shamples
New member
So I had a nice hike this past Saturday starting from Lincoln Woods trailhead, veering left onto the Osseo Trail to summit both Flume and Liberty before heading down Liberty Springs to a car spotted vehicle. Close to 11 mile hike which we started at 5:45am and finished at 11:45am. Made good time, but we met these 2 hikers going up the same route as us from Lincoln Woods. We kept catching each other on the trail at various points before I finally was curious atop Liberty if they were doubling back to their car since it had already been 7 miles to the top of LIberty.
Turns out these 2 guys were from North Carolina. And they were up here on vacation and had read the big loop was a great hike to see many peaks. Now I'm sure there have been plenty of people who have done this "big loop" over an extended overnights hike. Maybe 2 or 3 nights. But no, these 2 had it in their heads they were making it around this entire loop and back to the Lincoln Woods parking lot in a day.
What is the Big Loop? OK, they started at LIncoln Woods. Took the Osseo up to Flume and then peaked Liberty. From there, I saw their "big day loop" of continuing on the ridge to peak Little Haystack, Lincoln, Lafayette, Garfield, South Twin, down Twinway to peak Guyot, Bond and Bondcliff to loop back down to the Wilderness Trail and back to Lincoln Woods. I did a brief total mileage and it looked like around 32 miles they expected to do and be back at their car before night. I tried to tell them they were crazy, but they had it in their head to go for it.
Considering they started at 6am and peaked Liberty with us at 10am, that was 4 hours for 7 miles. Thinking of if they had a chance of making it, I projected at their current pace, another 4 hours of 7 miles would be 2:00, 14 miles and 6:00, 21 miles. It gets dark around 8:30 so by 8:30 they'd be lucky to have 24/25 miles. And I'm going by their morning pace which is always a little quicker than later. I just don't see how they were able to get it all done in one day. Is that loop even possible for anyone to accomplish in one day??? I mean they didn't even have huge overnight packs so I'm not even sure if they had enough food/water to last their whole day. It was just inconceivable what they were attempting to do, but they didn't want to be talked out of it. I'm in decent shape and 11 miles that day was enough for me, especially the pounding of Liberty Spring coming down. But damn, I had never heard of such a thing in one day.
Turns out these 2 guys were from North Carolina. And they were up here on vacation and had read the big loop was a great hike to see many peaks. Now I'm sure there have been plenty of people who have done this "big loop" over an extended overnights hike. Maybe 2 or 3 nights. But no, these 2 had it in their heads they were making it around this entire loop and back to the Lincoln Woods parking lot in a day.
What is the Big Loop? OK, they started at LIncoln Woods. Took the Osseo up to Flume and then peaked Liberty. From there, I saw their "big day loop" of continuing on the ridge to peak Little Haystack, Lincoln, Lafayette, Garfield, South Twin, down Twinway to peak Guyot, Bond and Bondcliff to loop back down to the Wilderness Trail and back to Lincoln Woods. I did a brief total mileage and it looked like around 32 miles they expected to do and be back at their car before night. I tried to tell them they were crazy, but they had it in their head to go for it.
Considering they started at 6am and peaked Liberty with us at 10am, that was 4 hours for 7 miles. Thinking of if they had a chance of making it, I projected at their current pace, another 4 hours of 7 miles would be 2:00, 14 miles and 6:00, 21 miles. It gets dark around 8:30 so by 8:30 they'd be lucky to have 24/25 miles. And I'm going by their morning pace which is always a little quicker than later. I just don't see how they were able to get it all done in one day. Is that loop even possible for anyone to accomplish in one day??? I mean they didn't even have huge overnight packs so I'm not even sure if they had enough food/water to last their whole day. It was just inconceivable what they were attempting to do, but they didn't want to be talked out of it. I'm in decent shape and 11 miles that day was enough for me, especially the pounding of Liberty Spring coming down. But damn, I had never heard of such a thing in one day.
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