a modified turkey trot...

a hike with sawyer, hannah, and pam up over town hill rather than on the AT back and forth to holt's ledge. 

since 2001, MOC has been gathering to hike from goose pond road to the top dartmouth skiway and back. it's only a couple of miles but it gains a good bit of elevation on the way over--and of course loses it on the way back.

the original idea was to go outside and play!, maybe burn off some of those extra calories from the feast, all the while hangout with friends you don't always get to see. we have had some pretty big crowds over the years, and then over the past five or six years, half of them had been just pam and i, maybe some pendletons.

this year, soy and han were psyched about hiking, hoping to see noah, eben, maybe andrew, colleen, and others. friday morning when i got up it was -8°F and a call from skip to let me know they would not be trotting, at least not in the morning. last night pam had mentioned that she was thinking of something less involved--like maybe town hill. when everybody finally made it out of bed and down stairs, we reprogrammed.


the kids went over to visit the pendletons, pam started her yearly holiday letter, i suited up to try skiing our trails up and over town hill.

the "bitter...record cold" greeted me as i started sliding up hill. having lived a few winters in northern minnesota and spent plenty of winter in the mountains, i can get pretty jazzed listening to the extreme verbiage hyping weather. i wrote a letter to NHPR pointing out particular hyperbole and questioning what sort of language might they use when it inevitably gets colder, windier, and snowier. the great thing about these two nights of below zero and days of brisk wind, it totally dried out the wet snow. that made skiing fairly fast!

fast enough to turn and yo-yo the 's curves' a couple of times, run up, then all the way down to bear pond road, climb back up and finish in one long slide home. i came in the door just as the kiddos and pam were suiting up to hike over the hill.

i stripped off my ski bibs and followed them following my ski tracks. hannah had her camera and took this series of pictures, the first one of sawyer on the other side of the gap i put in the stone wall between the broadbeests and jorgensens.

pam was zipping ahead on her snow shoes and we didn't catch her until just below the s curves where she stopped for a second. han was ready and snapped a partial family photo. i am particularly fond of the strip of sunlight along sawyer's leg and the side of my face.

pam scooted off again and in no time we were cresting the height of land. the third image captures the lineup.








it also has a great composition: the snow, people, and hill on the horizon fill the bottom third; the trees and their angled shadows accentuate the upright hikers; a spot of red with blue, again with a stripe of sunlight. it totally works for my eye.

what doesn't work is 'the truck', sitting in the middle of the trail for as long as we have lived here.











i have dreams of pulling it out of the woods someday. it will be a chore though as both axles are broken along with all the other things that would make dragging it away easier.

after the snow this week on tuesday, i am thinking we will have to wait a few seasons--i am throwing in mud, with winter and most of spring--to do anything like haul it out of the woods. that's fine with me, the more snow the merrier. and if it gets a little drier- fluffier than the last one i will be ecstatic!

whatever happens weather wise, it's always a pleasure to go outside and play!



ps--one of my 'other lovers' was out on the snow, up skiing the green woodlands. he took a photo looking at moosilauke in honor of my hike a couple weeks earlier. he also got a shot of his frosty, après ski smile!

thanks jay!!

an early serving...

two storms within a week's time--with no rain or melting between--and before thanksgiving at that!



pam and i had cruised a lasalette loop a couple of weekends back. it had been wicked blustery and cold-ish enough for pam to hood and hand warmer it. it was also sunny, which considering most of october and november, was a good time to get out and enjoy the woods--without getting soaked. but, armed with only the silkie bigboy™ hand saw, we had left a handful of bigger hardwoods to cut out later.

the following friday, as the first storm was tapering off, skip and i went back over with a chainsaw. going up the james jewitt trail--blue/green then green on the map--we cut out all the big stuff and a few new smaller tangles. at the height of land, we got pretty excited at the snow depth. that excitement flagged some at a plugged up stone culvert just past the 'potato field'. we cut a point on a pole which i used to 'drill' down into the leaves and muck. it seemed a bit useless until all of a sudden a very satisfying 'sucking' sound followed a whirlpool doing a pole dance down around the stick and into the culvert. skip gave out a call, as the muddy flow came through the other side.

