U
Unregistered
Guest
Date of Hike: 3/5/09
Conditions: Pemi trails packed for boots to Franconia brook, snowshoes needed on the Wilderness trail. Bondcliff trail has increasing snow depth, but has seen one hiker (me)
up & down now. Groups are expected on the Bonds/Zealand traverse Sat. 3/7, so it should
be in great shape. Very icy mixed ground over Bondcliff, trail easy lost on upper Mt. Bond
and going to W. Bond. Warmer temp's could create spruce trap issues for wanderers like
myself, hopefully group traffic will create a single solid path up here, although drifting
and melting quickly obscure things right now.
Equipment: MSR snowshoes and microspikes.
I put spikes on at Bondciff treeline and went back to snowshoes going up Bond.
Crampons would be a little unwieldly on the rocky stuff.
Steep water ice between Bondcliff & Bond requires careful footing !!!!
Comments:
This was a superb place and day to finish the series. I had all winter to get in shape for one
of the 3 hardest hikes. I did lots of scouting hikes since last summer to prepare for this, and that was a good investment. I had also done 13 peaks last winter, so recent memory
of "the way" came in handy. "Cerebro-GPS" is a hiker's most valuable safety equipment.
And I still got off-trail plenty.
Thank you to my wife Maryellen, Ed Hawkins, Eric Rathbun,Wolfgang,Cath Goodwin for encouragement and mentoring. There's no such thing as completely "unaided".
- Drew Petersen , Duxbury VT
Conditions: Pemi trails packed for boots to Franconia brook, snowshoes needed on the Wilderness trail. Bondcliff trail has increasing snow depth, but has seen one hiker (me)
up & down now. Groups are expected on the Bonds/Zealand traverse Sat. 3/7, so it should
be in great shape. Very icy mixed ground over Bondcliff, trail easy lost on upper Mt. Bond
and going to W. Bond. Warmer temp's could create spruce trap issues for wanderers like
myself, hopefully group traffic will create a single solid path up here, although drifting
and melting quickly obscure things right now.
Equipment: MSR snowshoes and microspikes.
I put spikes on at Bondciff treeline and went back to snowshoes going up Bond.
Crampons would be a little unwieldly on the rocky stuff.
Steep water ice between Bondcliff & Bond requires careful footing !!!!
Comments:
This was a superb place and day to finish the series. I had all winter to get in shape for one
of the 3 hardest hikes. I did lots of scouting hikes since last summer to prepare for this, and that was a good investment. I had also done 13 peaks last winter, so recent memory
of "the way" came in handy. "Cerebro-GPS" is a hiker's most valuable safety equipment.
And I still got off-trail plenty.
Thank you to my wife Maryellen, Ed Hawkins, Eric Rathbun,Wolfgang,Cath Goodwin for encouragement and mentoring. There's no such thing as completely "unaided".
- Drew Petersen , Duxbury VT
