First of all, I want to thank all that contributed to my thread "Rain all Weekend". As always, I received some pretty good advice:
"stay in bed"
"you don't know what the weather will be like until you get to the trailhead".
"watch out for stream crossings"
6/18 - We arrrived in Lincoln at about 11:30pm and grabbed the last room available at the White mountain motel. Stayed up until 2:00 finalizing gear, etc.
6/19 - Not surprisingly, we awoke to a drizzle and made our way to the Downs Brook Trailhead at 9:00am. I tried without success to talk my hiking partner out of this decision last night. Apparently, the White mountain trail description discussing 10 stream/river crossings with some "impassable" at high waters did not deter the ignorant.
We were the only hikers on this trail that day. Everyone else had a brain in their head. Book time on the trail to the intersection of Kate Sleeper and Downs Brook is approximately 3 hours and 40 minutes - projecting arrival at 1:00pm (conservatively). We did not arrive at the junction until 3:30pm.
The first of ten river crossings would have required boot removal so we decided to bushwack up the left side for a mile or so until we came to another stream crossing. (I think we bypassed two or three crossings). We arrived at a crossing that was not fast but deep (4 feet in most places). After 5 minutes of trying to find a place to pass, I turned around to find my partner taking a wet dead (devoid of bark) tree branch and placing over the stream. To my amazement, he successfully crossed the stream.
My turn...Lesson learned here...if you are not fully committed to a task in the whites don't attempt it or you will pay dearly. Half way across my foot slipped and in I go head first with full pack heading down stream.
We still have 90% of our trip to do and I was as wet as a suba diver. At this point, it was raining fairly hard. I re-grouped, took the boots off poured out the water, wrung out my wet socks (only had one other dry pair), put the now 5 pound boots back on and off we went. I would say of the 10 stream crossings we had to wade knee or higher deep in 6 of them.
For me it was easy - after getting soaked - I did not give a *$#@. My partner, however, was determined to keep the feet dry so he barefooted it across. We spent a lot of extra time trying to find safe passage. At one point, it seemed like it was going to actually be harder to go back then to go forward. The water was rising steadly and becoming faster. We actually moved a 200+ pound dead tree to serve as a bridge at the most difficult crossing. The stream just carried it down river like it was twig.
We finally arrived at Kate Sleeper with the rain subsiding. We were tired and the experience zapped any ambition we had for Whiteface that day let alone the thought of adding Osceolas to the trip. We set up camp and had a good time recovering. Interestingly, we were falling a sleep and we heard a "snort" next to our tent. I would be curious as to what "snorts" in the woods. My survival instincts kicked in at this point. Some would ready the pocket knife and prepare for a fight. I went right to sleep. My partner, however, had the pleasure of staying up listening to the night noises.
6/20 - Up early and day hiked up to Whiteface back down to camp at 9:30am. We saw our first sight of humanity with two hikers coming from Passaconway (they stayed at the old Rich camp the night before). We had breakfast and broke camp late (do any of you have hiking partners that can't get moving quickly? I do and it is always a struggle to get on the trial).
Anyways, we made our way over the tripyramids. We found a lot of moose activity on the Kate Sleeper trail. With the amount of Mosse droppings I can only assume that a herd resides close by. We did not find the south slide to be very difficult. The bug situation was good all weekend except on top of South Tripyramid. We had limited views all weekend.
We decided to hike down the pine brook trail rather than the Sabbathday trail. We had enough of the stream crossings, however, I assume that with the limited rain on Saturday that the trial was fine. We made it to within 20 minutes of the Kanc highway and my partner was unwilling to hike out and walk the 2.4 miles back to the car - so we camped out another night. It was a good decision. We had a very comfortable bug free night. It was good to get out in the woods and it made the trip.
6/20 - Not much to be said - lazing morning - back to the car by 11:00am. Lunch at Gordi's and back home by 4:00pm to celebrate father's day.
