Day 1 - d'Urban, Snag, Salmon 2/21/08

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campsite

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Lewiston, Maine
Fran and I spent Wednesday night at the Motel Arnold in Woburn, Quebec and were the first ones in their restaurant on Thursday morning at 5:30. (by the way, if you're coming into Canada from Pittsburg, - Canada Customs in Chartierville only opens at 8am) We then traveled ice and windswept snow covered roads through Notre-Dame-des-Bois and Chartierville. Once in Chartierville, we headed to the end of Rue St-Paul just as the town plow was clearing the turnaround area. The driver informed us that it would be OK to park for the day here. Of course he noticed we had Maine plates and wanted to know where we came from. It appears he had worked in Lewiston in the late sixties, and that we knew some of the same people. Mr. Duquette then obligingly widened the turnaround so that our car would be less of a nuisance to the school buses using this turnaround. (from this point on, Rue St-Paul is an unimproved dirt road, which soon swings South and heads up the side of Salmon - it appears as a double dashed line on topos)
We stepped out of the car in the early morning sun with a biting North wind that would accompany us all day. We started out barebooting on an ungroomed, single tracked, snow covered snowmobile trail. This was the same route we had scouted last Fall. In about an hour we were at the swath (about 1/4 mile North of the pond). Our first impression of the swath was that of a snowcovered downhill ski trail. Its surface was hard and covered with 0 to 12" of snow. (what we didn't know at this time was that the swath, over our entire traveled distance from d'Urban to Salmon, would be snowmobiled over 50% of its width and covered with just the right amount of snow).
We put on our snowshoes, mostly for traction, and were quickly on d'Urban. We then headed back down to the pond and towards Snag. A few times, we were tempted to bushwhack a straight line on the Canadian side where the border zigged and zagged. However the flat, hard, smooth surface of the swath always convinced us to simply follow it along. After Snag, we headed South down to the col. Once in the Snag/Salmon col, we now had to climb the steep Salmon side of the col. Incredibly (I couldn't believe my eyes), its entire steep width had been snowmobiled except for the ledgy areas. The angle to the sun had made the snowmobile tracks too slippery for our tastes - and past unfortunate experience. We headed for the deeper snow in the woods and pulled ourselves up tree by tree. Once out of the col area, the rest of the way to Salmon was easy.
Once back down to the col, we agreed not to go back up Snag. We decided to head out of the col on a 326-degree bearing. The goal was to hit the upper limits of the dirt road on which the car was parked. We had walked this dirt road last Fall up to a point due West of Snag. As it turned out, we followed our noses mostly, and occasionally the compass. Single track snowmobile tracks led out of the col in wide open woods, in the general intended direction. Where we encountered other snomo tracks, we always chose the ones going to the NW. In about 30 minutes, we hit our snomobiled road which we followed back to the car.
Now, it was on to Pittsburg for day 2.
 
Nice report

If anything this trek sounds easier in winter, at least until the slash along the vista from the cutting they did in the last couple of years decays. Were the boundary monuments in the 2 cols intact? I think the snowmobile traffic may be responsible for breaking a few of them (like #478 in the col north of Salmon).

Did you get any of the canisters? I'm guessing Nate's climbs last October might be the last ones in there (forgive me 3kers if anyone did this trio since October).

Question: are you pursuing the winter 3K list? Sound like that would be a fun endeavor. :cool:
 
We find hiking or bw in winter infinitely easier than in summer. We had planned to hike this entire route last fall, but gave up in frustration after about 1 mile - just too much slash. And we knew the route would be easier in winter with the snow depth. We didn't expect the extensive snowmobiling but we were expecting consolidated conditions due to the swath's constant exposure to the elements.
There was no canister on d'Urban last fall on both of our route finding trips in the area. We had even moved and searched slash in the area of the high point hoping to find it on the ground.
The only monument we saw was next to Boundary Pond. There was about 8" of the top of an obelisk sticking above the snow. I'd like to be there when a distracted cowboy on a snowmobile slams his "machine" into that.
We are pursuing interesting, creative, original routes in winter conditions to any peak. We took many pictures during our 3 days of hiking. I'm sure you'd like to see how tame the swath looks like in winter after all the difficulties you experienced in summer. Unfortunately, I don't know how to attach a photo to this post.
 
campsite said:
Unfortunately, I don't know how to attach a photo to this post.
Hit REPLY

Below the text box is another box with various choices including attach files. Click on MANAGE ATTACHMENTS and a browse window will come up

Enough help?
 
campsite said:
There was no canister on d'Urban last fall on both of our route finding trips in the area. We had even moved and searched slash in the area of the high point hoping to find it on the ground.
Yeah, that went missing last year. When Oncoman and I found it in 2006, it was on the Canadian side:

Oncoman fetches the d'Urban Register
IMG_9228.jpg



campsite said:
The only monument we saw was next to Boundary Pond. There was about 8" of the top of an obelisk sticking above the snow. I'd like to be there when a distracted cowboy on a snowmobile slams his "machine" into that.
Don't assume only the machine is the loser. Here's the next post south - between the Trumbull (=Snag) and Salmon col:

a10ac4ac-7afa-4edf-9065-e9f47a008d67.jpg


I had assumed that this was vandalism, assuming a machine couldn't get to that col. Your report changes my belief and now I bet it was a snow machine.

This is a real shame since these cast iron posts have been there since 1845.
 
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