Peaks and Peaks in western Maine - July 10 - 17

[spencer]

by the way, a few other posters and I did a less used route this past winter. It met up with the top part of the Stan/Audrey route. At Gathering 7.0, I talked with Stan a bunch about this route (we came up from the normal Porter Brook side and met with Stan and Eric in the col between NKD and WC that day). Anyway, I remembered about the easy going ATV trail that the Stan/Audrey route follows near the top.

So, this winter, we started on the Canada Rd. and ascended the NW-SE ridge (between the T3 and the top of Bear Brook on the Gazetteer) of White cap. We crossed the ridge heading due W and dropped slightly down and met up with the above mentioned ATV route about 10 minutes below the col proper. Despite some very deep and steep snows ascending the ridge, it really was a great route. We even were able to follow some smallish roads when we were dropping from the ridge and then countouring around the bowl.

We started at the Crystal Rd. off the Canada Rd. We were able to bag both NKD and WC that day, but didn't have the daylight or steam for Boundary. We went back for that...

spencer

PS - thanks for the great, detailed trip reports. PB just raised the bar for directions to the peaks.

 

[RoySwkr]

Re: Spaulding/ Caribou Pond Rd condition

As a footnote to the week, on Friday Pat, Little Bear, and I set off to find that elusive path from Caribou Valley to the Spaulding lean-to. We were successful for about half of the way, but the path became more fragmented and various pieces of tape, gift wrap ribbons, and semi-cairns started appearing left, right, fore, and aft.

Actually that's about how I remember it from 10 years ago, fortunately I was going downhill and the woods roads were converging not diverging so it was not so hard to stay on route. I think this was used heavily during the leanto construction and trail relocation but was deliberately not maintained to keep ATVs away from the leanto.

Thank you el-bagr for explaining the management of the Gosford area. It appears that Audrey has now climbed Boundary/Whitecap more often than Gene Daniell and should replace him as official tour guide.

 

[Papa Bear]

PapaBear: the map i sent you came from Meo ... SherpaK found a better map online somewhere ?

sounds like a fun week - congrats to Marge on reaching your NE100 !

Thanks Arm

That packet of information you sent was a great help. As you have read, we followed Meo's route (Ridgerunner's actually) and we literally had a superhighway from the car to the boundary swath. Bushwhack? What bushwhack!

I'd go back to check out Gosford if I get the chance on a clear weather day.

And congratulations on your 100th! Sorry I missed it!

Pb

 

[funkyfreddy]

Re: Re: Spaulding/ Caribou Pond Rd condition

Actually that's about how I remember it from 10 years ago, fortunately I was going downhill and the woods roads were converging not diverging so it was not so hard to stay on route. I think this was used heavily during the leanto construction and trail relocation but was deliberately not maintained to keep ATVs away from the leanto.

That's how I remember it from a few years ago. I explored the route the first day with a light pack to the logging roads, then the next day opted to take that route with a full pack back to my car on Caribou Valley Rd. from the lean to instead of going back over Spauding and Sugarloaf. It wasn't very hard to follow - I just made sure to reference my compass often. I can see how easy it would be to get confused by all of the tape and boundary markers if you're expecting a clearly blazed or easy to follow trail or herd path.

Nice pictures and trip reports, Papabear. I'll have to do these peaks if and when I seriously start to think about the 100 highest. I'll have to look at that list soon as I'm not sure how many I've done so far.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Congrats

on a great trip report Papa Bear. It is fun to see that my Boundary itinerary is gaining in popularity. It took me three times scouting the area before I was able to bag Boundary and White Cap on a solo jaunt to bag my 100th summit. Great memories.
Pic here . Congrats to Arm too !