Sentinel Mountain - Mount Flagg 1-1-2015

It had been a while since we had hiked any elevation, so we took care of that on New Year’s Day. Seeing how we didn’t have any snow in our yard, we didn’t feel like trudging through a lot of it. The Osspiee’s were the place we decided to go then. We had 5 mountains of the O-10 done already, so we did Sentinel and Flagg which brought us up to 7 completed.
We met up with friends at the gate from the Sentinel Mountain Trail. The directions from Google said to take 16B off of RT16, the sign actually says RT 25 to Center Ossipee. so much for directions. We did go a bit out of our way, then the road to the small parking area was not marked, luckily we spotted our friends vehicle parked up the road when we went by or the hike may not have happened at all. The parking area is limited to maybe 4 cars, but even that might be tight. After being 45 minutes late we were finally putting on the Microspikes and heading out.
We started down the road and shortly thereafter took a left at the sign for Mt Trail. The snow was spotty in areas and there were icy spots too. We did wear the Microspikes all day with no problems, well some of us had no problems. The trail itself was easy to follow using either the signs or the red blazing. Our friends had said that it would get steep right before the summit and it did, but the hike to the summit is a short one. On the summit we were treated to some decent views and found the first Geocache of the day.
After enjoying the view we took the Sentinel Connector Trail, which was blazed in orange. We followed that to the views on the Merrovista Ledges, then over to the shelter. We also found the second Geocache of the day. From there we took the Canaan Mt Trail (which you would think would go up to Canaan Mountain, but doesn’t) to the second shelter of the day. This trail is blazed in red. The trails up until this point were easy going with minimal snow cover. When we got on the Mount Flagg trail conditions changed.
The Mt Flagg trail is blazed in yellow. Along the route we found the third Geocache of the day. The trail was fine until we started the incline. Once there the snow was about a foot deep, but frozen solid. Traction with sharp points were really needed here, one of us in the group didn’t have that and…well did some unwanted butt sliding, back sliding, sideward sliding, basically uncontrolled sliding. We all made it up to the summit of Mount Flagg, then came back to the open ledge area to enjoy the views. We didn’t stay long, due to the cold temps and the blowing winds.
The trip back down on the Mt Flagg trail was done with caution until we past the area of ‘unexpected sliding’. After that it was pretty much a piece of cake all the way back to the vehicles. We waited until we were back at the vehicles to find the last Geocache of the day and that completed our first adventure of 2015.
Video for anyone interested...