Adams Slide Trail

Does anone know the history, location or demise of this trail? I was reading about it a chapter in Nicholas Howe's "Not Without Peril." A few hikers in the 1930s were planning to ascend this trail out of the Great Gulf but they had a tragedy in the Peabody River and never made it. I have never heard of this trail and it is obviously no longer on the AMC maps and I was wondering if anyone knows anything about it.

sapblatt said:

Does anone know the history, location or demise of this trail? I was reading about it a chapter in Nicholas Howe's "Not Without Peril." A few hikers in the 1930s were planning to ascend this trail out of the Great Gulf but they had a tragedy in the Peabody River and never made it. I have never heard of this trail and it is obviously no longer on the AMC maps and I was wondering if anyone knows anything about it.

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Hiked it in the early seventies.

Connected from the summit of Adams to a point low on Six Husbands. Rather steep: 2300 ft in 1.25 mi. (source: 1969 WMG, not mentioned in 1976 WMG)

Shown on my National Geograpic TOPO! maps (digital topo maps).

Doug

Thanks for the info

Hi Doug Paul -

Thank you...I figured it had been abandoned at some time or another. That is a rather steep profile...I cannot think of a steeper trail, I think that even surpasses the Great Gulf Trail beyond Spaulding Lake, and the Madison Gulf Headwall (writing/speaking from memory, not experience.)

By the way...Happy Birthday!

sapblatt said:

Thank you...I figured it had been abandoned at some time or another. That is a rather steep profile...I cannot think of a steeper trail, I think that even surpasses the Great Gulf Trail beyond Spaulding Lake, and the Madison Gulf Headwall (writing/speaking from memory, not experience.)

By the way...Happy Birthday!

Click to expand...

The 69 guidebook does call it "the steepest path of its length in the White Mountains". We hiked down it, stayed the night near Spaulding Lake, and hiked out via GGT headwall. (Don't recall how we got to Adams--might have been Osgood or Madison Gulf. I think the car was parked at Pinkham.)

Max slope angles from topo:
Adams Slide 45 deg
Grt Gulf Tr 38 deg
Mad Gulf Tr 34 deg

And thanks,

Doug

It's been out of use for over 20 years. I did hike most of it quite a while ago. It started from around the same point the Butress Trail leave the Six Husband's Trail. It is very steep, but I think Huntington is steeper and more of a scramble. You can read about it on this link:
http://world.std.com/~Whites/Presis.htm
It's a Lost Trails site. Very cool. There's a link in the description on that site to VFFT but it didn't work for me. I've been wanting to get back there some day and look for it, but every time I've been in the vicinity I seem to opt for the Six Husband's Trail, one of my all time favorites.