Neil
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I had a delivery to make at the twin horse lean-to’s, six miles in from Coreys Road trailhead, at 7am on Saturday morning. I carried in some soya milk, fruit juice and protein bars to a wild man who had hiked the Santanoni range and then bushwhacked from Couchie the day before with only a loin cloth.
On my way in I was startled by a deer that jumped up right in front of me on the side of the trail. We had a staring match and as soon as I moved my foot it was gone in a flash.
Deep in the shadows of the lean-to I could see that the wild man’s legs and arms were a mess of scratches that were possibly self-inflicted. His hair was a greasy matted mess and his eyes were bloodshot. I peered deeply into them and saw no traces of civilization or education. Thus was my initial meeting with the Cold River Couchieman. I kept a safe distance and threw the food in to the back of the lean-to. He leapt onto it and after a few moments of snarling and frightful grunting and jaw snapping sounds everything, including the packaging, was gone. After the feeding Couchieman calmed right down and so I let him out and we started off down the trail towards Duckhole. He began quoting Shakespeare and the scriptures, pulled out his compass and asked me what the bearing to East Seymour was. After a mile’s hike the brook that drains the swamp between Seymour East and Seymour crossed the trail. 5 more minutes and we veered into the underbrush and began climbing Seymour east, which at 3430 feet is peak #90 on the Barry Boomer list and #37 on the 50 pathless.
We followed open channels right to the top skirting one lone blowdown field. Without really exerting ourselves we were at the summit in an hour. We found a small viewing area and scoped Seymour, which I considered to be the crux of our day. In the col between the two mountains the aforementioned swamp shows on the map and a ridge leads due west directly to it, 300 vertical feet below and 0.3 miles away. It took us nearly an hour to deal with the cliffs, blowdown and general nastiness that is to be found on that innocent looking ridge. The south side was impenetrably thick and the north side entailed much too steep side-sloping. So we simply took it on the chin and finally were rewarded with one of the most beautiful Adirondack bogs I’ve ever been in. Morning sunshine, birdsong and mountain views fed our souls as the horseflies fed on them. Our souls thus became part of the food chain.
We put our head nets on, pumped lots of water and began the 1000 foot ascent of gnarly old Seymour. It was a tough climb with lots of detours and cliffy obstacles but we made steady progress as the day heated up. We never got badly ensnared but for some reason it was a long endeavour. Near the top we made some very nice elevation gain along the base of a cliff that spiralled up the mountain. Then we hit another cliff that spiralled up the other way until the terrain flattened out and we hit the herd path 10 paces (counted by Glen) from the summit. Yeah!
We had left the lean-to’s at 7:15 and now it was noon. I had just become a 20er with respect to my 46-B list.
Phase 3 of the hike was to find our way down to Ouluska pass without getting hung up on cliffs, trapped in high-walled gullies that terminated in precipices or impaled by gnarlies. The bugs were background noise in all of this.
Glen has been down that way before with Randomscooter who owns the route across Ouluska towards Donaldson and we had a couple of waypoints in a gps but there was some confusion as to which way we should go. Glen didn’t remember it being as thick as what we were in so we decided to cut north to the steep-walled gully. You stand above this gully from a viewing rock about 3 minutes below the summit, just off the trail and looking towards Seward.
We couldn’t get into it at first due to the high vertical walls but by following it down we found a chink in the armour and jumped in. We made rapid progress for a long way in the stream-bed but eventually it seemed to peter out and we spent the next 40 minutes or so pushing our way down to several very important waypoints that were the key to the next phase of our trip.
We were less than a half mile from the summit of Ouluska pass, between Seward and Seymour and it is one of the wildest and remotest feeling places I have ever been in. Beautiful cliff faces lined the Seward side of the approach to the pass and the area was a thick tangle of blowdown. This is why our WP’s were so important. We hit Ouluska Brook, crossed it and proceeded up a cut trail. Cut when and by who and for what reason I’ll never know but we followed it for 100 yards to another crucial WP that brought us to a meadow. Looking back over our shoulders we could see Seymour, now getting further away and ahead Seward loomed 1500 feet above us. We could see just about up to the summit.
Earlier on from Seymour we could plainly see a ramp that lies just below and to the south of the steep southern flanks of Seward and which ascended 500 feet towards our goal.
In that area of “blowdown on steroids” we were following WP’s that avoided the worst of it along a muddy trickle. The gps was consulted continuously but in spite of that we missed a very subtle turn and did some balance training atop chaos. We were aiming for “rocky stream” which was the only remaining key to a successful outcome and the gps said 60 meters dead ahead, then 50, 30…and suddenly, 80 meters directly behind us. We were stuck in the middle of a huge pile of blowdown.
