Summary | |
Owner | MITOC Gallery Administrator |
Creation Date | 2006-04-15 18:46:34 UTC-0400 |
Description | Spring Hike in the Kinsman Region
Let me preface this with a disclaimer. I do not condone solo-hiking; it is an inherently dangerous activity involving many unnecessary risks. This was not a MITOC activity, it was a personal trip that I thought some folks might like to see photos from. That said, I enjoy getting out in the woods away from everything now and then, and today was one of those days. I drove up to Franconia Notch early on Saturday morning (possibly passing some other MITOCers in a parking lot? I was pretty tired ). The original plan was to hike on the ridge, but it was raining and I opted for something on the other side of the highway since the visibility was looking pretty poor. Starting from Lafayette Place at 8am, I headed up the Dodge Cutoff to the Hi-Cannon trail. It was pretty rainy up to the summit of Cannon, and it was pretty clear why the facilities were closed since the skiing looked sub-optimal. Heading down the KRT there was one very icy section. Im no ice climber, but Id say it was almost technical. Despite the hot weather last week, the KRT still had up to 3 of snow in some sections. Around noontime I got to the Kinsman Pond Shelter and met three other brave hikers who were on their way up to the peaks as well. The clouds lifted a bit on the top of N. Kinsman, but rushed right back by the time I got to the South peak. When the clouds rolled-in again it got really cold really fast (and started raining), so I had a quick lunch and started heading down. There was a good deal of ice hiking out Fishin Jimmy towards the hut. The lower section was in that crazy transition phase where youre never really sure whether or not to keep the crampons on or off. The sky cleared all of a sudden and it got really warm out around 2pm. Overall I saw five other hikers above Lonesome Lake, but a ton of warm-weather folks walking up to the lake in tennis shoes. I guess its getting to be that time of year again. Overall this was an amazing day. Hiking with crampons and short-sleeves is just awesome. - Mike Kokko |