gore mountain, [bunnell mountain, née] blue mountain, west blue mountain 6/20/13
date: 6/20/13
trails: logging roads, bushwack
conditions: drove in via meriden hill road (leaves rt. 3 to the right a bit north of north stratford. google was a bit off with location, but close) to brown road. i followed brown road for roughly 1.4 miles. the road is rough in spots, but not an issue for a passenger car driven with care. where the road turned right down hill i continued straight onto an unmarked road that led in .7 to a gate that i parked shortly before. were i to do it again i would park at about .2 on this road in a grassy area to the left and walk the rest of the way. once committed i kept going, but it wasn't without more banging and scraping than i would like. high clearance could get in all the way in without too much issue. i started up the road beyond the gate and a sign for vickie bunnell preserve. the grassy road was in nice shape to start becoming wetter and rougher where a snowmobile trail turns off left. i continued straight as the road tightened into a herd path then opened back up again becoming more consistently wet with taller grass. i eventually hit a junction where i went right though the route left looks more travelled. this led to a beautiful clearing with a view dead ahead to gore and back to west blue. the road continued for a short distance out the far side becoming steeper and rougher until it ended about .4 miles from the summit of gore. a pretty good start. from there the woods were good with a mix of open walking and tigher regrowth spruce. it then really opened into nice fern woods up to the summit. from there i followed the ridge towards blue until the blowdown became annoying then slabbed to the east getting back onto the ridge beyond the col. on the southern plateau of the mountain a pretty amazing moose trail started and minus a few spots that have been blocked off by blowdown it weaved its way up to the summit of blue. the woods were generally quite open even when not on the moose trail. i dropped off blue towards west blue and almost immediately hit an old road i followed for a short distance until it turned north then bushwacked through generally good woods with on and off moose paths to an eastern subpeak then a short drop and ascent, with some scrappier woods higher up, to the summit of west blue. from there i dropped down directly towards the road i began on, hitting a little spruce up high then open woods, intersecting the road a bit over a half mile from the gate.
