The Horn.

[sierra]

Parked on Millbrook rd. and took the Unknown Pond trail to the Kilkenny Ridge trail. Ran into a huge porcupine up on the ridge, people often ask me why my dog is always on a lead, this is just one of the reasons, there is trouble out there for dogs, mine stays out of it. I had my dog wait, while I shood the Porcupine up a tree, he was quite cooperative about it. This is a great hike and our second time doing it. It's a quiet area and the trails are nice, the pond itself is really nice and it's worth sitting on the shore and having lunch. The Horn has definitely seen some action, the side path on the spur that avoids the steep rocks is now a well-established herd path and easy to follow. The Kilkenny Ride trail is Moose alley and there was fresh scat everywhere.

 

[JoshandBaron]

The view of the horn from Bishops Pond is one of my favorites

 

[peakbagger]

I have always been tempted at the potential to run a trail from the low spot between the Bulge and the horn north over to run the length of the Pilot Range. No doubt its spruce/fir hell but definitely a very undervisited range. I have always wondered what happened to the Sloat's cabin on Mt Mary.

 

[JoshandBaron]

I have always been tempted at the potential to run a trail from the low spot between the Bulge and the horn north over to run the length of the Pilot Range. No doubt its spruce/fir hell but definitely a very undervisited range. I have always wondered what happened to the Sloat's cabin on Mt Mary.

Still on maps and trip reports. I haven't seen news of his wife's death so I imagine it remains in the family.

 

[peakbagger]

I was not aware the Sloat's were still involved with the property as the house he used to live in has gone through a couple of owners since he was there.

The Pilot Range was a sad example of how the federal government dropped the ball on picking up a major addition to the WMNF. The majority of land along Lost Nation Road was owned by Diamond International (along with lot of other lands along RT 110 and the majority of Nash Stream). When Sir James Goldschmidt, bought Diamond International and stripped off all the forest land for sale creating Diamond Occidental Forest , the former NH governor, Sununu was in bed with a land developer who was intent on buying the Nash Stream valley (in order to strip the gravel and ship it to southern New England) which took the focus of the conservation community away from Lost Nation. The Lost Nation properties along with blocks of land north of RT 110 all got auctioned off parcel by parcel to mostly clueless buyers at an infamous auction at Bretton Woods around 1988. One of the not so clueless buyers was the infamous Dillon out of Maine who started his reign of clearcutting along Lost Nation road and eventually got the former Brown Company lands in Berlin, Success and Cambridge. The historical imagery on Google Earth is not great but if you look at the images of the Pilots around the early nineties you can see the clearcuts. They were very apparent on the side of the slope from the west for a decade or so. He only stopped short of the ridge line when he ran out of merchantable trees and terrain that could be navigated. Once he cut them off they got snapped up by buyers during another north country land boom. I dont think any of the land is actually managed, if there are any trees left, the owners get conned by loggers who high grade what is left.

The only good thing that came about the DIamond sale was that it got the Northern Forest Initiative funded which eventually put in place some land protection like Lake Umbagog National Wildlife refuge, expansion of Silvio Conte National Wildlife Refuge and the State of Maine purchase of the Nahmakanta Lake former Diamond lands in Maine.

 

[JoshandBaron]

Property maps have it owned by Mt Mary Hut, LLC, incorporated by a C Stuart Sloat in 2016 in Colorado.

 

[peakbagger]

Great, I didnt know those tax maps were on line. I took a look and I couldnt find them on the Northumberland site. Out of curiosity where did you find it?


Good to see a responsible owner still has it under control. Per Coos County planning and zoning rules, the cabin is in high elevation zone so it would be difficult to do much to it.

 

[JoshandBaron]

OnX Maps has a private lands layer with ownership information. Extremely useful.

 

[egilbe]

OnX Maps has a private lands layer with ownership information. Extremely useful.

Gaia maps has the same thing. It keeps me from camping on private property inholdings in vast amounts of BLM and other public land out West.

 

[peakbagger]

Okay, havent seen that one yet, Thanks

 

[skiguy]

This proposed project in the general area would have changed a lot of what the forest would look like today. Willard Basin Ski Area, New Hampshire - New England's Cancelled Ski Areas

 

[Dr. Dasypodidae]

This proposed project in the general area would have changed a lot of what the forest would look like today. Willard Basin Ski Area, New Hampshire - New England's Cancelled Ski Areas

I wondered who would post this one.

On a par with the plans to develop a ski area on the north side of the Bigelows. I think that both projects would have made the recent plans to develop the Balsams look quaint, but maybe Les should have hung around with the Red Sox.

 

[JoshandBaron]

My favorite is the one proposed for Bond. Mt. Bond, New Hampshire - New England's Cancelled Ski Areas