Looks like spring up north

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peakbagger

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I had to do a day trip down to Central Mass today to check on a project and left Gorham NH around 6 AM. I had about 30" of snow on my woodpiles and about 16" on my pitched garage roof. There was no sight of any pavement on my driveway. It was 58 degrees. as I headed down the big hill in Randolph. One car at Appalachia and all the rivers and streams were froze in on my way south. It actually cooled down to the 40s down through southern NH

I headed back north in continuous fog up I 93. I hit the southern whites around 2:30 PM.The I93 pemi crossings were up but they was still mostly frozen in but the fog made it hard to see. The East Branch was looking a bit more wild. Once thru the notch the fog dropped off and along RT3 I could see a lot of seasonal drainages in the woods out of their banks. The Gale River was definitely in flood mode, no ice and running out of banks plus the water looked like milk chocolate. I could see lots of bare ground in the woods. I stopped by the end of Little River road (and will post my observations separately on the other thread), but the Little River was cranking and out of its banks. I think it may have been intentional but there is low point on the approach to the bridge that I believe serves as flood bypass to keep the bridge standing. It had water flowing over it

The most striking was the Ammonoosuc River near the junction of RT 302. It was in full flood mode, it was bank to bank with ice chunks moving fast. I have no doubt its going to find a place to jam up. Rt 115 doesnt have many major streams to speak of until the Israel River. It was definitely cranking up but no where near the Ammo. I got home and it was just about dark but my snow pack is probably less the 10", my garage roof is mostly melted off and my wood piles have lost at least 3/4 of their snow. Its 7 Pm and the temps still 56 with wind gusts which is ideal melting conditions. I had some car repairs that I had held off on as I wasnt in mood to heat my garage. I spent about 2 hours in the garage with the door open and was quite comfortable even after dark.

My guess for Saturday is the trails will be mess, no such thing as ice bridges. There may be a bit of fresh snow when the front goes through but expect it going to be messy. I expect sunday will be ice with bit of fresh snow on top of it .
 
I have friends who are going to NH tomorrow to XC ski over the MLK weekend.

They know the forecast and have low expectations. Staying west of the Kanc, they wonder which of Waterville Valley or Bretton Woods would be the best bet on Sun/Mon.
 
I think I will head north to Millincoket and score some reservation for a warm summer weekend ;)

There was ice fog from I95 to Conway on 16. The hotels in N Conway are empty..maybe it's worth calling for rates... The plunge from 44 to 3 (Lincoln, base, Wunderground) is beginning, falling through 32 degrees around 0800

Hypothermia weather.
 
Its definitely is transitioning this morning. The damage to the snow pack is done, know its just how much damage the flooding will do before it all freezes up or drains down river.
 
Thanks for interesting and detailed report on significant change in conditions. I need to come up to Plymouth to check on our trailer home to see how it made out after the deep freeze. I was concerned about having to drive in sleet conditions but forecast has morphed to safe conditions after 1PM. I'm puzzling over what to do tomorrow for moderate distance excursion. Not looking for suggestions, just saying ...... Should be interesting whatever I encounter. My son wants to go ice fishing on Sunday in central NH was expecting great ice on lakes after deep freeze. I expect this remarkable event has screwed up lakes and ponds ice conditions.
 
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Real bummer for the ski resorts. They were off to a phenomenal start to the season for the first time in awhile. Hopefully they can hang on to the base depths without turning all the slopes into bulllet proof luge tracks.
 
The majority of ski areas don't really depend on natural snow. With the cold forecast this week, they can crank up the guns and in theory this rain filled up their water storage. It does cost them lot of money to run the pumps and compressors. They are far more dependent on folks down in southern NH and Mass thinking that its ski season.
 
The majority of ski areas don't really depend on natural snow. With the cold forecast this week, they can crank up the guns and in theory this rain filled up their water storage. It does cost them lot of money to run the pumps and compressors. They are far more dependent on folks down in southern NH and Mass thinking that its ski season.

I know but the natural stuff is much more fun. I used to downhill ski quite a bit before I started hiking about 6 years ago and I don't care what the resorts tell you. Natural snow is better, especially after 2' of it has just dumped on the mountain. :)
 
We met a couple a few days ago putting in their bobhouse on Newfound Lake -- and they didn't think that this warm-up/rain was going to affect the ice conditions that much, other than put a layer of water on the (at-the-time) foot-thick ice. (They made sure to mount the bobhouse on rails, to elevate it, so it didn't embed in the ice when the new precip freezes.)

If they're correct in their assumptions, your son's ice-fishing on Sunday should be fine.

I hiked Red Hill via Eagle Cliff on Squam Lake. Ice conditions were awesome!!! Not figure skating quality ice, but nice ice surface had formed. On way over I saw a group wearing hockey skates out playing around on Little Squam. Views of Squam from Eagle Cliff were fine with shiny surface especially when I returned on way back and witnessed sunset on the shiny ice and Alpen glow on Squam Range. My son did go ice fishing on Silver Lake and they had great day.

I started out on MSR snow shoes, but snow pack was much reduced and crusty. Racket they made was awful so I switched over to microspikes. I was wishing I had my Katoola Trail crampons. They would have been ideal traction for the conditions I encountered, but Microspikes were good enough. The submerged packed trail supported me well and only punched through dozen times over 6 mile hike. Intermittent stream drainage were bare and frozen due to rains and tops of high points showed much bare ground.
 
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