Blog - Waterfalls On A Nameless Brook In Pinkham Notch NH

Not gonna lie, little sore after conquering Moosilauke in the frigid clouds yesterday with my sister and brother-in-law. But not too sore for another hike! We loaded up the cars, took one last look at the small stream that runs behind the hotel and headed down for continental breakfast, I had my waffles today and they were delicious. We took a little stroll through the Whale's Tail parking lot next door for a morning view of the Franconia Ridge, our favorite view of all time.

Since no one was in a rush to leave, we decided to go up the Indian Head tower, way too many stairs for sore legs but nobody was willing to carry me up. The foliage was just starting and oh what the hell, where was this perfect weather yesterday when we were nearly getting blown off a mountain in the clouds? We hit the gift shop after and said our goodbyes, which is when I realized I was starting to get sick, the cold we'd all been dodging since Dad caught it a couple weeks ago, the one my sister just came down with.

Julie and JR headed to VT for a day of historical-esque activities and I made my way through Twin Mountain and up to Pinkham Notch, sucking on vitamin c drops the entire way. Spoiler, there was no avoiding the cold but I put up a hell of a fight and went out with a bang before it got too bad. A short ways south of Glen Ellis Falls, I'd followed an unnamed brook a couple years earlier but turned back a little too soon when I couldn't find a safe way into the ravine above the lower falls, which were quite spectacle so I was fine with it. Looking at my route on the maps, I knew there were more falls upstream. So I headed out on my first real bushwhack in quite some time. 

One major problem, the battery in my gps unit must be close to dead because it was shutting off after a minute or so. Second problem, breathing through a stuffy nose had me taking breaks every couple minutes. But I powered through and followed the brook uphill, sticking to the top of the ravine where it was steep but not the kind of steep you need to hold onto trees to stop yourself from rolling backwards, an obstacle I faced last time around. I got just enough juice out of my gps to know I was in the general vicinity of where I wanted to be, which meant making my way into the ravine.

 

The descent wasn't too bad, mainly because I overshot by about a hundred feet, putting me at the top of the falls when I was aiming for the bottom. From then on out, the adventure began to get a bit dicey with some questionable maneuvering down the ravine. Fortunately I was rewarded with one cascade after another, none nearly as tall as the lower falls but all impressive in their own right, averaging about twelve feet on most drops.

The upper multi-tiered set of falls gave way to sun soaked ledges with gentle waterslides, a nice change of pace after clinging to trees to lower myself down to the next shelf, paired with a couple controlled slides down exposed slabs until catching myself on protruding ledges. My mother would have a heart attack if she saw some of my methods. As would my sister, who explicitly told me not to do anything stupid on my exploration. Come to think of it, my wife wouldn't be too pleased either. Please, no one repeat to them what I just told you.

From there the brook entered an even more narrow part of the ravine where crossing became mandatory if I wanted to continue. I questioned calling it a day but knew I had to keep going or it'd haunt me, like it's been doing for the past two years. So I continued working my way down where I encountered another cascade into a crystal clear pool.

Definitely time to exit the ravine now as the brook traveled down a narrow sluice with high cliffs rising above it. Or, hear me out, I could make my way down the steep, mostly dry portion of streambed that skirts around the sluice. Yep, we're going with that one, and occasionally popping over to check out the ravine, but not getting too close because that is quite a long drop.

The dry streambed was rough going in parts with slick ledges and logs to climb under, over, and sometimes through. I had to contort myself into a pretzel to squeeze through this one, while also climbing up the chute of boulders.

But the waterfalls were worth the risk.

Even when the risk involved small rock ledge shelves with big drop offs, not the environment you want to trip or make a wrong move.

The pool beneath this twin cascade would be the perfect place for a swim, if there wasn't a thirty foot sheer cliff on the other side. Thank the hiking gods my cold hadn't progressed to the sneezing phase, I would have been clutching more trees than I already was.

Another questionable slide down a wet slab on the dry side-streambed brought me to the base of the falls I visited a couple years ago. They might have been closing up the Whale's Tail waterpark when we walked by this morning but I got my own personal waterslide right there in the woods. It was that or climb back up some routes I shouldn't have taken to get down in order to make it out of the ravine, and I was so close. Dry waterslide time!

Out of the ravine with no issues, other than some sticks poking me in the arms and one to the forehead, I made it to the thirty foot falls I'd first come across two years earlier, other side of the stream this time around. They were just as impressive, which is weird considering the drought and how low most of the streams were that I'd passed in the last few days. I'm definitely going to need to make a return trip after a good rain, maybe just to the lower falls, the upper part of the ravine had a few too many sketchy parts I'm not sure I need a repeat of.

Smooth sailing back to the car, picking my way over the gently sloping terrain. I continued down the notch to another pull-off where I spent a few minutes exploring the Ellis River, rock hopping downstream until I got hungry enough to head back up to Gorham. It didn't take long.

I hit the Dynasty Buffet, who'd thankfully reverted back to their old menu. It was phenomenal, the food was hot and felt like heaven going down my sore throat, water on the other hand didn't feel so good going down. Oh but that food, excuse me while I drool over this photo.

Woops, sorry, you caught me still drooling. I popped more vitamin c drops on the three hour drive home but it was useless by that point, I was already sick and deteriorating quickly. Other than that it was a nice drive with the first specks of fall foliage peeking through. Luckily the bad part of the cold only lasted three days, one and a half where my throat felt like I was swallowing shards of glass every time I swallowed. Three days isn't bad, I'm giving credit to all those vitamin c drops and Airborne tablets I sucked on. If you're familiar with my chronic idiopathic urticaria hives saga, yes, I did get a few after the illness left my body but nothing even worth complaining about. Wait, is that another unnamed Pinkham Notch brook just a short ways down the road? Time to start planning my next waterfall adventure.

BLOG - Mt Moosilauke in the Clouds

Home for a week, after a bunch of toy hunting and hiking in CT, and we're back at it on another road trip. The weather didn't look the best but with a storm predicted for the following weekend, we said screw it and headed for New Hampshire. We being just me this time, no wife as she caught the cold my dad was kind enough to share with all of us, but I was meeting up with my sister and her husband at Woodward's Motel in Lincoln. It rained the whole way there which meant no hiking but it's all good, I stopped at a few antique malls along the way and did a little toy hunting.

Made it to Lincoln in time to hit Chutters for some fudge, not just for me, wifey had requested it and I wasn't about to argue when fudge is involved. Then Price Chopper for some supper and over to the hotel. We've been coming to Woodwards since we were kids so it'll always have a place in our hearts.

The rain mostly stopped by the time we finished supper, okay not really but we love walking along the road in the evening there so we went anyway and just got a little wet. We kept the walk short though, just through the Whale's Tail parking lot and around the duck pond at the hotel.

Up bright and early the next morning, we found way more clouds than we were hoping for but stuck to the plan for Mt Moosilauke, a mountain none of us had ever climbed. The clouds looked like they were lifting though. (Future me jumping in here, they didn't.)

A little continental breakfast to start the day and we were off, disappearing further into the clouds the higher we drove. Not a good sign for things to come but man did it look cool.

We took the Snapper Trail up to the Old Carriage Road, overall not too strenuous of a climb, just a regular White Mountains trail with lots of rocks and roots that seems to never end. Not sure why I love it but I do.

Aside from rocks and roots there was an occasional stream crossing, made nice and easy by bridges.

The more elevation we gained, the lower the clouds got, until we could see them blowing past us. Definitely no views today. When we hit the ridgeline I peeked out over a little viewpoint and as we suspected, it was nothing but white as far as the eye could see. It made for some rather haunting photos in the eerie mountaintop forest.

We passed the turnoff for the South Peak, figuring we'd hit it on the way back, and continued along the ridge. The rain from the day before turned the trail into one long puddle with a few dry patches of higher ground sprinkled in. It took some fancy footwork but I managed to straddle, hop and shimmy through thick pines without getting my shoes wet. They both had waterproof hiking boots but weren't willing to give me a piggyback, I'm blaming it on the big breakfast I had.

After what seemed like a never ending stretch of puddles, with wind picking up now that the trees were barely taller than us, I decided to call it quits. I'm not working on any peakbagging lists so the summit wasn't that important to me. I told them to continue on while I slowly made my way back over the long stretch of puddles. Until a group of hikers coming down said this was the first puddle they encountered, meaning I only had one more to. So after showing them where to step, I rock-hopped back across and broke through the tree line, where I was greeted by tundra-like conditions.

The wind was constant and nearly strong enough to knock me over, with visibility so low you couldn't see over the ridge. Had to pull out the jacket my sister made me bring, even though it filled up my entire backpack. It turns out she was right, I needed it. I couldn't see them through the clouds, I could barely see the next massive cairn along the trail.

There may not have been any views, but the experience was otherworldly. I don't do winter hiking so it was nothing like any hike I'd ever experienced before. Watching the clouds whip by, every low lying bush shaking in the constant wind, it was like being in a snowstorm with whiteout conditions. My fingers went a little numb from taking so many photos.

I finally heard their voices on the wind and the summit post came into view, I was practically on top of them before I knew anyone was there. We took a few pictures from the summit before needing to get out of the wind.

I don't think my sweat turned into icicles but it was close. Ice certainly would have made the puddles easier to cross, but I somehow did it again without getting my feet wet. Back at the South Peak junction, I convinced them we needed to do it, just in case it counted as one of the 48 4,000 footers they were hoping to cross off their list, we later found out it doesn't, but the added 0.15 mile climb redeemed the viewless hike.

Although slightly steep in spots and surrounded by creepy woods, it was more than worth the added steps. Especially when we got to the top and the clouds lifted every once in a while, giving us our first partial views of the day.

Oddly enough the wind wasn't quite as bad on South Peak so we decided to eat lunch up there, dropping our sandwiches to take photos every time there was a quick break in the clouds.

With my sweat dried, or possibly frozen to my skin, we made our long descent. Sometimes the breaks in the trees lined up with the breaks in the clouds and we got quick views into the distance. No clue what mountains we were looking at but there were some cool humps before the clouds obstructed them again.

By the time we reached the bottom, 4 miles later, the clouds had mostly lifted. I think had we waited an hour or two after we'd started, we would have had some spectacular views. Oh well, still an awesome and very memorable mountain. We headed back to the hotel, washed up and went out for an early supper at a restaurant downtown they'd recently been to, the Woodstock Inn Brewery.

We sat outside and had fun dropping table scraps for the excited sparrows hopping around at our feet. I got the bbq pulled pork sandwich with sweet potato fries, it was delicious. The birdies agreed.

Back at the hotel, we hit the indoor pool and jacuzzi while everyone else was enjoying dinner, so we had it all to ourselves, at least for a little while. The pool at Woodwards is where we both learned to swim, this was our first time being back there together since the mid 90s.

The hotel's changed hands and had some updates, but to us it's still our home away from home. We even got to sit outside in the evening, since it wasn't raining that night, listening to the babbling brook as we had some dessert. The perfect way to end a day we'll never forget.

BLOG - Manchester CT's Case Mtn & off-trail gem Wyllys Falls

Back at it again on the May trip to CT for the Brimfield Antique Show. But first, well, after a town wide yard sale and a Sunday of toy hunting at the flea markets, I managed to squeeze a little hiking in there. This was my first mountain of the year, second hike after doing a quick trail to a waterfall a couple days earlier while out yard saling in the area. After having Case Mtn and Falls on my radar for a while, and hearing about a nearby unofficial trail to a nice cascade, my brother-in-law and I headed off to Manchester CT. The tiny Case Mtn lot was full but we found a parallel parking spot on the street, which put us a little closer to the unofficial trail to Wyllys Falls, about 0.25 mile from the lot. Sure enough, the trail was there, overgrown but clear as day beyond a break in the wooden guardrail, starting right beside a boulder with a plaque on it.

The trail led rather steeply downhill where a small stream emerged from a drainpipe we could hear rushing through sewer grates on our way down the hillside. It emptied into a larger babbling brook with a pair of fallen trees we'd need to tightrope across to reach the falls. Me from a decade ago would've been able to hopscotch across it no problem but the me of today was a little trepidatious, needlessly though, I turned back the clock a decade and scooted right across, no hopscotch though.

A faint trail followed the brook upstream through a steep ravine where the unexpectedly impressive Wyllys Falls could be seen roaring through the trees just a few hundred feet ahead. Driving through the residential neighborhood, this was the last thing you'd expect to find beyond the immaculately manicured lawns. The falls must be close to 30 feet tall, splitting at the top of a cliff and forming two horsetails, ending up in a small rocky pool at the base. The few pictures I'd seen did it no justice.

My brother-in-law regretted leaving his good camera and tripod in the car, neither of us expecting something so spectacular, so we tightoped back across the log bridge, up the steep hill, to the car and then back again to get some real photos. And no, we didn't fall in on any of our stream crossings, I did carry his camera for him though since my balance is a little better and he relied on a couple handy, and really tall, walking sticks in order to keep his feet out of the water.

After getting our fill of the slightly foul smelling falls and photos from every angle, with me standing awkwardly on boulders to keep errant branches out of his shots, we headed back to the the Case Mtn lot and admired the much more well known falls there. He'd been there before but it was a first for me. As opposed to the wild falls we just came from, this was more of a man-made wonder with an arched bridge and beautiful stonework set into the hillside.

