Cohos in mind

just was acquainted with the Cohos trail www.cohostrail.org thanks to a link provided by pedxing, a member of alpinezone.com , sounds right for me but I would greatly appreciate speaking with someone who has walked this extremely remote and wonderous niche of New Hampshire.. thinking about tacking this 16? mile venture onto whatever portion of the Whites I can handle in the 2 weeks prior to hooking up with the CT. Thanks everyone...
-T-Rex

I did the Nash Stream section when the trail first opened. I guess that would be three (four?) summers ago. I love the idea of a new trail up there but the section I did had some problems then, mainly, much of it was road-walking on Nash Stream Road and the actual trail itself had not yet been "hardened." I wondered how it would survive erosion. In parts it was more like a guided bushwhack than a trail, which is fine if you know that in advance but don't expect an AMC-RMC type of engineered trail with lots of rock work and anti-erosion measures. I believe the trail-maker has the intention, however, of going back and doing that kind of work once the whole trail is cut. And perhaps he's been able to relocate the Nash Stream part. Much of the section further north uses snowmobile and ATV routes. I've had some good day hikes up there. You certainly won't find crowds on it. I do plan to go back and do the whole thing. After all the road-walking three summers ago, I bailed and went to the Bondcliffs for a few days! I don't quite follow what you mean by the "16 mile venture?" The CT is much longer than that.

I think the Kilkenny Ridge trail is part of the Cohos, isn't it? Papabear and I did that last year and it was a great hike with many nice views. Check out Papabears trip report on his website if you want more details.

funkyfreddy said:

I think the Kilkenny Ridge trail is part of the Cohos, isn't it? Papabear and I did that last year and it was a great hike with many nice views. Check out Papabears trip report on his website if you want more details.

Click to expand...

Yes the CT incorporates the exisiting WMNF trail on the Kilkenny Ridge. The new CT starts in the Nash Stream section just north of the Kilkenny Ridge. The K. Ridge is a great hike, I agree.

Below are some changes just released from the Cohos Trail Association:

IMPORTANT CHANGES FOR 2005:

The High Route of the Sanguinary Summit Trail is closed for 2005 due to a large logging operation nearby. This logging work has made it impossible to follow the trail over a considerable distance on the northern Sanguinary Ridge to Mud Pond Ridge.
We have posted a CLOSED sign at each end of the High Route of the SST. Please abide by these signs. This means the Panorama Lean-to is not available for use now that the logging operation has begun. Use the Low Route of the Sanguinary Summit Trail to bypass the logging area and you will be fine. The Low Route encompasses the Balsams Grand Resort Hotel Spruce Trail, Canal Trail and Sanguinary Ridge Trail (across country ski trail not to be confused with the foot trail of the same name on the north side of Dixville Notch.) In 2006, we will try to rebuild the trail or find a suitable alternative for it.

CORRECTION: Barrier Plate on Mt. Clinton Road

In the guidebook it states that, after leaving the Edmands Path on Mt. Eisenhower and traveling northbound on the Mt. Clinton Road, one should look for a barrier gate in a very sharp dogleg turn. The gate is on the left. Go around that gate. Actually, it is the second of two gates just off the road only a short distance apart. Go around that second gate that is the actually directly in the dogleg.

CORRECTION: Offset Four-Way Intersection In the guidebook and on the maps (Map 5 - the Dixville Notch section).

There is reference to an offset four-way intersection at the north end of the Sanguinary Summit Trail where it meets the Spruce Trail. It shows that the little spur to the northwest goes to the Mud Pond spillway on the northeast end of the lake. This is not correct. The little spur trail that goes down to the lake is actually about 600 feet or so farther to the west on the Spruce Trail. The one right next to the SST goes through low country before climbing up onto Keysar Mt. If you would like to visit the lake northeast shores, be sure to hike farther west from the SST-Spruce Trail junction.

ask me

My brother and I hiked the CT last year (2004). I just pushed my journal (rather raw - sorry) and a few photos up to http://trailjournals.com/location.cfm?trailname=3270.

The trail is very nice overall. The far north is flat and there are some road walks, but the lakes are pretty. My biggest beef with the far north was that the snowmobile trails were so full of weeds (actually tall grass and flowers) that when they get wet the vegetation holds so much water it's like swimming. And a couple of the snowmobile trails had gotten chewed up by quads which turned them into long narrow swamps. Still, we took our time up there and enjoyed the moose and lakes.

Once you get south of Lake Francis, things start getting bumpy. But there's still a bit of (dirt) road walk until Coleman State Park/Sportsman's Lodge. From there south, pretty much the whole trail is in the woods and it's a very fun walk.

My personal favorite spots were
- Cherry Mountain/Owl's head
- North Percy
- Dixville notch
- crossing the presidentials

Alas, much of this list is a function of how the weather was at the time we happened to go by. We had cloudy weather for the north part of Nash Stream Forest, but I could tell from the occasional glimpses that it could be quite nice in the sun.

The guidebook mentions this, but many places really are rather remote. Until we got to the white mountains, we only saw a total of three people on the hiking trails. All were dayhikers, less than 1/2 mile from a trailheads. One was in Dixville notch and the other two were in Nash Stream Forest. Even including the whites trails, we probably didn't see more than 30 people, almost all of them on the hike up Edmonds path.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

T-Rex: Interesting coincidence. Much of the Cohos trail was cut and blazed by Tracy Rexford (who I had the pleasure to meet on Lake Umbagog in May). His trailnam? T-Rex! Now you REALLY have to go!