times.
This was Lacho's bright idea. The ski trips worked out, so why
not do a group hike up Mt. Monadnock in Southern NH. This is one of
the most hiked mountains in the world, only 3200 feet high. How hard
could it be?
|
| 1. View of the mountain from the approach. The hike started at the south edge of the mountain (to the left of this photo). The word "monadnock" is from the Abenaki meaning a "mountain that stands alone". |
| 2. All eleven of us at the start, including Juan's 9-year-old son who had more energy than everyone else combined. |
| 3. We took the White Arrow trail, reputed to be one of the easier ones. It's an old road half-way up. Here we are at the end of the road, all still happy and full of energy. |
| 4. Shri next to the Halfway House sign marking the location of an old hotel that was on the mountain. |
| 5. Either a plaque used to be here or someone cut a throne into the rock. |
| 6. Gee, we've already covered 1.2 miles. Almost there... |
| 7. After the half-way point, the trail starts to get steep. (But Janice still has her coffee.) |
| 8. The higher you go, the steeper it gets. "Mom" is chasing Christian; everyone else is falling behind. |
| 9. Breaking out of the trees we viewed what we *thought* was the summit. |
| 10. We took a rather longish break here on a the rocks with a great view. |
| 11. Juan taking a photo of the group with the mountain in the background. |
| 12. Jeremy caught up to us here. He had returned to accompany Andrew back down who was feeling dizzy and lightheaded. After escorting Andrew back to the road he hiked back up to join us. (And he wasn't even breathing hard.) |
| 13. Kyle having a bit of fun for the camera. |
| 14. Reaching the top we discovered we really weren't at the top yet... |
| 15. Janice's expression says it all. She decided she's climbed enough and would wait there while the rest of us climbed to the top. |
| 16. Christian of course couldn't get enough climbing. |
| 17. The last little bit before the top. It took us almost an hour to do the last quarter-mile. (Lacho and Kyle much less.) I barely made it, my legs turned to jelly part way up here. |
| 18. View from the summit. Amazingly (at least to me), we had cell phone service. Jeremy called Janice and told her she made the right choice (in the opinion of a couple of us) by not attemping the final climb. |
| 19. There was quite a crowd. We probably spent an hour relaxing and having lunch. Despite predictions, it was windy but not that cold at the top. |
| 20. View to the northwest. Dublin Lake in the background. (I went swimming there after the climb just to cool off.) |
| 21. View to the northeast (and the easier Pumpelly and Dublin trails down the north side). A good list of trails can be found here at monadnocktrails.com. |
| 22. On the way down we encountered a couple of baby snakes. This one is a Ringneck Snake and was no more than 1/8" in diameter. |
| 23. Further down the trail we found a baby Eastern Milk Snake. This one was quite aggressive, snapping at insects flying close by. |
| 24. Someone owns a very nice house at the end of the road (the only private residence on the mountain). |
| 25. This is the last remaining private holding on the mountain above 1000 feet. The majority of the mountain (over 4000 acres) is owned by The Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests. The State of New Hampshire owns 1000 acres (including two campgrounds and several trailheads). The town of Jaffrey owns a small amount as well. |
| 26. At the bottom finally. Total of seven hours round trip (2.2 miles each way). I carried two bottles of water (just about the right amount), plenty of snacks, a camera (obviously), jacket, and a first aid kit. (The group was very well prepared with about half of us carrying a first aid kit.) |
times.