sugarloaf mountain, hogsback mountain, jeffers mountain, blueberry mountain 7/11/14

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bryan

New member
Joined
Mar 2, 2004
Messages
1,019
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Location
southeastern, nh
date: 7/11/14

trails: abandoned sugarloaf mountain trail, bushwhack, blueberry mountain trail

conditions: spotted a car at the blueberry mountain trailhead on north-south road in glencliff and drove around to page road, off of lime kiln road, in east haverhill. i don't have the mileage for the road we parked at the end of, but i would say roughly a mile. the road is on the left and has a "private drive" sign and sign allowing for foot traffic only. we parked at the end out of the way. we walked the unnamed road and turned right as it approached a house. shortly it crossed onto forest service land and we continued to follow it to the old sugarloaf mountain trail which leaves on the right marked by a sign and flagging. the footbed is clear up into a large clearcut and then it was amys memory that kept us on route. beyond the cut the trail is nice with some blowdown one of which got us off route for a bit. we followed the trail, marked sporadically with tape and some lingering orange blazes up towards the cliffs to what we expected would be the crux of the route at a notorious rope and ladder section. we found that both the rope and ladder were missing (a thin piece of cord remains) which would have made for a sketchy exposed scramble we did not want to risk. we decided instead to bushwhack around under the cliffs and approach the summit from the northwest. we had to drop a fair amount of elevation, but worked around and then headed up in pretty good woods eventually reaching ledges then the upper part of the trail to the summit. from there we bushwhacked along the woods to hogsback, skirting an old cut, in mostly good woods. some scrappy bits up around the ledges and cliffs of hogsback. leaving hogsback we soon found a very distinct herd path for a bit that eventually split up. numerous herd/game paths and mostly open woods up to jeffers. some gorgeous open going down towards blueberry with one long section of dense undergrowth that made footing interesting. we popped up onto scattered ledges and pushed through a bit of scrappy woods to the summit. heading down the blueberry mountain trail was in great shape with lots of nice dry ledge walking. bugs, in particular deer flies, were obnoxious at times during the hike.

equipment: nothing in particular.

comments: great hike. both of us had this one in mind for a while and today couldn't have been more perfect for it. great temps, a bit of a breeze and clear views to be had from the many viewpoints. sugarloaf and hogsback both have spectacular open summits with hogsback being particularly so. we spent a lot of extra time getting up sugarloaf after bailing on the trail, but it seemed safer than risking the sketchy cliff ascent. lots of nice bushwhacking all the way across the ridge. blueberry was beautiful as well with stunning views to moosilauke and the other surrounding peaks from numerous points on the trail. thanks to amy for an awesome hike.

bryan

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