Trail Report: Mount Moriah

April 12, 2014

Today's adventure took us to Mount Moriah which sits at 4,049'.  Moriah is also another long drive at about 3 hours each way.  Thankfully we only have a couple more of these mountains that sit at the far end of Pinkham Notch.  The trailhead for Moriah also sits at the end of a dead-end residential street with very little parking and houses with signs stating not to park on their property.

Very little parking at the trailhead

The trailhead

From the start the trail was icy

 The snow was packed down well at the lower elevations

First view of the Presidential Range

Mount Adams (l) and Madison (r)

Presidential Range

Mount Washington

Nice view

Tony with the Presidential Range

Summit of Mount Moriah 4,049'

USGS Marker for Moriah

Another summit view

Summit brews!

There was still a lot of snow at the higher elevations
This sign would normally be about chest high, as you can
see it was at ground level

The temps got to about 50 degrees which made the descent rough
as the snow was very soft.  Even with snowshoes you would post hole

 Some bare booters were ahead of us.  This is what happens
when you don't wear snowshoes.  It destroys the trail/monorail

 Take in the final view before descending into the trees

GPS Track

GPS Track

GPS Track

Summit of Mount Moriah.....: 4,049'

Total hike time (round trip)..: 8h 32m

Elevation Gain......................: 3,768'

Distance (round trip)............: 10.07m

Trails....................................: Carter-Moriah Trail

Trail Report: Mount Cabot

March 9, 2014

It's been a while since I've gone hiking so I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

It's been 4 months to the day since I've done a hike.  This is the longest stretch I've gone without a hike since I starting hiking two years ago.  This winter has been long.  Very cold and a lot of snow.  Usually we look forward to the warm up in March but this March it is still cold and I've still got 4-5" of snow in my yard.  I think the Whites will have snow on them until May this year.

Today's hike was quite a drive.  3.5 hours North just past Berlin, New Hampshire.  Mount Cabot 4,179' is the furthest North 4000 footer.  Because of how remote this hike is, a lot of people do this mountain last.  We decided to get it out of the way early and because I haven't hiked in 4 months I thought it would be good to find a hike that was less than 10 miles long.  Most of the hikes I have left on my list of 48 (I've done 29 I think) are 11-15 miles.

The weather was calling for clouds but it turned out to be a beautiful sunny day with some light winds.  About 30 degrees at the base and 19 at the summit.  Tony was guessing the temps at the summit were closer to 0 with the wind chill.

Gearing up in the parking lot

Trailhead

Me @ the trailhead

Bridge crossing

First trail intersection

Tony with our destination (Mount Cabot) behind him

The trail was nice and packed down the entire way

Another trail pic

There was not much elevation gain until we reached this point and then

the last 1.8 miles was long

 Kilkenny Ridge Trail

This is the first view we saw on the hike up.

There are no real good views on this hike unless you do the loop and hike over to the Horn and the Buldge (which we didn't do)

The last 1.7 miles of this hike was all up hill

A very short spur trail leads to this view

First time I've seen an outhouse at 4000'

Cabot Cabin at 4000'

It was colder inside the cabin than out in the sun but it was nice to sit down for 15 minutes and take a break

View from the cabin

From the cabin we hiked over to the summit and had a couple of views

Another view

Mount Cabot Summit Marker 4,179'

Not the summit but close to it.  We ran into someone who offered to take the pic

GPS Track #1

GPS Track #2

GPS Track #3

Summit of Mount Cabot.......: 4,179'

Total hike time (round trip)..: 6h 15m

Elevation Gain......................: 3,273'

Distance (round trip)............: 10.51m

Trails: York Pond Trail, Bunnell Notch Trail, Kilkenny Ridge Trail

Trail Report: Mount Garfield

Nov 9, 2013

It's not quite winter but the air is getting colder and the snow and ice is starting to show up on the mountains.  The temps today were about 30 degrees at the base and 19 degrees at the summit with a slight wind.  I wore a shell most of the day, at our food break I put on my winter jacket.  By the time we got half way down the mountain I was ready to remove the winter coat.  We both brought our microspikes but ended up not using them.  This was probably a mistake.  The ice near the summit was bad in a few sections.

Trailhead

Trailhead sign

Just like the Twins, this trail was flat for a while

As we started to ascend snow started to appear

The higher we went the bigger the ice flows were

The ice and snow covered trees are always a pretty sight

This sign doesn't actually tell you how far to the summit of Garfield but it's about 10-15 minutes from here

Me @ the summit of Mount Garfield 4,501'

Tony @ the summit of Mount Garfield 4,501'

Foundation of an old building at the summit

(old fire tower maybe?)

Very overcast today

More beautiful ice covered trees

I believe the two pointy mountains behind Tony are

Mount Flume and Mount Liberty

I'm looking at Mount Lafayette in the clouds

Nice view from the summit

Mount Lafayette in the clouds

Another nice view

 GPS Track

GPS Track

GPS Track

Summit of Mount Garfield....: 4,501'

Total hike time (round trip)..: 6h 26m

Elevation Gain......................: 3,101'

Distance (round trip)............: 10.75m

Trails: Garfield Trail and Garfield Ridge Trail