This day, I attempted to do Dial and Nippletop. The day started out as usual, with a quick walk up to the trail register and down lake road to the turn off for the Leach trail. Going up the Leach trail is not bad, but there were a few icy spots that made it adventerous. After the icey spots were over, switched over to snowshoes for the climb up Noonmark's shoulder. This climb just killed me. I couldn't get my heart rate down, and was really struggling.
The plan for the day was to start early and go up the Beaver Meadows trail to get Gothics and Armstrong. If we felt good about it, we would continue on to Upper Wolfjaw and Lower Wolfjaw if we were feeling it.
First hike of the year from AMR. We went for one of the further ones and did Sawteeth up and down the Weld trail. Early start and up and down the lake road with no big issues. I was getting a little tired with the fast pace, but I pulled through. We crossed the river, stopped and looked at Rainbow Falls a bit, and then it was up the mountain. Once you start climbing, it keeps going. The trail was already broken out, and we just packed it down better. The trail was smooth, and no rocks. It was everything I like about winter hiking.
To end out the year, I hiked Big Slide. This was weirdly the first time I did it over the Brothers, which is the typical way most people first approach it.
It's the first day of winter, time to start hiking winter peaks again! Unfortunately, there was a major rain storm in the week leading up to the 21st, and that did some major road damage by Owl's Head on 73. Coming into the day, I was concerned about water levels around the washbowl. I totally forgot that on the ridge trail you cross the outlet 3 times.
For my last winter hike of the year, I went back up north and decided to do a "simple" 12 mile hike, TableTop and Phelps. The weather forecast was good, but suggested weather would be moving in later in the day.
I have heard many good things about doing Allen mountain in the winter. Biggest being that the hike up Allen Brook is not a slippery mess of moss and slime. I was looking forward to doing this hike in the winter to see how much better it can be. I also have never come in from the south on the East River trail, so those couple miles would be new to me.
Today, I took a floating holiday and went up to get my winter Porter (Cascade was done a couple weeks ago, so it was a secondary goal if weather was clear). I got up to the trail head about 845 and was on the trail just before 9. When I was getting boots and all on, I looked down at the trail register and the couple of bridges over small streams and all I saw was ice on the trail. Now anyone that has hiked a popular winter trail will know that the snowshoes compact everything down and what is known as a "monorail" is created. Towards the end of the season that tends
So, last time I ended up going up Cascade and skipping Porter. The biggest reason was I got to the top right about my turnaround time. This was based off of not knowing how fast I would be heading out. It took 4 hour up but only 1.5 down. If it was 4 down I would have been off the trail at 5 and in the mountains where the sunset is around 6, it can get dark quickly and I don't really want to be hiking in the dark. Now I know better about my abilities. My turn around time won't be 130 like it was last time. It will be more like 3. Looking back