hikersinger
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This was an AMC-sponsored hike, the first in a little while (my last was Owl's Head with John Bergmann, a great hike). Heard about the hike through NHTramper (Mike Cherim), who posted the event via a meetup.com-based Random Group of Hikers event.
Beth Zimmer was coaching Mike, who's on his way to becoming a certified AMC trip leader (way to go Mike!). Wonderful to meet and get to know Beth, who I can tell is a wonderful leader.
We started in about 9:15am. About an hour in, one of the group shared she was feeling sick to her stomach. Turns out she skipped breakfast because of the malady, which while understanding, wasn't so helpful. She had a bite to eat, but soon after wasn't feeling any better, so Beth and Mike made the very tough decision to have the group descend together, then re-group to see what could be salvaged for the day.
Shortly after starting the descent, we ran into two of the group that were late and had started up much later than we did. Beth asked me how I felt about the situation and I let her know I wanted to sign out and continue up the planned route. She was fine with this so I and one of the late-comers (Inna R.) continued, and the rest descended. They ended up taking in the Frankenstein Cliffs and Arethusa Falls, and had a nice time.
Continuing up, we encountered no trouble as we used the spur path to summit Mt. Crawford. The trail was quite dry and the open rock ledges were mostly dry, following rains of the past day or so. Fabulous views south and west toward Crawford Notch, and north toward Resolution and Stairs Mountain. Continuing on Davis Path, parts were wet, and others grown in quite a bit -- attention trail adopter(s), if there are any. I know we were within the Dry River Wilderness, but acceptable clearing width is around two feet, and in at least a few places there was really no width to be had; a lot of brushing between wet branches.
We took the Mt. Parker trail up to Mt. Resolution. Some of the sloped ledges were wet with black moss (?) so they were a little slippery, but we didn't have a hard time finding dry paths. Coming down we did lose our way on the same ledges somewhat, but were back on track within a few minutes.
While heading up the spur trail to Stairs Mountain, we met a USFS backcountry ranger who had spent the past 4+ hours on top, taking inventory of anyone she saw; turns out we were the first she ran into all day (likewise for us, aside from our group that descended). She removed some trash from the area, including a short Himalayan-type prayer flag that unfortunately couldn't stay due to USFS rules.
Thinking back, I'm hoping we actually got to the summit proper of Stairs Mountain; is it characterized by a rather steep drop off, from which you look directly at Mt. Resolution in front of you, and Crawford Dome and Mt. Crawford a bit to the right of that? There are a few "stairs" of course, that make up the mountain, but I think we reached the end of the trail -- the cliff outlook is to the right of the trail.
We headed out the same way without incident, made it back to Route 302 by 5:40pm. Great day, no rain, sun in and out of the clouds, temps around 60-70 with some good wind on the summits and ledges. Really quite the perfect day.
Total Mileage: approx. 10 miles, including spur paths to summits
Total Elevation Gain: 3,534 feet
- Davis Path from Route 302 end
- Spur path to summit of Mt. Crawford
- Continued on Davis Path, took Mt. Parker Trail to summit of Resolution
- Back to Davis Path, took spur path to summit of Stairs Mountain
- Return to Route 302 via Davis Path
This was an AMC-sponsored hike, the first in a little while (my last was Owl's Head with John Bergmann, a great hike). Heard about the hike through NHTramper (Mike Cherim), who posted the event via a meetup.com-based Random Group of Hikers event.
Beth Zimmer was coaching Mike, who's on his way to becoming a certified AMC trip leader (way to go Mike!). Wonderful to meet and get to know Beth, who I can tell is a wonderful leader.
We started in about 9:15am. About an hour in, one of the group shared she was feeling sick to her stomach. Turns out she skipped breakfast because of the malady, which while understanding, wasn't so helpful. She had a bite to eat, but soon after wasn't feeling any better, so Beth and Mike made the very tough decision to have the group descend together, then re-group to see what could be salvaged for the day.
Shortly after starting the descent, we ran into two of the group that were late and had started up much later than we did. Beth asked me how I felt about the situation and I let her know I wanted to sign out and continue up the planned route. She was fine with this so I and one of the late-comers (Inna R.) continued, and the rest descended. They ended up taking in the Frankenstein Cliffs and Arethusa Falls, and had a nice time.
Continuing up, we encountered no trouble as we used the spur path to summit Mt. Crawford. The trail was quite dry and the open rock ledges were mostly dry, following rains of the past day or so. Fabulous views south and west toward Crawford Notch, and north toward Resolution and Stairs Mountain. Continuing on Davis Path, parts were wet, and others grown in quite a bit -- attention trail adopter(s), if there are any. I know we were within the Dry River Wilderness, but acceptable clearing width is around two feet, and in at least a few places there was really no width to be had; a lot of brushing between wet branches.
We took the Mt. Parker trail up to Mt. Resolution. Some of the sloped ledges were wet with black moss (?) so they were a little slippery, but we didn't have a hard time finding dry paths. Coming down we did lose our way on the same ledges somewhat, but were back on track within a few minutes.
While heading up the spur trail to Stairs Mountain, we met a USFS backcountry ranger who had spent the past 4+ hours on top, taking inventory of anyone she saw; turns out we were the first she ran into all day (likewise for us, aside from our group that descended). She removed some trash from the area, including a short Himalayan-type prayer flag that unfortunately couldn't stay due to USFS rules.
Thinking back, I'm hoping we actually got to the summit proper of Stairs Mountain; is it characterized by a rather steep drop off, from which you look directly at Mt. Resolution in front of you, and Crawford Dome and Mt. Crawford a bit to the right of that? There are a few "stairs" of course, that make up the mountain, but I think we reached the end of the trail -- the cliff outlook is to the right of the trail.
We headed out the same way without incident, made it back to Route 302 by 5:40pm. Great day, no rain, sun in and out of the clouds, temps around 60-70 with some good wind on the summits and ledges. Really quite the perfect day.
Total Mileage: approx. 10 miles, including spur paths to summits
Total Elevation Gain: 3,534 feet
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