It looked like Tower Road had not been plowed at all this year when I turned onto it around mid-day, but the layer of snow was thin and there was no shortage of tire tracks traversing the road. Soon, I was at the trailhead, where it appeared that the ample parking area had itself in fact been plowed. Strange!
I grabbed my pack and headed up the trail, stopping to sign in quickly at the register as I passed it. The trail starts out with an even uphill grade that is quite steady. I encountered one icy patch soon after the trail register, but for the most part, the lower section of the trail was quite clear and, despite being a wide path eroded to bedrock in many places, the going was easy. Judging from the register, and the numerous footsteps in the thin layer of snow, this mountain had been a popular destination this past weekend.
This changed when I reached the upper slopes of the trail, prior to reaching the ridge. Here, the trail starts to switchback somewhat, and I once again encountered ice. It was quite thick in spots, and covered most of the rest of the trail up to the ridgeline. I found myself stepping quite carefully to avoid taking a tumble back down the mountain.
Before long, I crested the ridge, and turned south towards the summit, leaving the worst of the ice behind. I soon encountered the "Dear David" sign that, judging from other trip reports and forum pots, appeared quite recently and has perplexed many hikers who have passed by. No one that I know of has been able to figure out what it means. I also saw the remains of the phone line from the tower sticking out of a tree trunk that was doing its best to swallow the metal wire up.
After a short flat section, the trail continued it's uphill climb to the summit. I encounter some more ice, but nothing as bad as what I'd been forced to cross on the lower slopes. I caught glimpses here and there of Great Sacandaga Lake through the trees, and just below the summit, I crossed a lookout that gave some great views to the south.
The snow itself was of some interest up here... in contrast to the thin layer at the base of the mountain, there was several inches at the top. The snow was quite light and fluffy, and covered with a layer of large, thin, fragile ice crystals that looked like nothing I'd ever seen in nature before. The didn't look like snow flakes, but rather some sort of frozen condensation that had formed on top of the snow after it had fallen. Walking through fresh patches of snow dislodged the crystals and caused them to rub against one another, and it sounded a lot like I was walking through piles of broken glass... pretty neat!
At the summit, I stopped to check out the observer's cabin first. The cabin itself is in great shape, and is bolted up tight for the winter. A sign in the parking area indicated there is an interpreter who works on this mountain in the summer, providing environmental education to visitors. I imagine that the cabin is open during this time. Behind the cabin was the remains of a root cellar that were in pretty poor shape, the roof all but caved in.
I then turned my attention to the tower, and the views from the summit. The tower itself is in pretty good shape, but the cab was locked tight. A few of the handrails on the higher landings of the stair case also felt quite rickety, and I'm not sure I would have trusted them to support the weight of my body if I'd leaned against them.
When I climbed Hadley some 10 years ago or so, I remember the summit being socked in with clouds and there not being any available view. Today, I was greeted with the exact opposite... there were only a few clouds in the sky, and these certainly weren't low or numerous enough to block out the view. To the south and the east I could see the lower hills and mountains that line the edge of the Adirondack Park. Great Sacandaga Lake was clearly visible to the southwest. To the east, numerous small mountains dotted the landscape, and I was disappointed when I looked at my map and discovered that they were all on private land, as they looked like they'd be fun to explore. To the northwest, Spruce Mountain dominated most of the view, and it looked like there might be some ledges with decent vantage points near the summit, making this mountain a potentially good one to bushwhack up and explore. To the north, I could clearly make out Crane Mountain, and the ski slopes on Gore Mountain beyond. I couldn't see Lake George to the northeast, but I could see a gap in the mountains and higher elevation terrain where the lake mostly like should be.
As it was already mid-afternoon, and I still had a fair amount of driving left to do, I didn't stay long at the summit, and soon began to make my way back down. The ice was a bit harder to deal with on the decent, and a couple of times I almost slipped before catching myself. I did carry but never used both snowshoes (worthless but I don't mind, the extra weight gives me more of a workout) and crampons, the later of which definitely would have helped on the icy patches, but would've been overkill for the rest of the trail and been obnoxious to constantly put on and take off. I really need to invest in microspikes, which would have been perfect for the conditions I encountered on the trail. As I approached the base of the mountain, I passed a couple on their way up. Hopefully they made it up and back down before nightfall.
After reaching the base, I decided to head north towards Warrensburg to get back to the Northway. I'd never driven Route 2 along the Hudson River before, and it turned out to be a quite scenic drive. The road itself parrallels close to the river, which has carved out a deep valley with steep walls that looks unlike anything else in the Adirondacks!
In summary, there is a lot of ice on the trail, and traction devices like yacktrax, microspikes, or stabilicers are highly recommend until a decent amount of snow falls and covers it up, at which time snowshoes should be fine.
This puts me at 20 out of 29 (maybe 30) for the fire tower challenge... I still have to do Bald, Cathedral Rock, Gore, Loon Lake, Woodhull, and Spruce in the Adirondacks, and Balsam Lake, Red, and Tremper in the Catskills. Loon Lake isn't technically part of the fire tower challenge, but was opened to the public after the guidebook was written. I've been told that Stillwater is also open to the public, but haven't verified this, so this could be #30. Even though they aren't required for the challenge, I'm still hiking them to fulfill my own goal anyways.
Right now my plan is to finish both the fire tower challenge and the Catskill 3500 peaks together on Balsam Lake Mountain!
