Wet Grass - 21 Dec. 2013

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Joined
Jan 15, 2013
Messages
151
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Location
Vernon, Conn.
On Saturday I climbed Grass Mountain in Southwest Vermont.

The hardest part of the day was probably driving over icy back roads to get to the end of Shaftsbury Hollow Road, where I started my hike. I parked where the road forks and neither branch is as well plowed as what I'd been on, and took the right fork, following the right bank of White Creek. Soon after the road forks again. The right branch of that fork had a sign saying, "No Tresspassing". I hope that was for vehicular traffic. I walked past it. At this point and for the rest of the hike I was breaking trail.

I was on snowshoes the whole day. Although there were bare patches in the snow all up the mountain, it was mostly wet snow of varying depth. I measured it at a point which seemed typical, and it was six inches. There were no human tracks, foot or vehicle, after that first fork.

The road (which eventually became what I guess is an ATV/snowmobile trail) passes a lodge or something soon in, and then starts crossing the creek. It crosses five times, twice over culverts, leaving you on the left bank. None of the crossings were particularly difficult on Saturday. Soon after the fifth crossing the road turns right, goes uphill a ways, turns left, and then parallels the creek from up above. Most of the elevation gain in the hike is in this section. Eventually the creek runs out of valley and the road rejoins it just before the col between Grass and Spruce Mountains.

In the col there's the old remains of a car. I turned left there and started the true bushwhack of the hike. I'd set a compass bearing of 320 deg., but that was leading me a little to the right of an obvious ridge, so I just started following the ridge. Parts of the bushwhack were pretty steep, but not for long. It had been drizzling off and on, but during the whack it started raining enough to put on the rain gear. It stopped before I reached the summit, though, and never rained again during the hike.

On the way up I encounted bear tracks. They didn't look fresh enough to be made that day, but they'd obviously been made since the last snow.

The summit of Grass has a number of false peaks. When I got up on top I just started heading north along the main ridge of possible peaks until I came across a yellow canister attached to a yellow birch. The most recent entry before mine was from October.

I had a long break there on the summit and then followed my tracks back to my car. I didn't see another person the whole time. On my way out the icy roads had become muddy roads.

Here are the pictures.

Grass is number 35 on the New England Fifty Finest list for me.

--

Cumulus

NE111: 115/115 (67/67, 46/46, 2/2); Cat35: 23/39; WNH4K: 29/48; NEFF: 35/50
LT NB 2009

"I don't much care where [I get to] --" said Alice, "-- so long as I get somewhere," ...
"Oh, you're sure to do that," said the Cat, "if you only walk long enough."
- Lewis Carroll
 
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