Thursday, October 2, 2014

N. Kennebago Divide, White Cap & Snow (Cupsuptic) Maine NEHH Oct 2 2014



  
 
PICTURES:  trip report embedded with captions.



Clearing at the end of the long dirt road and beginning of the logging swaths where I spent the night in the back of my truck. It wasn't that easy finding this area. even with a gps track of the road trip , I ended up ,at yet another locked gate at the end of the wrong dirt road.
 Standard tail gate breakfast.  Coffee, oatmeal, and eggs , all cooked on my Jetboil.
Directly up the logging road/swath. That grassy road to the right is where I should have gone if I were to do Whitecap first. I missed it and zigzagged between logging roads until I realized I was better off doing N. Kennebago first from where I ended up. This picture was actually taken on the way down after I came down the grassy skid trail from White Cap
 
 
 
Various degrees of grown in logging/skid trails  on the way up to NK.
 My Bushwhack up to NK starts about here.
 
 
 
NK Peak after an hour of moderate Bushwhacking. Some herd paths near the ridge top.
 
 A glass jar peak cannister.
 
 A  moderate bushwack in the cole between NKD and WhiteCap with on and off herd paths that eventually lead to the grassy skid trail up from the bottom.
 herd path througn the spruce in the col - not too bad really
 White Cap
 
 
 Easy skid trail all the way down.
 Another one of those twisted logs. Funny, since I first noticed one on Nancy I see them all over.
 
 View of the cleared logged out area near the bottom.
 End of the Skid path If you look close you can  just see my truck cap in the center of the picture.
 Looking back, this is the picture I showed earlier.
 Not sure what you call these logging roads coverd with left over limbs and short logs. Kind of a combination of a logging road and a cut swath. They look like easy hiking paths but arent really.
Back at my truck at 11:50 two peaks in less then two hours and plenty of time to drive down the dirt road and start my next hike to the other Mt. Snow (Cupsuptic)
 
 Still a lot of color in Maine
 First view of Snow(cupsuptic) 
 Side road up to the start of the "trail". there was a cleared area for parking just a short way back but I drove up until the road started turning into a marsh and pulled over to the side in case there was any active logging going on.
 The road starts turning into a mud bed with loads of moose tracks.
 

Eventually the grassy road ends up at a large level logging "landing"  I continued straight up a grown in path but it turns out that the best route starts on the far right of the landing. - the way I came down.

 Most of the way up turns out to be following one of several logging paths. Actually it was easier staying in the woods parallel to the logging swaths, then starts into the woods with numerousv herd paths that all converge at the top. No bushwacking.
 Top of Snow (cupsuptic)
 most intricate canister yet. It has a stainless nut and bolt handle and a roll pin to prevent people from overtightening. Good idea, some have been real hard to open.
 
 
 I didn't notice them on the way up but there were many small cairns marking the best herd path.
End of the herd paths and start of the logging swaths.
 
 This arrow is on the far right of the landing I mentioned earlier and points up to the best path up which is marked with many cairns, actually the mountain is so logged out and the woods fairly open were it isnt logged out that almost anyway up would be easy.
 Looking down the landing the road down is up to the left.
 Another arrow further down the road that I missed on my way up. on the way up I went left for a while instead of straight here and then returned.
 
 
This area of the "road" had a lot of moose tracks in the mud, but i'm not sure what this is a track of. It doesn't look like moose 
 
 Back at the truck and ready to leave by 4:30 pm not bad 3 peaks in 8 hours. I attempted to dry my boots and pants off by hanging them from the back on the long drive back on the dirt road (mostley Tim Pond Road) toward Stratton. But it was a bad idea with the cload of dust behind me turning the wet into mud.
 
 
The day before driving to the trailhead at about the same time of day, I didnt see one other car. This afternoon driving back I passed over a dozen pick-ups with orange capped passengers driving slowly along the road. I found out later it was because small game season had just started in Maine. For the rest of the hikes I usually wore my orange stocking cap.