Garfield & Galehead

Planning to hike Garfield & Galehead in the next few weeks - one car. Would others who have done this hike before be willing to comment on their route preference for this loop and which one they preferred to summit first? Thanks in advance.

depends on the weather, and if its day hike or not. not a good day hike, unless your a peakbagger who walks past sunlight or you dont stop much to smell the roses. if you day it, go from the northwest, but remember that area, and that mountain as well as the twins are cold, and exposed to northwest Canadian wind, and with the broad plains north of the peak, you'll be the first windbreak for a large area if the weather is dodgy. otherwise just go up to gale-head hut. Beautiful trail, huge spruces on the way up, then stay at garfield tentsite after scoping the view and clouds/weather from the hut. You can climb up on top of the propane tank holding box out back to look over towards garfield better from the hut. That entire route is mostly sheltered except for a stretch by the hut going west towards Garfield briefly. Garfield trail from that side is much safer and sheltered more. whats great is that you can come from the east even if its windy and cold, and only pop out exposed on the summit area for like 6 minutes of walking in thinner trees and only a few hundred feet of open area,; enjoy your views and then duck back down into the trees before you go into deep freeze. Do Galehead on your way back. Its easy but save your fresh legs for garfield steep summit cone. If its dicey weather over at garfield or just nasty but you enjoy the woods there( a very quiet, still, wonderful place) then just camp somewhere around galehead area and maybe you can enjoy some lazy in and out of the clouds views from galehead. I would NOT plan on doing a dayhike up to galehead and over to garfield and back. I see all kinds of kooks these days doing the storm-trooper weekend warrior routine, but I dont subscribe to it. The area west of galehead is a special place, even without alot of views or in snowy/cloudy weather, its something you don't want to miss, but you'll never notice it if your in a rush or everyones gabbing. make sure to take in the stars at galehead hut and mountain if you up there at night. a good dark hemmed in spot with good views from eastto south east sky.
Goodluck

I’ve climbed Garfield and Galehead in both directions, but never in winter (Veterans Day was the closest) and not since the Gale River Trail was re-routed (avoiding a river crossing, I think).

That said, the Garfield Ridge Trail is pretty steep dropping off of Garfield, and I remember from my September 2000 hike that it was wet, too. (I don’t recall any ice being present on that steep part when I climbed it in November 2009, but I wouldn’t swear there wasn’t any. There were a few icy places along the ridge, between Mount Pam and Garfield Ridge West.) I guess that it would be safer to go up the Ridge Trail to Mount Garfield than down.

So I would recommend climbing Galehead first, then going up Garfield. But if you climb Garfield first, you can always add South Twin after Galehead if you’re feeling ambitious. You’d just have to hike back down again to pick up the Gale River Trail.

I did that trio with a knee that I’d wrenched the day before on Mount Flume, and it only bothered me during the final descent to the road, but that was in the middle of September, so very different circumstances from what you’ll find in the next few weeks.

When I face a road walk between trailheads, and I have my druthers, I prefer to begin with the road walk as a warm-up to the main event, rather than have to deal with it as an anticlimactic trudge back to the car.

If you do loop them, you could possibly shorten your time on Gale River Road by using the old FR 117 as shown here. I know the start on Gale River Road is obvious, but I haven't ever looked for it from the Mount Garfield Trail side. I would park at Beaver Brook and go up Galehead first. Maybe even ski, if you like, to the summer Gale River Trail trailhead.

Tim

bikehikeskifish said:

If you do loop them, you could possibly shorten your time on Gale River Road by using the old FR 117 as shown here. I know the start on Gale River Road is obvious, but I haven't ever looked for it from the Mount Garfield Trail side. I would park at Beaver Brook and go up Galehead first. Maybe even ski, if you like, to the summer Gale River Trail trailhead.

Click to expand...

It is the snowmobile trail that crosses between the two brook crossings, unless it is obvious you probably don't want to break it out

However I would park at Five Corners and walk out the other direction from Garfield, maybe a mile shorter

Wow - I like the caltopo.com web site! Thanks for the link!

Through my eyes, Forest Road 117 doesn’t appear to be any shorter than just staying on the trail all the way to the road. The two routes seem like two sides of a rectangle, and, in addition to involving some climbing when it first leaves the Garfield Trail, the forest road also side-slopes. It could be more of an adventure, however.

Perhaps a party with two GPSes would be willing to check it out.

Also, notice where the Garfield Trail forks just after crossing a town line. That could be confusing in the dark. The descending trail you want takes a sharp right turn, but it looks like the trail could also (and, apparently, once did) go straight ahead.

Raymond said:

Also, notice where the Garfield Trail forks just after crossing a town line. That could be confusing in the dark. The descending trail you want takes a sharp right turn, but it looks like the trail could also (and, apparently, once did) go straight ahead.

Click to expand...

It used to go straight, leading to a sizable river crossing. I've skied it both before and after the relocation.

As you head in (from the west entrance to the road) to the summer parking lot for the Garfield Tr, there is a sharp left turn followed by a bridge just before the trailhead. The old trail follows an old road leaving from the west end of the bridge. You can follow the old trail (follows the river, often wet) over the stream crossing to the new trail or just before the stream crossing there is another trail to the right which I think leads to Bethlehem Reservoir. (I've never followed it.)

The old trail is shown on my 1995 USGS 24k topo of the region.

Doug

When I came down there in the dark, I suddenly realized that brush was grown up around me, and knew that it shouldn’t be like that if there was a trail there. So I looked around more carefully and saw that the trail had made a 90° turn.

Then I got even more confused after I reached the road, as I wrote about here at the time (November 2009), when I got myself turned around and walked the wrong way, hitting three bridges in a row that had been wiped out by flood waters. Sheesh.