firescrew, mt. cardigan 3/14/14

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bryan

New member
Joined
Mar 2, 2004
Messages
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Location
southeastern, nh
date: 3/14/14

trails: orange cove trail, mowglis trail, west ridge trail

conditions: good plowed parking at the base of mt. cardigan road for west ridge trail where we spotted a car. we also found good plowed parking at the gate on new colony road for the start of the orange cove trail. orange cove trail was snowmobile packed. at first just by one machine that had jumped the bank, but the trail soon entered a pretty major corridor. at the height of land we picked up the mowglis trail which had 4-6 inches of new snow blown into a previously laid track. snow depths increased a bit high on firescrew, but then the snow became crusty and wind packed and we were mostly able to stay on top from firescrew to the base of the ascent of cardigans summit cone. after firescrew the trail corridor was not always clear so we just sort of headed across where we knew it might be and were in and out of the corridor. on the final ascent we left the trail and slabbed around and up to the west where there was better snow coverage and less ice. the crust was quite hard in spots and borderline icy in a couple which tested snowshoes, but with decent snowshoe crampons it was ok. the area around the summit had a mix of ice and crusty snow as did the initial ascent down the west ridge trail. once in the trees we had a nice blown in snowshoe track to follow back to the summer trailhead and beyond to our spotted car.

equipment: were wore snowshoes the whole hike. some may be more comfortable in crampons up on the summit ledges and if conditions get more icy they will be a good idea.

comments: nice hike up cardigan. blue skies and sun to start, but clouds moved in fast. real pretty in the woods with all the ice covered trees. the hike from firescrew to cardigan was great walking up on top of everything. some great views despite the cloud cover. thanks to amy for a good hike.

bryan

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