All in all a good trip. Thanks again for the help and I will submit some pics in the next day or two.
Rainman
"stay in bed"
"you don't know what the weather will be like until you get to the trailhead".
"watch out for stream crossings"
6/18 - We arrrived in Lincoln at about 11:30pm and grabbed the last room available at the White mountain motel. Stayed up until 2:00 finalizing gear, etc.
6/19 - Not surprisingly, we awoke to a drizzle and made our way to the Downs Brook Trailhead at 9:00am. I tried without success to talk my hiking partner out of this decision last night. Apparently, the White mountain trail description discussing 10 stream/river crossings with some "impassable" at high waters did not deter the ignorant.
We were the only hikers on this trail that day. Everyone else had a brain in their head. Book time on the trail to the intersection of Kate Sleeper and Downs Brook is approximately 3 hours and 40 minutes - projecting arrival at 1:00pm (conservatively). We did not arrive at the junction until 3:30pm.
The first of ten river crossings would have required boot removal so we decided to bushwack up the left side for a mile or so until we came to another stream crossing. (I think we bypassed two or three crossings). We arrived at a crossing that was not fast but deep (4 feet in most places). After 5 minutes of trying to find a place to pass, I turned around to find my partner taking a wet dead (devoid of bark) tree branch and placing over the stream. To my amazement, he successfully crossed the stream.
My turn...Lesson learned here...if you are not fully committed to a task in the whites don't attempt it or you will pay dearly. Half way across my foot slipped and in I go head first with full pack heading down stream.
We still have 90% of our trip to do and I was as wet as a suba diver. At this point, it was raining fairly hard. I re-grouped, took the boots off poured out the water, wrung out my wet socks (only had one other dry pair), put the now 5 pound boots back on and off we went. I would say of the 10 stream crossings we had to wade knee or higher deep in 6 of them.
For me it was easy - after getting soaked - I did not give a *$#@.
My partner, however, was determined to keep the feet dry so he barefooted it across. We spent a lot of extra time trying to find safe passage. At one point, it seemed like it was going to actually be harder to go back then to go forward. The water was rising steadly and becoming faster. We actually moved a 200+ pound dead tree to serve as a bridge at the most difficult crossing. The stream just carried it down river like it was twig.We finally arrived at Kate Sleeper with the rain subsiding. We were tired and the experience zapped any ambition we had for Whiteface that day let alone the thought of adding Osceolas to the trip. We set up camp and had a good time recovering. Interestingly, we were falling a sleep and we heard a "snort" next to our tent. I would be curious as to what "snorts" in the woods. My survival instincts kicked in at this point. Some would ready the pocket knife and prepare for a fight. I went right to sleep. My partner, however, had the pleasure of staying up listening to the night noises.
6/20 - Up early and day hiked up to Whiteface back down to camp at 9:30am. We saw our first sight of humanity with two hikers coming from Passaconway (they stayed at the old Rich camp the night before). We had breakfast and broke camp late (do any of you have hiking partners that can't get moving quickly? I do and it is always a struggle to get on the trial).
Anyways, we made our way over the tripyramids. We found a lot of moose activity on the Kate Sleeper trail. With the amount of Mosse droppings I can only assume that a herd resides close by. We did not find the south slide to be very difficult. The bug situation was good all weekend except on top of South Tripyramid. We had limited views all weekend.
We decided to hike down the pine brook trail rather than the Sabbathday trail. We had enough of the stream crossings, however, I assume that with the limited rain on Saturday that the trial was fine. We made it to within 20 minutes of the Kanc highway and my partner was unwilling to hike out and walk the 2.4 miles back to the car - so we camped out another night. It was a good decision. We had a very comfortable bug free night. It was good to get out in the woods and it made the trip.
6/20 - Not much to be said - lazing morning - back to the car by 11:00am. Lunch at Gordi's and back home by 4:00pm to celebrate father's day.
All in all a good trip. Thanks again for the help and I will submit some pics in the next day or two.
Rainman