coming down what we call the 'little sherbie', the moses johnson trail, we finished clearing the large hardwoods along with quite a few new fallen pieces. we got back to the truck feeling very satisfied that with another good snow, at least the green loop would be skiable!

on tuesday, we got our wish. it snowed and accumulated all day. both of us had to work, but wednesday it would be even deeper and we would have off.  skip had a doctor's appointment in the am, so i told him to meet me over at drummond custom cycles after 'lunch o'clock'. food is crucial for skip. i had made muffins for the guys in the shop, and took them with me as i headed over to get a first run in. i dropped off the goodies and went across the road to try out the coverage.

nearing the top of moses johnson
photo by Jennifer Barden of bikekitz

the james jewitt side of the green trail is the long way up, but less steep than moses johnson--'little sherbie'. skip loves that one so i saved it. i went up the jj planning to take a side trail up to 'lost pond' and then come down through what we call the glades, my favorite. it was so peaceful, if i hadn't been skiing, i could easily fall asleep. to my surprise, two women came from the opposite direction. always keen to show others all the possible shaker paths, i woke up fully.

jen and jen were hiking the loop backwards but were open to checking out 'lost pond' and the glades. jen d was all about exploring new trails that could be mtn biked later. it reminded me of last year around the same time and about the same conditions, meeting jacob with kiddos nikao, and lolo--nikao with his little bike. they were likewise keen to explore. of course i was pleased to lead.

as self-appointed, semi-official 'lost pond' tour guide, i skied on excited. it worked out the jens were pumped at seeing the pond with its laid up stone damn. and speaking of pumped, they laughed when they noticed the relic pump that somehow ended up at the base of a tree growing on the damn. next time i go by, i will try to remember and take a picture.

looking back up the glades
photo by Jennifer Barden of bikekitz

the pond is the height of land and from there, we were headed downhill. i buckled my boots, and put my jacket and hat on, ready for it to get a little faster. again, the glades was my favorite run and i was hoping the coverage would be enough. it was, mostly, and though i stopped a few times for the jens to come down, the flow felt really good.


after getting past the rocky section, i kept with the flow all the way to the bottom. when i got to the tiny fields, a set of ski tracks came in. i skied back up to the jens and gave them the word so they would follow the right tracks--in this case the left ones.


i got back smiling to the truck, stowed the skis, and de-booted. when the jens arrived i they were delighted to jump at my suggestion that making snow angels would be a hit on their website bikekitz--"Empowering Women to Get Out and RIDE!" after all, playing in the snow is the winter version of riding. i borrowed the camera and tried to catch them in the act.




after they brushed off, we piled into the truck and went back to drummond's for muffins. they had walked over from there at the beginning of their hike and jen had snapped this picture looking up into hills we had just came out of.

some of the hills above one of the shaker fields 
photo by Jennifer Barden of bikekitz

it looked just like that now, only different--backwards in the rearview mirror. and that was ok--a fine ending to a wonderful day outside and playing!

ps of course it wasn't the end  of the day, not yet...i called skip from the shop and he came over for a couple more runs. first, we yo-yo'd the blue/green section of the james jewitt. we took a last run, finishing on his favorite, the moses johnson, or little sherbie. as we were going up for the last time, we got caught in a crazy squall. skip's blue shirt, even his black pants, were dimming, even disappearing in the near whiteout. it reminded me of the phenomenal downpour on town hill soy and i were out in a couple weeks previous. only this time instead of getting immediately soaked, we got 'plastered' under giant white flakes. the wind was so strong, it felt like being sprayed with a snow-making gun. we looked like we had been too!

what's that bright yellow thing up in the sky...?

the sun is certainly welcome during these naturally cloudy and precipitation prone months, but it definitely hasn't been out much these past few weeks. and people have been pretty grumpy!

not that i am ever all that grumpy, but my general remedy for any malady is to grab some tools and head for a trail that needs work. sawyer was here the end of last week, with saturday free. of course it was raining when we headed out--with our tools.

