The Samurai has returned from a truly enchanting backpacking trip to the Pemigewassett Wilderness area. The weather gods did grin down upon us, allowing us to feast our buggy eyes on the crown jewels of the Pemi: The Bonds. Yea, the valleys did echo with the soft fluttering of camera shutters flick-flickering as the mountains stretched out in the sunlight.

Our intrepid group consisted of Rob and Jess, Ouzo, and the Samurai. We started at the Zealand Falls Trail, hiked on past the AMC Zealand Falls hut (mobbed with pasty flatlanders who smelled like aftershave and detergent!) and then on up the Twinway to the expansive views at Zeacliff. From there, we kept on truckin’ on the Twinway until we came to the junction with the Bondcliff Trail. We hiked the Bondcliff Trail over Mt. Guyot and down the other side to the Guyot Campsite. At camp, we stayed at the Guyot shelter. Nice shelter, even had a porch and furniture! We settled in, fetched water from a mossy mountain stream, made dinner, and then shucked and jived ’till we fell asleep.

The next day, we had our minds blown. With such a beautiful day, we got some classic views of the famous outcrops at Bondcliff as well as of Bondcliff seen from West Bond and from Mt. Bond. Sometimes, the vistas were so turquoise that it seemed like we were underwater. We just took our time traipsing along the open ridges and even napping atop West Bond. We ended the day by taking in a glorious sunset atop West Bond.

Looking out from the shelter the next morning, the sky was heavily overcast and it soon began raining. After a hearty breakfast, we broke camp and headed out. When we broke out above treeline, the wind was whipping the chilly rain horizontally. On the summit of South Twin, visibility became so poor that it was sometimes tricky to follow the trail. But as we headed down North Twin, the rain soon stopped and we walked into bright sunshine. The contrast was amazing, like this whole trip.

You can see all the pictures from this trip here. And to complete this magical mystery tour, click the audblog link below to listen to a couple of short sound clips recorded live on the trail.

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Yep, heading out tomorrow for a backpacking trip to the Bonds with a couple of friends up visiting from Georgia. We’ll be off stomping schist until Wednesday night. Should be back online around then. In the meantime, keep checking back here for live audblog posts from the summits.

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Been having some spectaculous hikes in the White Mountains of New Hampshire this summer. I hope you’ve been getting out and doing some hillstomping in your neck of the woods. You can check out my ever-expanding collection of summer hikes for this year ratcheer.

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I went hiking today. It was so beautiful that I wanted to share it with you all. Happy trails!

Hiking up Kearsarge,
I met Spring’s first mosquito.
Black schmear on my shirt.

Made a couple of great hikes up to the Franconia Ridge last week. The first one was up the Falling Waters trail on an overcast day to the summit of Little Haystack Mountain where I had an impressive view of Mt. Lafayette at the other end of the ridge. The Falling Waters trail is a tough trail in summer with no snow–even more so during winter. I honestly didn’t know if I would make it to the summit. Even Ouzo was one hurtin’ unit at the summit of Little Haystack.

Then, a couple days later, I hiked up the Old Bridal Path trail to the summit of Mt. Lafayette. This was a sparkling, cloudless day that afforded excellent views of the Franconia Ridge, the Bond Range in the Pemigewasset Wilderness area and the Presidential Range.

You can check out the complete set of photos from these two trips here.

Winter is loosening its grip on us up here in New Hampster. And as we watch it melt away, it’s like saying goodbye to an old friend. It’s been an especially long winter, distinguished by several kick-ass snow storms and scores of sub-zero days with rare and challenging hiking conditions. I did lots of snowshoe hikes this winter but the best ones were Mts. Welch and Dickey in December, North Kinsman in January, and Carter Dome in February.

So while we say goodbye to our old friend, Winter, we also look forward to what is called Spring in most parts of the Northern Hemisphere and is affectionately dubbed Mud Season up here in the great Live Free or Die state. But I thought it was only meet and right that I put together a collection of photos to commemorate the glorious and awesome Winter of ’03. Enjoy!

