Adirondack Ladies
Member
- Joined
- Apr 2, 2008
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Adirondack Ladies close the mountain....again
After reading earlier reports of successful climbs of Cliff and Redfield it looked like a good time to give it a try. We started at the Loj where we met SteveD and hiking partner - they were going to both...Redfield first. We chose to do Cliff first as Lori already had Redfield and also we wanted to do the hardest one first. We started as a group of 4 but about a mile in one of our hikers did not feel well enough to go on, so a quick call to her husband (lucky we had coverage) and we were assured that he would pick her up at the Loj. It put a damper on the day to be missing our hiking partner but we were glad we were not way in the mountains when she got sick.
At Avalanche Camps we met a trio heading to Skylight and Gray. We decided to follow the tracks of SteveD and go the lake route. This ended up being a wise decision as not only was it not windy, but it is always beautiful to cross Avalanche Lake with the cliffs on both sides.
We met several skiiers comming out from camping and skiing Marcy..soon we were at the Uphill Brook Lean-to. We started on the trail to Cliff - it had a few inches of new snow, but you could still see the tracks of previous hikers and thanks to mtnhiker false trails were blocked off by sticks..thanks!!
The hike up cliff was no short of a 'humdinger'..up and up and up...steep areas with not much to hang onto - going 2 steps up and sliding back 1 ...several areas of blowdown to go under...a couple of ice ledges to negotiate, but nothing our msr lightening ascents couldn't handle. As we were the first on the trail for the day, Lori kept an eye on her GPS...as we leveled off...then down down we went we were questioning did we miss it??? But no,,before long there was that beautiful sign!!! We met Inga on the summit and she took our summit photo for us. Soon we were off and had some awesome butt slides - Got down a lot quicker than we made it up
Off we go to Redfield - we knew many hikers had broke out Redfield so the trail was much easier, but after doing Cliff, it was no piece of cake. I also have to mention that this was a repeat winter of Redfield for Lori...thanks so much for rehiking with us The snow hanging on the trees was awesome and a couple of times the sun managed to peak out, but for the most part there was a light snow. On a brief water break, Lori dropped her nalgene and watched it slide waaaaay do the trail....oh dear. Enroute to Redfield 'Orge' caught up and visited with us for part of the hike until we convinced him we were much slower so off he went. Summiting Redfield he was there and we each took photos of each other. When Orge headed out we mentioned the lost bottle and were happy to see it sitting in the middle of the trail waiting for us..thanks Jeremy
Trip back down Redfield was quick to lean-to and we were comming to the end of daylight...time to hit the trail back home. We retraced our tracks across the lakes. We met Margaret, Ranger from Colden Interior Outpost and we assured her we were all feeling well with plenty of supplies to make our way back out. It is nice to know someone is looking out for you.
Trip out was uneventful and we were all very happy to see the Loj parking lot.
We met many wonderful people on the hike and for those who still have Cliff/Redfield to do...trail is well broken...that is for now
Happy Trails.
Photos: http://good-times.webshots.com/slide...69719884CvZwPM
After reading earlier reports of successful climbs of Cliff and Redfield it looked like a good time to give it a try. We started at the Loj where we met SteveD and hiking partner - they were going to both...Redfield first. We chose to do Cliff first as Lori already had Redfield and also we wanted to do the hardest one first. We started as a group of 4 but about a mile in one of our hikers did not feel well enough to go on, so a quick call to her husband (lucky we had coverage) and we were assured that he would pick her up at the Loj. It put a damper on the day to be missing our hiking partner but we were glad we were not way in the mountains when she got sick.
At Avalanche Camps we met a trio heading to Skylight and Gray. We decided to follow the tracks of SteveD and go the lake route. This ended up being a wise decision as not only was it not windy, but it is always beautiful to cross Avalanche Lake with the cliffs on both sides.
We met several skiiers comming out from camping and skiing Marcy..soon we were at the Uphill Brook Lean-to. We started on the trail to Cliff - it had a few inches of new snow, but you could still see the tracks of previous hikers and thanks to mtnhiker false trails were blocked off by sticks..thanks!!
The hike up cliff was no short of a 'humdinger'..up and up and up...steep areas with not much to hang onto - going 2 steps up and sliding back 1 ...several areas of blowdown to go under...a couple of ice ledges to negotiate, but nothing our msr lightening ascents couldn't handle. As we were the first on the trail for the day, Lori kept an eye on her GPS...as we leveled off...then down down we went we were questioning did we miss it??? But no,,before long there was that beautiful sign!!! We met Inga on the summit and she took our summit photo for us. Soon we were off and had some awesome butt slides - Got down a lot quicker than we made it up
Off we go to Redfield - we knew many hikers had broke out Redfield so the trail was much easier, but after doing Cliff, it was no piece of cake. I also have to mention that this was a repeat winter of Redfield for Lori...thanks so much for rehiking with us The snow hanging on the trees was awesome and a couple of times the sun managed to peak out, but for the most part there was a light snow. On a brief water break, Lori dropped her nalgene and watched it slide waaaaay do the trail....oh dear. Enroute to Redfield 'Orge' caught up and visited with us for part of the hike until we convinced him we were much slower so off he went. Summiting Redfield he was there and we each took photos of each other. When Orge headed out we mentioned the lost bottle and were happy to see it sitting in the middle of the trail waiting for us..thanks Jeremy
Trip back down Redfield was quick to lean-to and we were comming to the end of daylight...time to hit the trail back home. We retraced our tracks across the lakes. We met Margaret, Ranger from Colden Interior Outpost and we assured her we were all feeling well with plenty of supplies to make our way back out. It is nice to know someone is looking out for you.
Trip out was uneventful and we were all very happy to see the Loj parking lot.
We met many wonderful people on the hike and for those who still have Cliff/Redfield to do...trail is well broken...that is for now
Happy Trails.
Photos: http://good-times.webshots.com/slide...69719884CvZwPM
