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Whiteface (9/48), East Sleeper (10/100)
Out of Boston in the morning to wend our way through backroads of New Hampshire up into Wonalancet for a post-Thanksgiving backpack.
I didn't bother cooking breakfast, planning on finding something on the way. Unfortunately smalltown New Hampshire doesn't have too many places open on a holiday weekend, so we finally managed to find a general store that sold breakfast sandwiches (we were too late for real breakfast, having left home about 7:30). From there it was up to the Ferncroft kiosk before setting out into the Wilderness.
The sign above and to the right of my head says "What Does Wilderness Mean to You?" and there's a lovely set of photos on the other panel, describing the former WODC shelters in the area. The orange area is the Sandwich Range Wilderness; the "wasp waist" is fortunately being expanded with the new Wilderness designation.
We had gone around in circles a lot in planning the trip, mostly whether we were going to try and bag the Tris. Given the lack of snow we decided to climb up the south face of Whiteface and head west towards them. The Blueberry Ledge Trail runs along the road for a little bit before cutting into the woods, sharing with a few driveways and then plunging under the trees on its own.
It was an absolutely gorgeous day and a few other folks were out. We were carrying nearly full winter backpacking weight so the climbs hurt a little but it diesn't take long to come out into the ledges proper. No blueberries at this time of year, of course.
Great views down into Wonalancet and beyond into the Lakes region, even from a relatively low altitude.
The climbing continued in the woods
before emerging onto the ledges below the south summit.
By now the rest of the world had left the mountain and we were quietly alone, with the light starting to fade (about 3:30).
The ledge climbs the rest of the way up were difficult and slower than we would have liked, since we had hoped to be down into the Downes Brook valley by nightfall.
The holes in the cliff to Erik's right were drilled when the trail was originally cut. Wooden pegs went into them to hold steps onto the face. After the wilderness was designated in 1984, the steps could no longer be legally maintained, and were eventually removed as they rotted out. I climbed the face by pressing up against the rock, placing my feet flat, and pulling with one finger of each hand in the holes. Erik managed to climb by pressing himself into the chimney. Good times.
When the WODC was founded and the trails cut in the late 19th century, mountain hiking was the extreme sport of the time. Trails are steep, hung off the edge of a cliff face, and not easy to maintain. This boulder's been wedged repeatedly over time, but eventually will come down and probably smash the trail.
After a few more scrambles we hit the south summit, where the Rollins Trail starts and the McCrillis Trail joins.
A short distance along, passing the frightening Tom Wiggin trail, we reached the Kate Sleeper trail and turned west towards the Tris. Kate was a rather remarkable woman; an innkeeper in Wonalancet, she formed the WODC and pushed mountain tourism to drum up business. The trail, the Sleepers, and Mt. Katherine are all named for her.
After a sharp, steep descent we reached the head of Downes Brook and sat down for supper. Despite the cold, freezerbag cooking with hats as cozies did the job nicely. We packed up and managed to figure out the continuation of the Kate Sleeper trail...the descent from Whiteface actually leaves one pointed more along Downes Brook than along the rest of the trail.
East Sleeper's summit is a little off the main trail, but it's a Hundred Highest so we had to bag it. The trail was difficult to follow by headlamp and we were a little confused when we found the summit.
A combination of trail-finding and bushwhacking got us back to the main path and we started looking for a campsite off-trail, before we got into the muck in the col. Our first check north of the trail found a pile of bear scat, so we crossed back over and found a clearing just large enough to fit the tent in. We turned in, happy to not deal with cooking or cleaning at this point.
The morning was simply cold. I had doubled up my pad again, but the pack was too large to fit inside, so my legs were cold. It took a lot of effort to wake up, dig out the cookwear, and get water on. First priority was hot chocolate.
We packed up camp and stashed all our extra gear in the woods off-trail, with a nasty note to anyone who might want to yoink it. We weren't sure we'd make the Tris, but wanted to give the best shot at it.
