Bombadil
Active member
3-3-13
Parked at the Abol Bridge parking area and found the trail to the tote road to be very well packed by skiiers and snowmobiles. It was nice and firm after a solid warmup the day before followed by a freeze overnight so it was nice and firm in snowshoes. The tote road was a snowmobile highway as expected. Abol Slide had been broken out by a couple of small groups a few days before, big thanks to the guys that broke that out, it made flying up Abol super easy. Caught up to Michael and his group of 3 about 800 feet or so below the top of the slide where fresh windblown snow had covered up tracks and broke that out to the top of the slide. The sun actually began to poke through the snowshowers briefly at the top of the slide and for a brief few minutes it was actually pretty comfortable! Where Abol tops out it was super firm and boney and I made a big mistake of over-analyzing and ditched my snowshoes (won't make that mistake again). Turns out the windslabs from there to Hamlin and up to Baxter weren't so good at holding my weight so I wound up going much slower and less inefficient than I could have, good alpine training in some way I suppose. Occasionally got views to Chimney Pond and Pamola which was unexpected and awesome. Found the snow from Baxter down to Abol to be a mixture of nice soft powder and firm windslab which made for pretty easy and quick travel. I barebooted from the top of Abol to both peaks and all the way back to the car. The plunge stepping in the wet snow down Abol was amazing, a nice 45 minutes to shoot down 3000+ feet! I carried my axe but in the conditions I encountered arresting would have been cake with anything so I could definitely have left my spikes, crampons, and axe back at the car but I had no idea what to expect up there. A nice day to finish up my winter 67, glad I stuck around Millinocket for one more day to play and was pleasantly surprised by the weather.
Pat
pcushing21 at yahoo dot com
Parked at the Abol Bridge parking area and found the trail to the tote road to be very well packed by skiiers and snowmobiles. It was nice and firm after a solid warmup the day before followed by a freeze overnight so it was nice and firm in snowshoes. The tote road was a snowmobile highway as expected. Abol Slide had been broken out by a couple of small groups a few days before, big thanks to the guys that broke that out, it made flying up Abol super easy. Caught up to Michael and his group of 3 about 800 feet or so below the top of the slide where fresh windblown snow had covered up tracks and broke that out to the top of the slide. The sun actually began to poke through the snowshowers briefly at the top of the slide and for a brief few minutes it was actually pretty comfortable! Where Abol tops out it was super firm and boney and I made a big mistake of over-analyzing and ditched my snowshoes (won't make that mistake again). Turns out the windslabs from there to Hamlin and up to Baxter weren't so good at holding my weight so I wound up going much slower and less inefficient than I could have, good alpine training in some way I suppose. Occasionally got views to Chimney Pond and Pamola which was unexpected and awesome. Found the snow from Baxter down to Abol to be a mixture of nice soft powder and firm windslab which made for pretty easy and quick travel. I barebooted from the top of Abol to both peaks and all the way back to the car. The plunge stepping in the wet snow down Abol was amazing, a nice 45 minutes to shoot down 3000+ feet! I carried my axe but in the conditions I encountered arresting would have been cake with anything so I could definitely have left my spikes, crampons, and axe back at the car but I had no idea what to expect up there. A nice day to finish up my winter 67, glad I stuck around Millinocket for one more day to play and was pleasantly surprised by the weather.
Pat
pcushing21 at yahoo dot com