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Got my pictures developed from our winter backpacking trip last week to Carter Notch in the White Mountains where we stayed at the AMC Carter Notch hut. I went with my budrow, Dave, from PA. That was by far the best snowshoeing trip of the season, even if we did have to cut it short by a day due to weather. We started off with perfect weather and unbelievable views. We were struttin’ our stuff on Carter Dome and makin’ tracks up to Mt. Hight where we paused for a word from our sponsor and the views were even more incredible than atop Carter Dome. You can check out all the pictures from this great trip here.

Word up: you won’t have ol’ Samurai to kick around after this Wednesday. My budrow from PA is driving up here to New Hampster on Wednesday and we’re heading up to the White Mountains for a five-day winter backpacking trip. We’ll be staying at the AMC high mountain huts at Carter Notch and Lonesome Lake. If all goes well, we’ll return on Monday, 2/24, sometime late afternoon. I may be back online Monday night (if I’m sober), Tuesday for sure.

Y’all be cool. I know we will be.

Had a great snowshoe hike up North Kinsman the Friday after Christmas. On Christmas Day, Wednesday, we got a thick blanket of snow and Friday was a perfect day for snowshoeing: the snow had settled for two days, clear blue skies and chilly, about 20°F at the base, maybe 10°F at Kinsman Pond. Total mileage about 7½. You can check out all the pictures from this hike here.

Going up the Lonesome Lake trail, the snow was well packed from all the hikers going to the Lonesome Lake hut and you hardly needed snowshoes. At Lonesome Lake, I had spectacular views of the south side of Cannon Mountain and the ever-majestic Franconia Ridge.

But going up the Fishin’ Jimmy trail to Kinsman Pond was a whole different deal. A few intrepid souls had ventured about a third of the way up and packed the trail a little bit but turned back when the trail began its steep ascent to the pond. From that point on I was bustin’ powder. A couple of times, I had to claw my way up sheer rock faces. I almost turned back more than once but caught my breath long enough to keep going. As I ascended, the temperature kept dropping and it got so cold that the water in my hydration tube froze solid. It would’ve been funny if I weren’t so damn thirsty. I could have removed the hydration bladder from my pack and drank directly from it but the problem is when it’s that cold outside, you start to chill as soon as you stop moving. The thought of standing still for several minutes, fumbling around with my water bladder with numb fingers didn’t appeal to me much so I just sucked on some snow and kept going.

After more than an hour of busting through three feet of fresh powder and scrambling over vertical, snow-covered boulders, I saw the Cascade Brook trail junction sign. By then, even Ouzo was feeling it. A little further beyond that was Kinsman Pond, from which I had a spectacular view of North Kinsman. There were two guys camping out at the Kinsman Pond campsite. They’d come up the Cascade Brook trail the day before, breaking snow the whole way. That’s hard core!

I finally bagged the Bonds, the peak-bagger’s nemesis. Since this would’ve been a 22 mile dayhike, my semper fi canine hiking bud, Ouzo, and I did this as an overnight backpacking trip. We bagged all three Bonds, Bond Cliff, Mt. Bond, and West Bond, on Thursday and camped in the shelter at Guyot campsite Thursday night. Then on Friday, we returned via the same trails and bagged ’em again. About eleven miles each way. Perfect weather, clear skies, chilly but not cold, and we just missed the snow and hail storm that blew through the White Mountains on Wednesday. Stunningly clear views of a snow-capped Mt. Washington from Mt. Bond. You can feast your peak-bagging squinties on all my photos from this most splendiferous of hikes ratcheer.

Uploaded the rest of the photos from our family camping trip to Moose Brook State Park last month. Good times, good times.

That hike sucked! Over 10 miles of almost pure hell with no rewarding views. I didn’t even take a single picture. Now that I’m back home, I’m applying the cleansing power of beer to purge the memory of this hike from my mind. Mmm…beer! But the good news: since I’m back earlier than I planned, I’ll be available for live help today. No schedule, I’ll be on and off all day, just keep checking back ’till you get me. Later, yo.