One interesting formation we'd found along the way the night before, and continued to see, were these little pillars of ice.
The holes between the ice pillars are about a foot or two deep. It looks like a mixture of ice and dirt froze and the dirt disappeared...it's not like it could have been washed away by water while leaving the ice. Any ideas?
Some rough walking along the very edge of the ridge brought us to the south slide of Tripyramid.
We saw this was a serious slide climb, and a solid mile or so to get to the north summit. Erik hates slide scrambles. And, at this point I ran out of water. We realized our safest option was to turn back as the closest guaranteed water was at Downe's Brook. This was very disappointing, but we were hoping we could bag Passaconaway and get out the same day, so we turned back.
On the way back to our stash we went off-trail to find the summit of West Sleeper, which turns out to not be a list peak.
The picture was taken from the trail. The summit's unmarked so I wandered until I found a point where it was all downhill.
We came past our site, picked up our gear, and headed back to the brook.
From here it was a heartbreaking climb back up trail we had descended the night before. A fairly quick walk along the Rollins Trail brought us to the true peakbagger's summit.
After this, the fun began. The trail had very rough footing with a fair bit of small up and down, and some small ledges that were very, very icy. We'd pushed hard two days in a row and were planning on reaching Camp Rich that night, since it was the only water available up on the ridge. The fading light was discouraging, but at least there were frequent outlooks down into the Bowl.
The last outlook before reaching Dicey's Mill gave us a wonderful view to Lake Winnipesaukee and the Lakes Region.
Much discussion took place at this point. It was already dark and we were about half a mile from Camp Rich. I was tired and not looking forward to another cold night and morning and we'd overextended ourselves. In the end, we decided to head out Dicey's Mill and get dinner and a room in North Conway, then do the "North Conway Traverse" in the morning. Hopefully missing the peak would teach us a lesson about overextending. It was, at least, a gorgeous walk out in the starlight, although we were a little frightened by the sound of explosions in the woods. As it turns out, one of the ski areas opened that weekend, including fireworks, which we could hear but not see.
In retrospect, we should have camped closer to the brook or carried more water away from it, then we could have done the Tris in a fairly easy day and still managed Passaconaway the next day, getting all the peaks and having a good three-day out. Or, we should have just let the Tris be.
The sign above and to the right of my head says "What Does Wilderness Mean to You?" and there's a lovely set of photos on the other panel, describing the former WODC shelters in the area. The orange area is the Sandwich Range Wilderness; the "wasp waist" is fortunately being expanded with the new Wilderness designation.
We had gone around in circles a lot in planning the trip, mostly whether we were going to try and bag the Tris. Given the lack of snow we decided to climb up the south face of Whiteface and head west towards them. The Blueberry Ledge Trail runs along the road for a little bit before cutting into the woods, sharing with a few driveways and then plunging under the trees on its own.
It was an absolutely gorgeous day and a few other folks were out. We were carrying nearly full winter backpacking weight so the climbs hurt a little but it diesn't take long to come out into the ledges proper. No blueberries at this time of year, of course.
Great views down into Wonalancet and beyond into the Lakes region, even from a relatively low altitude.
The climbing continued in the woods
before emerging onto the ledges below the south summit.
By now the rest of the world had left the mountain and we were quietly alone, with the light starting to fade (about 3:30).
The ledge climbs the rest of the way up were difficult and slower than we would have liked, since we had hoped to be down into the Downes Brook valley by nightfall.
The holes in the cliff to Erik's right were drilled when the trail was originally cut. Wooden pegs went into them to hold steps onto the face. After the wilderness was designated in 1984, the steps could no longer be legally maintained, and were eventually removed as they rotted out. I climbed the face by pressing up against the rock, placing my feet flat, and pulling with one finger of each hand in the holes. Erik managed to climb by pressing himself into the chimney. Good times.
When the WODC was founded and the trails cut in the late 19th century, mountain hiking was the extreme sport of the time. Trails are steep, hung off the edge of a cliff face, and not easy to maintain. This boulder's been wedged repeatedly over time, but eventually will come down and probably smash the trail.