we wound our way up the west side of town hill, passing through a gap i had built in a stone wall the week before--in the rain. today's heavy drizzle grew steadily wetter as we climbed. at the top, the proverbial 'sky opened up' with an unbelievably, massive amount of water coming down, beating loudly on the leaves. in seconds i was soaked--quick enough to forgo pulling out my rain jacket from soy's pack. it wasn't cold enough to be miserable, but it was definitely wet. 

so wet that water ran off my eyebrows in huge drops, making it almost hard to see. fortunately, only almost. looking through the downpour had a lens effect, the light seemed to magnify the yellows and browns of the remaining leaves. the resulting glow got sawyer to let out a happy sigh, "it's so beautiful!" that was an understatement.

both rain and glow softened up a tad as we tipped down toward bear pond road and the blowdowns we had brought saws for. we set up with the two-person cross cut on a section of a huge poplar that i had been cutting at for a couple years now. taking out that chunk made a path round the remaining giant piece we left for another day--maybe even a chainsaw. 

the next stop was working a ditch with improvised stick-shovels to let a large-ish puddle drain some. a few blowdowns later and we were at the beaver dam--our turn around point. on the way back past the somewhat reduced puddle, we got the sticks out again and dug the ditch out more. i am guessing that playing with water like that, is a basic human trait.

as we started hiking homeward, the rain actually stopped, the wind came up, and you could see blue patches of sky as the clouds scudded by. i won't pretend we were dry when we came in the house, but we were happy--and not just because sadie and otavio were coming for dinner.

and an excellent dinner it was, even though i don't eat roast 'beest'--spelled that way it's too close to cannibalism. add to that a good night's sleep and i was ready to go out again. bonus--it wasn't raining. but i took a few tools anyway, plus a warm jug of water, and drove up to cardigan. the warm water was for the clivus bacteria. i was hoping this might be the last 'stirring of the composting toilet' i would have to do.

after seeing to the clivus, i grabbed the rake and started up. raking drains had already been done on west ridge, but i figured i would hit all the ones on the ski trail and redo any i ran across on the main path that were clogged again. the wind and rain had been furious last night, which more than likely brought a lot of oak and beech leaves to ground.

just about every drainage was full of leaves and water was starting to spill over the bars--it was a good thing i brought the rake. while i was cleaning out one spot, a group of four hikers went by--two of them that i recognized, the drummond boys, noah and speight, with friends deena and elaine. oh, and benny the lab was with them. seeing them prompted me to rake a bit faster so that i could get up to the top before they started down. i try to show as many folks i can the 'girl chasing her handkerchief' carved at the ledge she fell over. at least that's how the story goes. 



it's a fine story and the carving is a classic--i was glad they were still there and game to take a look. i snapped the photo with noah pointing to the fading image, elaine next to him, speight and deena flanking benny. there is a very faint date of 188-9 or -4 or -7 or something just to the right the carved skirt.

we decided to walk down the ski trail together so the boys could dream with me about winter and skiing fast through the woods. on the way down, it took a few pics of the water bars in action.



it was a fine day to be out given that the next two days were again cold and rainy--sometimes even snowy. finally, wednesday dawned sunny and lasted all day. while i worked, i thought, if it's nice tomorrow, i'm going biking!

oh my gosh, two sunrises in a row! as i ate breakfast, i enjoyed the sun streaming in through the windows and doors--they weren't open, it was in the low 20°Fs. i was out pedaling by 10:00a and as you can see looking out over tewksbury pond, it was indeed glorious! 

the clouds were building in the west, but for now i was casting a sharp shadow. i bopped off onto the rail trail to take the picture above and discovered two 'grafton little libraries' posted along the path. i picked two books to feature in these photos, hoping someone would 'check them out'.



my main mission, besides enjoying the sunny day, was to alter the usual big block route, looping 4, 11, and 4a. the plan was to cut through the back roads of danbury and wilmot, hoping to find sawyer road. i had a map in my pocket to help. from an adventure standpoint, i  was fortunate to lose the map. the first time i stopped to check , my bearings, it was gone. oh well, already turned off rt 4, i kept going.