I looked at the screen and it was locked frozen. It was one of those WTF moments. We waited patiently and after 2 minutes it straightened itself out and “rocky stream” was 30 meters dead ahead again. We picked up the stream and suddenly it was like being on the northway as it led us along the up-ramp through a malevolent looking forest. We whizzed past the waypoints and when the stream eventually petered out we were close to 3500 feet and closing in on the Scooter Slide. We veered more northerly and then it got very steep. Glen racked his memory trying to remember exactly which way he and Random had gone 2 years ago. Rather than follow the WP’s we followed the law of up (and it was very steep) and checked the altimeter very closely. We were now following a long line of cliffs and they had thrown the gps completely off. The cliffs would have to peter out soon because we were nearly level with the slide’s base and the cliffs were between us and it.
Of course they did peter out and then Glen said, “There it is!” We were less than 50 feet away. We crawled through the mess of trees that had been brought down by the slide and there we were. It was 4PM. I had started hiking at 4:50AM which made this the longest approach to a slide I have ever done.
I was awestruck. I have been on many slides before but never such a recently formed one. It was as if the gun barrel was still smoking. In fact the rock was still covered with a powdery substance. It was fairly steep but ran in a series of steps. Ie. Steep section, flat spot, steep section, flat spot. At each flat area the slide had lost energy and another mass of trees were piled up. In the pockets of soil that had been left behind birch seedlings had taken root and were growing up. At the edges of the slide the soil layer was raw and jagged-looking like a fresh laceration.
Turning around we looked into the immensity of the Cold River Valley. Seymour, Donaldson, Emmons, Couch and Panther walled it in and the Cold wound it’s peaceful way out between Couch and Emmons.
We climbed, stopped to catch our breath and admire the expanding views and then climbed some more. Eventually we could see Marcy and Allen and a great many other peaks. Our descent route off of Seymour was clearly visible.
Near the top I was struck by how small and spindly the trees were. It’s a wonder the slide ever got started with such small trees and shallow soil. It was steepest at the top headwall and I traversed carefully over to Glen on one side in order to find an opening (there wasn’t one). We finessed our way through the first 20 very steep and thick krumholtz and the slope relented and the woods opened up. We cruised to the herd path in less that 5 minutes. It had taken 4 hours and 30 minutes to get from Seymour to Seward. While on Seymour we had estimated less than 5 hours, more than four.
I have only been on Seward in winter-like conditions and was amazed at how rugged the trail to Donaldson is. Much better to do it on snow. I sat on a log below Donaldson and trimmed my toenails while Glen climbed it. The black flies were very hungry and aggressive. I wore my raincoat to prevent my very soul from being consumed. I found a pair of red prescription sunglasses and stuck them in my pack. An hour later down the Calkins path we ran into two guys that looked to be in their mid-sixties. One of them asked if we had happened to find a pair of red prescription sunglasses. It was a special treat to see his face light up when I said they were in my pack. Glen calls that sort of thing Trail Magic. Sounds good to me. We got out at 7:00
This trip would not have been possible without Randomscooter’s help. Thanks Tom!
On my way in I was startled by a deer that jumped up right in front of me on the side of the trail. We had a staring match and as soon as I moved my foot it was gone in a flash.
Deep in the shadows of the lean-to I could see that the wild man’s legs and arms were a mess of scratches that were possibly self-inflicted. His hair was a greasy matted mess and his eyes were bloodshot. I peered deeply into them and saw no traces of civilization or education. Thus was my initial meeting with the Cold River Couchieman. I kept a safe distance and threw the food in to the back of the lean-to. He leapt onto it and after a few moments of snarling and frightful grunting and jaw snapping sounds everything, including the packaging, was gone. After the feeding Couchieman calmed right down and so I let him out and we started off down the trail towards Duckhole. He began quoting Shakespeare and the scriptures, pulled out his compass and asked me what the bearing to East Seymour was. After a mile’s hike the brook that drains the swamp between Seymour East and Seymour crossed the trail. 5 more minutes and we veered into the underbrush and began climbing Seymour east, which at 3430 feet is peak #90 on the Barry Boomer list and #37 on the 50 pathless.
We followed open channels right to the top skirting one lone blowdown field. Without really exerting ourselves we were at the summit in an hour. We found a small viewing area and scoped Seymour, which I considered to be the crux of our day. In the col between the two mountains the aforementioned swamp shows on the map and a ridge leads due west directly to it, 300 vertical feet below and 0.3 miles away. It took us nearly an hour to deal with the cliffs, blowdown and general nastiness that is to be found on that innocent looking ridge. The south side was impenetrably thick and the north side entailed much too steep side-sloping. So we simply took it on the chin and finally were rewarded with one of the most beautiful Adirondack bogs I’ve ever been in. Morning sunshine, birdsong and mountain views fed our souls as the horseflies fed on them. Our souls thus became part of the food chain.
We put our head nets on, pumped lots of water and began the 1000 foot ascent of gnarly old Seymour. It was a tough climb with lots of detours and cliffy obstacles but we made steady progress as the day heated up. We never got badly ensnared but for some reason it was a long endeavour. Near the top we made some very nice elevation gain along the base of a cliff that spiralled up the mountain. Then we hit another cliff that spiralled up the other way until the terrain flattened out and we hit the herd path 10 paces (counted by Glen) from the summit. Yeah!
We had left the lean-to’s at 7:15 and now it was noon. I had just become a 20er with respect to my 46-B list.
