SpencerVT
Member
The terrain and experience of hiking three Fishing Brook peaks last week felt exactly like Julie Andrews at the beginning of Sound Of Music.
Open forest. Birds chirping and laying eggs. Babies being born. Rainbows in the sky. Dancing in fields. The hand of God cradling you in gentle woods like a Koala Bear on a Eucalyptus Tree. Tie-dyed butterflies and kittens. Angels strumming harps and ****.
And then I hiked Stewart. Aka the Douche Bag of the Adirondack Sentinel Range.
My wife and I set out on the Old Iron Road out of Wilmington Notch near the entrance to Whiteface ski area. The Old Iron Road was built in 1814 by Archibald McIntyre though the Wilmington notch used to haul Iron Ore to Lake Placid. The road was abandoned in 1854 when the present day Route 86 roadway was built. And the Old Iron Road looked like you might expect a road that hadn't been used for 162 years would look: Totally decrepit, hard to follow, and not more than a minuscule herd path in many places.
After a while down the Old Iron Road, my wife and I followed a nice and easy drainage up to the spine of Stewart. From there though, the rest of the hike was an apocalyptic bombardment of conifer hell.
I call Stewart a dodecahedron on crack because that is what the terrain is like. There seem to be no steady contours. Just a chaotic jumbled landscape of infinite sides and angles, with cliffs, ledges, boulders and relentless Class 4 and 5 conifer thickets.
Let's put it this way, at one point the bushwhacking was so hellacious my wife exclaimed: "You're never touching my vagina again."
I think that statement alone encapsulates the Stewart hiking experience.
However, I was able to get some good peak-out views looking predominately over towards Whiteface. It was a beautiful Fall day.
I think Gargamel's cave from the Smurfs must be on Stewart. This mountain was emotionally, mentally, physically and spiritually debilitating to hike. It's the kind of mountain that could break up a marriage. It's the kind of mountain that could eliminate ISIS. It's the kind of mountain that could shred Kevlar.
Stewart has to be the most improperly named peak I have ever climbed. It needs a much more ominous name like: "Mt. Shattered Dreams", "The Eliminator", "Mt. Hopelessness", or "The Bludgeonator."
A great day. Going to tackle Sentinel next.
Spencer Bigfoot.
At the summit of Stewart. Good Lord.
My wife loves to hike and is an excellent climber, but this relentless terrain got to be overwhelming:
Awesome view on the descent west towards Whiteface:
Open forest. Birds chirping and laying eggs. Babies being born. Rainbows in the sky. Dancing in fields. The hand of God cradling you in gentle woods like a Koala Bear on a Eucalyptus Tree. Tie-dyed butterflies and kittens. Angels strumming harps and ****.
And then I hiked Stewart. Aka the Douche Bag of the Adirondack Sentinel Range.
My wife and I set out on the Old Iron Road out of Wilmington Notch near the entrance to Whiteface ski area. The Old Iron Road was built in 1814 by Archibald McIntyre though the Wilmington notch used to haul Iron Ore to Lake Placid. The road was abandoned in 1854 when the present day Route 86 roadway was built. And the Old Iron Road looked like you might expect a road that hadn't been used for 162 years would look: Totally decrepit, hard to follow, and not more than a minuscule herd path in many places.
After a while down the Old Iron Road, my wife and I followed a nice and easy drainage up to the spine of Stewart. From there though, the rest of the hike was an apocalyptic bombardment of conifer hell.
I call Stewart a dodecahedron on crack because that is what the terrain is like. There seem to be no steady contours. Just a chaotic jumbled landscape of infinite sides and angles, with cliffs, ledges, boulders and relentless Class 4 and 5 conifer thickets.
Let's put it this way, at one point the bushwhacking was so hellacious my wife exclaimed: "You're never touching my vagina again."
I think that statement alone encapsulates the Stewart hiking experience.
However, I was able to get some good peak-out views looking predominately over towards Whiteface. It was a beautiful Fall day.
I think Gargamel's cave from the Smurfs must be on Stewart. This mountain was emotionally, mentally, physically and spiritually debilitating to hike. It's the kind of mountain that could break up a marriage. It's the kind of mountain that could eliminate ISIS. It's the kind of mountain that could shred Kevlar.
Stewart has to be the most improperly named peak I have ever climbed. It needs a much more ominous name like: "Mt. Shattered Dreams", "The Eliminator", "Mt. Hopelessness", or "The Bludgeonator."
A great day. Going to tackle Sentinel next.
Spencer Bigfoot.
At the summit of Stewart. Good Lord.
My wife loves to hike and is an excellent climber, but this relentless terrain got to be overwhelming:
Awesome view on the descent west towards Whiteface:
