Belknap Traverse – 12+ peaks in one day

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Joined
Feb 25, 2007
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Location
Bradford, MA
I’ve wanted to do this run/hike since reading about the Belknap range on Peakbagger.com
The first mountain I ever climbed was Mt Major as a 13 year old Boy Scout over 30 years ago. Conditions were very good, with temperatures hovering around freezing at 8 AM.

Here are the peaks we did…

ROWE: 1690 ft. Parked next to the access road at the base of Gunstock. Group of four – DD, Albee, Sherpa-John, & MtnGoat doing the entire traverse in one run/hike. A little trouble figuring out exactly where we were headed but nothing too bad. Hit summit in 19:34.

GUNSTOCK 2250 ft. Nice views from Gunstock, could see Snow on Mt Washington. 29:41 from Rowe to Gunstock.

BELKNAP 2382 ft Very good footing and trail conditions from Gunstock to Belknap. Albee and MtnGoat climbed the tower; we only spent 3:30 on the summit. 19:05 from Gunstock to Belknap.

KLEM 2001 ft. Long section of the run, it took us 1:00:14 from Belknap to Klem. We went via the RP link to Round Pond to Klem loop. We didn’t use the flagged bushwhack choosing our own way instead. The cliffs were a bit icy in spots (it was 29 degrees when we started at 8:00 AM). We took a break on the summit for 5:47, before heading off for Rand.

RAND 1883 ft. Pretty easy going from Klem to Rand. Time 20:15.

QUARRY W. 1894 ft. Spent a few minutes goofing around at The Quarry, checking out some of the leftover machine parts. I was expecting a lot of this section to be on some sort
Of dirt road as the map from “Stepping Stones across NH” has detailed maps, but it doesn’t appear that it differentiates Single track from dirt road. Time from Rand to Quarry was 22:40 and we took an 8:06 rest on the summit.

MAJOR 1786 ft. Some very nice views from Quarry as we made our way over to Major. We went via North Straightback and decided to do this section as an “out & back”. The red
Dotted trails on the “Stepping Stones” map were for the most part impossible to find. Better being safely on the correct Trail. Time from Quarry to Major 43:52. The summit had the only people we saw on the entire hike, and there were about 20!

STRAIGHTBACK S. 1890 ft. Backtracked a little on the Major/Straightback trail then up over South Straightback. 19:01 to cover this section.

ANNA 1670 ft. Nice section of trail. We had the sun in our faces most of the way which combined with downed leaves made some of the going a bit difficult. SB to Ann took 18:49.

MACK 1945 ft. It seemed to take a long time to descend Anna, but the section from Anna to Mack only took 33:43. Took our final break (9:19) on the summit.

PIPER 2044 ft. We moved pretty well on the downhill to Round Pond then went back the way we’d come out (on the RP link), then we skirted Belknap on the Piper link trail. I think
We all agreed this was the best stretch of trail. Nice view of Belknap, Piper, and Whiteface during most of the section. The last 200’ up to the saddle and the Old Piper trail was pretty steep. We had a little debate on exactly where we were once we got to the summit. The color copy of the map definitely helped, although some trails are blazed in multiple colors. Mack to Piper took us 1:12:17.

WHITEFACE 1664 ft. This was another great section of running and easier because we could see our goal right in front of us. We got from Piper to Whiteface in 34:45, which included some time watching a porcupine climb a tree. We had trouble finding any trail going off the southwest of the summit so we just bushwhacked down to the car which we had left on Belknap mountain road.

We reached the car in 38:57 for a total time of 7:47:36. A great day in the woods with Friends!

Link to SJ’s Trip Report: http://www.rocksontop.com/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=3635

Link to Pictures:http://s153.photobucket.com/albums/s209/davedunham/2007 Beklnap
 
I hope you'll come back again before another 30 years pass. I'm glad it was a nice day to enjoy the hills that are near and dear to me.
 
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