After a few more scrambles we hit the south summit, where the Rollins Trail starts and the McCrillis Trail joins.
A short distance along, passing the frightening Tom Wiggin trail, we reached the Kate Sleeper trail and turned west towards the Tris. Kate was a rather remarkable woman; an innkeeper in Wonalancet, she formed the WODC and pushed mountain tourism to drum up business. The trail, the Sleepers, and Mt. Katherine are all named for her.
After a sharp, steep descent we reached the head of Downes Brook and sat down for supper. Despite the cold, freezerbag cooking with hats as cozies did the job nicely. We packed up and managed to figure out the continuation of the Kate Sleeper trail...the descent from Whiteface actually leaves one pointed more along Downes Brook than along the rest of the trail.
East Sleeper's summit is a little off the main trail, but it's a Hundred Highest so we had to bag it. The trail was difficult to follow by headlamp and we were a little confused when we found the summit.
A combination of trail-finding and bushwhacking got us back to the main path and we started looking for a campsite off-trail, before we got into the muck in the col. Our first check north of the trail found a pile of bear scat, so we crossed back over and found a clearing just large enough to fit the tent in. We turned in, happy to not deal with cooking or cleaning at this point.
The morning was simply cold. I had doubled up my pad again, but the pack was too large to fit inside, so my legs were cold. It took a lot of effort to wake up, dig out the cookwear, and get water on. First priority was hot chocolate.
We packed up camp and stashed all our extra gear in the woods off-trail, with a nasty note to anyone who might want to yoink it. We weren't sure we'd make the Tris, but wanted to give the best shot at it.
One interesting formation we'd found along the way the night before, and continued to see, were these little pillars of ice.
The holes between the ice pillars are about a foot or two deep. It looks like a mixture of ice and dirt froze and the dirt disappeared...it's not like it could have been washed away by water while leaving the ice. Any ideas?
Some rough walking along the very edge of the ridge brought us to the south slide of Tripyramid.
We saw this was a serious slide climb, and a solid mile or so to get to the north summit. Erik hates slide scrambles. And, at this point I ran out of water. We realized our safest option was to turn back as the closest guaranteed water was at Downe's Brook. This was very disappointing, but we were hoping we could bag Passaconaway and get out the same day, so we turned back.
On the way back to our stash we went off-trail to find the summit of West Sleeper, which turns out to not be a list peak.
The picture was taken from the trail. The summit's unmarked so I wandered until I found a point where it was all downhill.
We came past our site, picked up our gear, and headed back to the brook.
From here it was a heartbreaking climb back up trail we had descended the night before. A fairly quick walk along the Rollins Trail brought us to the true peakbagger's summit.
After this, the fun began. The trail had very rough footing with a fair bit of small up and down, and some small ledges that were very, very icy. We'd pushed hard two days in a row and were planning on reaching Camp Rich that night, since it was the only water available up on the ridge. The fading light was discouraging, but at least there were frequent outlooks down into the Bowl.
The last outlook before reaching Dicey's Mill gave us a wonderful view to Lake Winnipesaukee and the Lakes Region.
Much discussion took place at this point. It was already dark and we were about half a mile from Camp Rich. I was tired and not looking forward to another cold night and morning and we'd overextended ourselves. In the end, we decided to head out Dicey's Mill and get dinner and a room in North Conway, then do the "North Conway Traverse" in the morning. Hopefully missing the peak would teach us a lesson about overextending. It was, at least, a gorgeous walk out in the starlight, although we were a little frightened by the sound of explosions in the woods. As it turns out, one of the ski areas opened that weekend, including fireworks, which we could hear but not see.
In retrospect, we should have camped closer to the brook or carried more water away from it, then we could have done the Tris in a fairly easy day and still managed Passaconaway the next day, getting all the peaks and having a good three-day out. Or, we should have just let the Tris be.