NH 48 4000 footers: Owls Head

Sunday, September 17, 2017
Start: 13 Falls campsite
End: Lincoln Woods Visitor Center
Miles: 12.9
Ascent/Descent: 2569'/3615'
Listened to: Nancy Podcast, Hidden Brain, 99% Invisible, Welcome to Nightvale

I was up at 6am and on trail by 7am. I crossed Franconia Branch river and followed Lincoln Brook Trail just under 4 miles to the Owls Head path, where I dropped my pack to do the spur trail.

Not easy to miss, as there are cairns on both sides of Lincoln Brook Trail, indicating the start of the path to one side

Owls Head path

From there, I climbed up a few tenths of a mile to the Owls Head slide. This section had beautiful views of Franconia Ridge, with Lincoln, Lafayette, Little Haystack and Liberty all visible.

It was also steep and had treacherous footing for around half of the ~1 mile to the summit.

 The terrain of the top half of the trail was nice, though there were a fair number of fallen trees to deal with. As with so many NH 4000 footers, the peak was a pile of rocks on a completely tree'd-in summit...

Once summiting, I headed back down to my pack. All said and done, it took me 2 hours to do the ~2 miles of the spur trail. The terrain requires that level of caution with each footstep for the crumbly, steep ascent and descent. Once I was back down, I grabbed my pack and hoofed it towards Lincoln Woods, following Lincoln Brook trail to its intersection with Franconia Brook trail, and then Lincoln Woods trail back to the parking lot. During the hike, I crossed both Lincoln Brook and Franconia Branch a number of times, all the while successfully remaining dry! 

     

NH 48 4000 footers: Bondcliff, Bond, West Bond, Galehead

Saturday, September 16, 2017
Start: Lincoln Woods Visitor Center
End: 13 Falls campsite
Miles: 17.9
Ascent/Descent: 5472'/4406'
Listened to: Nancy Podcast.
Cried from said podcast: 3

I drove up to NH after work yesterday, and stayed the night at the Notch hostel. I got up around 5:45am and was in the parking lot of Lincoln Woods by 6:30am. I paid for my parking, finished packing up, and hit the trail by 6:45am.

The first 4 miles or so of the trail was super flat and smooth sailing. 

Then the slow and steady climbing started. I climbed up to Bondcliff (4265') first, then Bond (4698'), and then out and back on the West Bond (4541') spur. 

View of Bondcliff peak, with Bond in the distance

View of West Bond and Bond, from Bondcliff

View of Bond from Bondcliff

View of Bond and Bondcliff from West Bond

View of South Twin in the center distance with Bond to the right, from West Bond

I dropped down to Guyot shelter for water and then climbed up the side of Mt Guyot and then up South Twin Mountain (4902'). From there, I descended to Galehead hut, arriving by 2:30pm, where I got water, soup, bread, and  a piece of frosted yellow cake. I had nice chats with one of the hut croo, Holly, who recently graduated from UConn, majoring in healthcare business management. From the hut, I headed to the Galehead spur, dropped my pack, and went up and back (4026').

Peak of Galehead

View of Galehead Hut, South Twin Mountain, and some of the Twin Range

View of Galehead Hut and South Twin

After that final climb of the day, I descended 2.6 miles to the 13 Falls campsite (2231'). 

I arrived at the campsite at 5pm. There were plenty of tent spaces left when I arrived; I don't think the sites are full even now, after dark. I set up my tent, treated water, cooked my dinner (which, as it turned out, sucked), checked out the falls, forced myself to eat dinner, and then packed up and headed towards bed. I'm sleeping without my rainfly tonight since it's supposed to be a nice night and only drop to 55. Tomorrow, I have a much easier day, with only 12.9 miles and only climbing Owls Head before getting to my car.

The dinner didn't turn out well. The food was stale and plastic tasting, and I neglected to add much salt at all... it was beyond bland and tasted weird. And there was a lot of it; it was an ordeal to finish the majority of my dinner. It left my jaw tired and painful. I didn't even bother to eat dessert.

-

As I was hiking over Bondcliff, I met Fynn, an AMC caretaker out for a walk. We had great conversations, and we walked together from Bondcliff to West Bond spur, and then we chatted a bit more when I went to Guyot shelter for water. Once the season ends in a few weeks, Fynn will be back living in western mass, so we exchanged phone numbers and plan to keep in touch.

I've been listening to Nancy, an LGBTQ podcast from WNYC. It's a beautiful thing and I'd highly recommend it. For a 25 minute podcast, they manage to pack a lot of intersectionality into their episodes. There's some beautiful trans representation.