We consulted the map with its spiderweb of trails and started our way up the mountain, one neither of us had climbed before. Hell, growing up in CT and going to Manchester nearly every weekend, I never even knew it was there. We started on a carriage path before switching to a hiking trail and made short work of the mountain with no sweating or heavy breathing. That may not all be entirely true but we made it to the top where there was a lovely view of the Hartford skyline. I relaxed on one of the many conveniently placed benches while JR got his zoomed-in photos that made Hartford look like more than the blurry blocks my camera is capable of. Man, it's amazing I've made so many hiking guides with this thing.

We took a different path back down for a change of scenery and explored the stone pathways and arches of Case Falls some more. A group of tree swallow birds were flying through the arches of the bridge at warp speed and catching bugs on their way through. I love those crazy little guys, we get a family every spring and it's always fun to watch them zip through the air erratically like bats on their hunt for insects.

Time for lunch, which meant a quick trip over to the Buckland Mall on the other side of town, where I of course got Cajun Cafe, a staple of every trip to CT. It's not actually cajun food, it's regular mall foodcourt Chinese food but it's my favorite ever, sometimes I have wet dreams about it. Did I say that out loud? I've been going there since high school when we'd all pile into the car and head to the mall on weekend nights. We even ate in the food court by the windows for old time's sake.

We did a loop through the mall after, even came across a store I hadn't noticed last time, mostly Lego but in the window I spotted some MOTU Origins from across the hall and nearly broke a sweat running over to it, which would have been my first time sweating today. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Nothing I needed there but it was a glorious sight seeing all those action figures in person.

Don't tell my sister because JR is on a diet but we got some dessert that was not on his list of approved foods. He got a cinnamon pretzel at Wetzels and dipped it in caramel, I had a few bites and oh my god I fell in love. With the pretzel, not my brother-in-law for sharing it with me, though maybe a little of that too. It was one hell of a pretzel. I thought about grabbing one for myself as we sat on a bench to enjoy it but I'd had my eye on Cinnabon since we walked in. I planned on getting whatever they had on their promotional sign when we passed by earlier but then I saw a Reese's ice cream sundae and plans changed. I ate it in the car while he drove home and dare I say, there might have been too much peanut butter in it, but whoa was that good, at least the half I ate in the car was, I had to save the rest for later so that got a little freezer burnt. When we got back I helped him pull out some stumps from bushes that had been chopped down at their new house.

Well that was the perfect way to kick off the hiking season. After doing practically none last year, too busy getting our new author pen name up and running, it was great to hit the trails, and non-trails, once again. The miles I put on my shoes today were nothing compared to what I'd be doing the next few days at Brimfield; a mile long stretch of road with flea market fields on both sides the entire way. Might just make a post about it because the toys I picked up deserve to be honored, I had some insane finds.

BLOG- Blackledge Falls in Glastonbury CT

First hike of the year! Not that it's much of a hike but it's in the woods and there's some uphill walking that made me sweat so it counts. Oh and there's a nice waterfall at the end which makes any trail through the forest worth it.

We came down to CT for the May Brimfield Antique Show a day earlier than planned so Jaime could go to a big church book sale with my family and I could do the Hebron town wide yard sale. It sprinkled a little which seemed like it would put a damper on things but only one yard sale seemed to close because of it. The rest of them were there, they just didn't have much of the stuff I was looking for. I did get one little baggy of vintage GI Joe accessories though, and a cute watering can Jaime saw in the preview photos for a sale, so it wasn't a complete bust.

Just over the Hebron town line into Glastonbury, about 3 minutes from the last yard sale I hit, is a waterfall I'd been to once before; Blackledge Falls. I was walking beneath it when my sister took a photo, this was in the days before digital cameras, and when we got the film back, I just happened to be in the classic bigfoot pose while carefully making my way over the wet rocks. I haven't been able to locate the photo to post but it's one I never lived down. I've been wanting to go back to the scene of the crime ever since. Last month my brother-in-law visited the falls and I got jealous when he sent me the photos, so today was my chance. The spring woods were lush with fresh leaves and the parking lot was empty other than me and a family that pulled in right in front of me.

I took the shortcut so I could get to the falls before the parents with their two little ones got there. Despite all the recent rain in CT, the falls weren't much more than a trickle but still spectacular for an eastern CT cascade. It's not often you see sheer drops in New England and hopefully I get to see it again before another 25 years passes, and preferably with more water next time. This was the perfect way to kick off a week of hiking and flea markets.

Ugh, fine, yes, I tried recreate the old bigfoot photo. Here it is. Hopefully I'll be able to find the original someday so I can do a side by side comparison.