Phase 3 of the hike was to find our way down to Ouluska pass without getting hung up on cliffs, trapped in high-walled gullies that terminated in precipices or impaled by gnarlies. The bugs were background noise in all of this.
Glen has been down that way before with Randomscooter who owns the route across Ouluska towards Donaldson and we had a couple of waypoints in a gps but there was some confusion as to which way we should go. Glen didn’t remember it being as thick as what we were in so we decided to cut north to the steep-walled gully. You stand above this gully from a viewing rock about 3 minutes below the summit, just off the trail and looking towards Seward.
We couldn’t get into it at first due to the high vertical walls but by following it down we found a chink in the armour and jumped in. We made rapid progress for a long way in the stream-bed but eventually it seemed to peter out and we spent the next 40 minutes or so pushing our way down to several very important waypoints that were the key to the next phase of our trip.
We were less than a half mile from the summit of Ouluska pass, between Seward and Seymour and it is one of the wildest and remotest feeling places I have ever been in. Beautiful cliff faces lined the Seward side of the approach to the pass and the area was a thick tangle of blowdown. This is why our WP’s were so important. We hit Ouluska Brook, crossed it and proceeded up a cut trail. Cut when and by who and for what reason I’ll never know but we followed it for 100 yards to another crucial WP that brought us to a meadow. Looking back over our shoulders we could see Seymour, now getting further away and ahead Seward loomed 1500 feet above us. We could see just about up to the summit.
Earlier on from Seymour we could plainly see a ramp that lies just below and to the south of the steep southern flanks of Seward and which ascended 500 feet towards our goal.
In that area of “blowdown on steroids” we were following WP’s that avoided the worst of it along a muddy trickle. The gps was consulted continuously but in spite of that we missed a very subtle turn and did some balance training atop chaos. We were aiming for “rocky stream” which was the only remaining key to a successful outcome and the gps said 60 meters dead ahead, then 50, 30…and suddenly, 80 meters directly behind us. We were stuck in the middle of a huge pile of blowdown.
I looked at the screen and it was locked frozen. It was one of those WTF moments. We waited patiently and after 2 minutes it straightened itself out and “rocky stream” was 30 meters dead ahead again. We picked up the stream and suddenly it was like being on the northway as it led us along the up-ramp through a malevolent looking forest. We whizzed past the waypoints and when the stream eventually petered out we were close to 3500 feet and closing in on the Scooter Slide. We veered more northerly and then it got very steep. Glen racked his memory trying to remember exactly which way he and Random had gone 2 years ago. Rather than follow the WP’s we followed the law of up (and it was very steep) and checked the altimeter very closely. We were now following a long line of cliffs and they had thrown the gps completely off. The cliffs would have to peter out soon because we were nearly level with the slide’s base and the cliffs were between us and it.
Of course they did peter out and then Glen said, “There it is!” We were less than 50 feet away. We crawled through the mess of trees that had been brought down by the slide and there we were. It was 4PM. I had started hiking at 4:50AM which made this the longest approach to a slide I have ever done.
I was awestruck. I have been on many slides before but never such a recently formed one. It was as if the gun barrel was still smoking. In fact the rock was still covered with a powdery substance. It was fairly steep but ran in a series of steps. Ie. Steep section, flat spot, steep section, flat spot. At each flat area the slide had lost energy and another mass of trees were piled up. In the pockets of soil that had been left behind birch seedlings had taken root and were growing up. At the edges of the slide the soil layer was raw and jagged-looking like a fresh laceration.
Turning around we looked into the immensity of the Cold River Valley. Seymour, Donaldson, Emmons, Couch and Panther walled it in and the Cold wound it’s peaceful way out between Couch and Emmons.
We climbed, stopped to catch our breath and admire the expanding views and then climbed some more. Eventually we could see Marcy and Allen and a great many other peaks. Our descent route off of Seymour was clearly visible.
Near the top I was struck by how small and spindly the trees were. It’s a wonder the slide ever got started with such small trees and shallow soil. It was steepest at the top headwall and I traversed carefully over to Glen on one side in order to find an opening (there wasn’t one). We finessed our way through the first 20 very steep and thick krumholtz and the slope relented and the woods opened up. We cruised to the herd path in less that 5 minutes. It had taken 4 hours and 30 minutes to get from Seymour to Seward. While on Seymour we had estimated less than 5 hours, more than four.
I have only been on Seward in winter-like conditions and was amazed at how rugged the trail to Donaldson is. Much better to do it on snow. I sat on a log below Donaldson and trimmed my toenails while Glen climbed it. The black flies were very hungry and aggressive. I wore my raincoat to prevent my very soul from being consumed. I found a pair of red prescription sunglasses and stuck them in my pack. An hour later down the Calkins path we ran into two guys that looked to be in their mid-sixties. One of them asked if we had happened to find a pair of red prescription sunglasses. It was a special treat to see his face light up when I said they were in my pack. Glen calls that sort of thing Trail Magic. Sounds good to me. We got out at 7:00
This trip would not have been possible without Randomscooter’s help. Thanks Tom!
