This story begins, as they so often do for me, with the usual plan to go North, sleep over and get up early to go hiking.
Gallery / slide show
Alas, as almost always happens, I was overly optimistic about how early I could get out. On the other hand, there was compensation...
With the nice bright moon in the sky I thought I'd head to camp via the Kanc ... the Kancamagus is always pretty , but at night with a bright moon and hardly any traffic ... it's really beautiful.
It's eerie at night at the scenic outlooks - crowded by day with people stopping and going like hummingbirds at a feeder; abandoned at night. I always expect a bear to be cruising the grounds looking for discarded food or whatnot. Never seen one, but still ...
Anyway, I don't usually expect to see UFOs .
That streak is the UFO. What I saw was probably a VTOL jet on military exercises, but it was interesting. It hovered for a while, then slowly drifted up, then blinked out ( I may have just missed it putzing around with the camera) and was very quickly overhead moving and sounding like a jet. You don't see that every day !
After that it was an uneventful trip to camp , arriving past midnight. Waking up at 4 A.M., I had no trouble rolling right over and sleeping a few more hours.
Eventually I did get up and drive up to the Edmands path trailhead. The Mt Clinton Road is not maintained for winter travel, the sign says. It also is not terribly well maintained for summer travel. I live on a dirt road, and it is less full of holes and bumps than the Mt Clinton Rd. Still, it's nice to not have to walk all the way to the trailhead from 302!
I suggest anyone going to the Edmands Path should go to the Base Road and head in from that side. More on that later ...
So, maybe it's because I was tired & whiny from lack of sleep , or maybe it's just that I've been on Edmands too many times. Or maybe it was the result of my UFO encounter ... but I had a hard time going up. It just felt so boring. I almost turned back. I think maybe I was feeling a bit intimidated , too. The plan was more ambitious than anything I've done for a while, and one of my feet was feeling like it was going to be a problem...
But when I hit treeline, my attitude began to shift. I was feeling pretty strong. The goal looked doable.
There were a few people, but it being a Friday, not that many. Of course, one group decided that they should stop at a trail junction for a snack. Where better to sit than the middle of the trail ? I know ... the middle of two trails!! Doh. I did meet one NoBo hiker, he was fun to talk with for a minute or two, but he had a long way to go still so couldn't chat long. Interesting to note that you could just glance at him and know he was a through hiker, and you could glance at several other backpackers going by and know they weren't . The difference is subtle but real :)
Cresting the rise before Franklin, there were lots of ... I don't know, flying ants? At least they weren't bees, and they weren't biting. I did find it necessary to keep my glasses on until past Franklin. Maybe that's why I missed the junction and had to backtrack. At least it wasn't far.
So ... decisions ... go ahead to LOC/Ammonoosuc Ravine Trail and risk having to do a 3 mile road walk? Or head back to the car via Edmands?
Somehow the Edmands option just seemed too boring, and some of the footing on the Edmands seemed slippery on the way up ( not-quite-moss on a lot of the boulders/ledge). I convinced myself I could find somebody to give me a ride from Marshfield out to the car ... so off I went.
I chatted with a couple people at LOC , and asked a couple whether they were heading back out and open to giving me a ride. One couple was just awesome.
They had parked at the Observatory and hiked down and were going back up. But they offered to drive to the parking lot and give me a ride!!!
What they didnt realize was that they would be driving down on the other side of Mt Washington ... it would have been a long ride for them :) but still ... what a nice offer.
I headed down sooner than I really wanted to, trying to get down before others to enhance my hitching odds. I met one couple who were ascending the ART , about 3/4 of the way, and already winded at about 1 PM. They were planning to ascend Washington and descend Jewell :O .... I expressed some caution, but they assured me they were in good shape for it. Maybe they turned around at LOC . Havent read about them, anyway, so that's hopeful.
So I got out to Marshfield Station and cast around for a little bit with no luck. Decided I might as well walk down to the ART parking lot. Nobody there either, except an elderly couple who seemed kind of nervous at the idea of giving me a lift. Ok, I'm scary, I get that <sigh>
Well, might as well keep walking. I did get a ride eventually that took me to Mt Clinton Rd. Nice rest break.
Remember I said earlier people going to Edmands should come in this side of the Mt Clinton Rd? Well, there are two reasons for that. First, the mileage is a little longer, but the road is in so much better shape on this end ... you might save your suspension. Heck, it might even be faster. The second reason is a bit self-serving. The road was a pleasant evening walk, pretty and cool, but it was *still* a road walk. I want to do this loop again sometime, and I'd like to avoid that. I figure some more traffic on the MCR might improve the chances of getting a ride ... so c'mon people, start using the other end of the MCR :)