albee
New member
- Joined
- Jan 14, 2005
- Messages
- 637
- Reaction score
- 122
This past weekend had beautiful conditions for hiking in the White Mountains. My chosen route for Saturday morning was up the 19 Mile Brook trail to the Wildcat Ridge Trail, then across the ridge from Wildcat A to Wildcat D, then down the Polecat ski trail.
The trip up was very enjoyable. The temperatures were almost 30 degrees when I left at 7:30 AM with Beaner from CT. I had done these mountains in the summer before and the weather looked favorable, so I packed about as light as I could. I tied an extra fleece around my waist under my winter coat, packed my GPS, a 20 oz water bottle and a couple energy bars into my coat pockets and set off.
The trail was well packed on the way up, so I decided to try out my virgin crampons for the climb and carried my snowshoes for the first 3.5 miles. When we reached Carter Notch, I switched over to snowshoes and proceeded to carry my crampons. The trip up Wildcat A was steep at times but the trail was broken out and easy to follow.
From there, I parted with Beaner and headed across the ridge to bag Wildcat D. The trail was straightforward and the views from peaks B, C, and D were spectacular but the snow was so deep that the tree branches were pretty much at chest level and the blazes were below my knees. I managed to squeeze my way through most of them but did get a little scratch on my right temple despite wearing my hood, a hat, and protective sunglasses.
I glissaded off of Wildcat C and kept looking up for the expected arrival of Sherpa Kroto, Whitelief, LarryD and ChrisB. I finally found them near the ski lift just below the summit. They seemed like a friendly and enthusiastic group and I must say that even as Sherpa kept asserting that he was the "old, fat guy", he looks thinner in person!
I took off from the summit on the Polecat ski trail and passed a number of skiers and snowboarders getting ready for their own descents. I had my lightweight running snowshoes on so I darted past and jogged downhill at a surprisingly comfortable 7 minute mile pace. I must have passed 3 or 4 groups of hikers, including one large group of about a dozen high school kids. One guy even reached out to give me a high 5 as I jogged by, grinning and giving them the thumbs up. I thought I must have looked pretty odd running down with the skiers and carrying a pair of crampons in my hand. Maybe people were thinking I'm some kind of nut that rides the lift up and runs down for fun. Then I realized that I didn't have the telltale lift-ticket on my coat and I felt legitimate again.
I made it down the Polecat in 17 minutes flat. The whole hike had taken about 3.5 hours. I walked along the road for a little while and Beaner finally drove over to pick me up. Not a bad start to the weekend!
P.S. Beaner and I went on to hike Cabot that afternoon, and then we squeezed in hiking Waumbek in the early hours of Sunday morning. Four winter 4000'ers and 28 miles of hiking in less than 24 hours... a peakbagger's dream weekend!
The trip up was very enjoyable. The temperatures were almost 30 degrees when I left at 7:30 AM with Beaner from CT. I had done these mountains in the summer before and the weather looked favorable, so I packed about as light as I could. I tied an extra fleece around my waist under my winter coat, packed my GPS, a 20 oz water bottle and a couple energy bars into my coat pockets and set off.
The trail was well packed on the way up, so I decided to try out my virgin crampons for the climb and carried my snowshoes for the first 3.5 miles. When we reached Carter Notch, I switched over to snowshoes and proceeded to carry my crampons. The trip up Wildcat A was steep at times but the trail was broken out and easy to follow.
From there, I parted with Beaner and headed across the ridge to bag Wildcat D. The trail was straightforward and the views from peaks B, C, and D were spectacular but the snow was so deep that the tree branches were pretty much at chest level and the blazes were below my knees. I managed to squeeze my way through most of them but did get a little scratch on my right temple despite wearing my hood, a hat, and protective sunglasses.
I glissaded off of Wildcat C and kept looking up for the expected arrival of Sherpa Kroto, Whitelief, LarryD and ChrisB. I finally found them near the ski lift just below the summit. They seemed like a friendly and enthusiastic group and I must say that even as Sherpa kept asserting that he was the "old, fat guy", he looks thinner in person!
I took off from the summit on the Polecat ski trail and passed a number of skiers and snowboarders getting ready for their own descents. I had my lightweight running snowshoes on so I darted past and jogged downhill at a surprisingly comfortable 7 minute mile pace. I must have passed 3 or 4 groups of hikers, including one large group of about a dozen high school kids. One guy even reached out to give me a high 5 as I jogged by, grinning and giving them the thumbs up. I thought I must have looked pretty odd running down with the skiers and carrying a pair of crampons in my hand. Maybe people were thinking I'm some kind of nut that rides the lift up and runs down for fun. Then I realized that I didn't have the telltale lift-ticket on my coat and I felt legitimate again.
I made it down the Polecat in 17 minutes flat. The whole hike had taken about 3.5 hours. I walked along the road for a little while and Beaner finally drove over to pick me up. Not a bad start to the weekend!
P.S. Beaner and I went on to hike Cabot that afternoon, and then we squeezed in hiking Waumbek in the early hours of Sunday morning. Four winter 4000'ers and 28 miles of hiking in less than 24 hours... a peakbagger's dream weekend!
