Tri P via Pine Bend Brook Trail 7/17/05

[LenDawg]

On Sunday, BPSchroeder and I hiked up the tripyramids via the Pine Bend Brook Trail off the Kanc. We both drove past the starting point so we began heading up around 9:30. Brian did an extra mile and a half in order to jog back and get his camera, always good to have. The trail was a little muddy at the bottom as it crosses by Pine Bend Brook and around to the beginning of the steeper climbing. I keep hearing about the slides (and I'm sure they are incredible), but this trail is fairly steep in its own right. It certainly isn't a bare slab of exposed rock, but it certainly gets your heart pounding. It was very warm and humid. O'cast skies with some light mist at times. Very little visibility throughout the hike. Mesquitos were everywhere! Buggy and Muggy!

I really liked the ridge crossing before the final push up the north mountain. It was like a hallway of trees. The mist and passing of low clouds added a touch mystique to this sight. We hiked up all three sumits, stopping at the middle peak to eat lunch. We were joined by a friendly group of two ladies and a man who were doing both slides.

When we got to the south peak, we ran into someone who was looking for his beagle. Apparently, he and his son lost the dog late Saturday night. A ranger had seen the dog earlier on Sunday, but nobody else had seen the dog. I hope he was found.

The hike down was fairly quick and uneventful. Both BP and I flew through our fluids on the hike returning to the cars around 1630. I enjoyed the hike, despite the clouds limiting any visibility and the humidity. The people we met kept us abreast of the other trail conditions. I'm glad to get those two done, but by the sound of all the posts, I have to try the slides!

 

[bpschroder]

LenDawg! You beat me to my own trip report!

Okay's here's mine.... and pictures are here

I had a sleepy start to this hike. First I got a call from LenDawg early in the morning saying that he was running late and would be about 15 to 20 minutes late. I thought great, I’ll be a little late too, so no problem. The next thing I knew I was heading down the Kanc after the Pass and wondering where the Pine Bend Brook Trail was. Whoops! I had driven right past it. I guess LenDawg didn’t see me speed by him the wrong way. I turned around and got to the trailhead a few minutes after he did. We took some time to get ready and hit the trail around 9:45 then after about 15 minutes I remembered that I forgot my camera so, I ran back to get it. After running to the car and back I think I finally woke up and by this time was already drenched with sweat.

It was a hot and humid day with foggy misty summits for the rest of the hike. The Pine Brook Bend Trail has an easy section at first, but then has a steep ascent until you reach the junction with the Scaur Ridge Trail. Before the rocky and steep section of the trail watch out for a large bog of mud that will swallow your boots up to your ankles. Bugs swarmed us the entire way up every time we stopped to catch our breath or drink water. I wondered how they could bite me with all the sweat dripping off of me! This trail seems less used than most and a lot of the rocks are slippery and green with growth.. If this was a rainy day we would have slipped constantly.

Once we reached a flat section before the final ascent to the summit, I bumped into a father and daughter I had seen the day before when hiking Carrigain. They joked that I was stalking them around the White Mountains and we all agreed that the Pine Brook Bend Trail was a harder climb than Carrigain the day before. We wished them well and made our way to the summit of North Tripyramid. The summit was enclosed in low clouds, fog and lots of bugs so we continued on to Middle Tripyramid where we sat and ate lunch. LenDawg always carries a sub to the summit, but today he actually had two! He offered one of them to me, but I held off thinking of making my pack lighter by eating some of the various snacks I always carry. Some fellow hikers joined us on the summit and we enjoyed their company while we searched for a view. For one brief moment we saw Passaconaway in the distance, but that was it for views. This was my second time to the Tripyramids and now both times I had no view.

LenDawg and I headed for South Tripyramid just to for fun and so we could say we hiked the Tripyramids and not Bipyramid. At the south summit we ran across two hikers who had lost their beagle near the south summit the day before. They said a ranger had seen him near the south slide, but the dog ran off. We wished them luck finding their lost dog as we hadn’t seen or heard a trace of him. We returned the way we came and when we arrived at the north summit we heard voices nearby. The group we had shared lunch with was trying to find the Tripyrmamid Loop Trail down to the north slide and was attempting to bushwack down off the clearing near the summit. We both consulted the map for a minute and it looked correct, but as we headed down we noticed the loop trail splits off slightly after the summit to the left. We hollered back and soon they were on the correct trail. I kept thinking to myself “why would anyone go down the slide?”

We made a quick descent down to the Kanc arriving just after 4:30. It was partly sunny down near the road and I thought it had cleared up, but the summits where still in the clouds. It would be just my luck if they had cleared as I drove away. I changed out of my wet and sweaty clothes and LenDawg was off for his long drive down to CT. It was already late in the day and we had talked about hiking Tecumseh, but with a long drive ahead of him LenDawg needed to head home.

 

[Sherpa John]

like two peas in a pod