pedaling along a beautiful stream mostly paralleling roy ford road, i junction-ed with walker brook and frazer, two names i remembered. i took a right and pedaled on. passing a couple of guys roofing a cottage, i stopped and chatted them up. "you two look like you're locals, do you know a sawyer road or white pond?" 


that seemed to puzzle them and they looked at each other shrugging their shoulders--not a good sign. but one of them thought they might have heard of white pond. one of the guys drew me a quick map on the back of an old envelope and they sent me off with waves and smiles.


following the map, i pedaled uphill toward north wilmot on, conveniently, the north wilmot road. a couple miles up, i raised my arms in victory--"yes! sawyer road!!" (some of you will know why this particular sign was prized...) icing on the cake, not too far up the road, i spotted white pond!!! 



a pair of hooded mergansers skittered away when i stepped out on a bridge to take this picture. in the reflection, i noticed the blue sky had pretty much disappeared and it was starting to cool down. 


i got back on the bike, looking for the church in north wilmot that, according to the roofers, the north wilmot road t-ed into. sure enough, it did. and bonus, piper pond road took off from one side of the church. that was another name i remembered and followed it. at this point, all the roads out to 4a had "not maintained in winter" signage, but for now that wasn't an issue.


in a half mile though, i ran into a different weird problem. i came up to a car that had passed me earlier, now parked in a turn off. i stopped and talked to the women about getting to 4a. she convinced me to turn back and take tewksbury. she seemed mostly concerned i didn't bother her dog, who was 'walking' itself down piper pond road. i didn't really care, i sorta knew where i was going now.


checking on google maps later, i got in an extra 3+ miles, by not challenging the dog for space on piper pond road.

when out on 4a, i had few miles of uphill to warm me, but as soon as i hit the high point and started down, across springfield and into enfield center it was noticeably cooler. i stopped to take one more picture of a rushing cascade of water--the plentiful rain was gathering and 'falling' to the sea.

it looked pretty cool down in there, someday i will stop and check it out. for now though, i bee lined it to drummonds for my weekly sweep. robbie and corey were in the back, each with a bike on the stand. dick was off riding bikes in california, hopefully avoiding fires.

finished sweeping and visiting, i hopped back on the bike and headed home. given the likelihood of at least one rainy day before we saw the sun again, i was extremely thankful to be "outside and playing"!

is this a signal or just a tease...

a foot of snow, 30+mph winds, 20°F temperature--that's almost winter!

bill, my co-father-in-law, called me last week and wondered if i would be interested in an adventure with a guest that was coming to visit. i am always up for something like that, so i signed up. he called mid-week to schedule something for thursday. we decided on a hike. just in case, i sent the baumbucks a favorite weather site, specific to the mtn you want to go up.


i packed for cold and snow and went over thursday morning. myron and bill were eating breakfast and i snuck a piece of french toast. i gave myron a choice of 7, 8, or 10 miles with a brief description of the trails. the long one with a bit of a slog at the bottom. the short one with a longer drive to the trail head. the middle one sustained steepness and well maintained because it is the AT as well. he went for 8, steeper, shorter, and bill's favorite trail on moosilaukee--glenncliff / AT.





i hadn't been on the glenncliff in a long time but i figured i could find it alright. myron got his gear together and we headed out. bill saw us off with the classic line, "don't forget to show him the missile--'in god we trust, but just in case!'" i got the reference, but it wasn't until he saw it that myron had any idea.



we stopped for a picture of "a real redstone ballistic missile" and i caught site of a marker that honored norris cotton, a us representative and  senator, and warren native. i had read or heard somewhere that it was put there to honor alan shepard--which seems odd as he was born in derry. but the redstone rocket also carried the first us astronaut into space. i guess it mattered who you were rooting for.


back on the highway, we headed for glencliff home where the trail takes off. i 'booted' up in the parking lot--it was definitely not going to be croc weather up top. we both de-layered some, shouldered our packs and started hiking. 

the first bit of trail goes gently up an old farm road through a few fields, past ancient apples, and the stone foundation of a long gone house. about a half mile up the hurricane trail goes right and we go left. soon after that split, i notice i am huffing and puffing, scrambling hard to keep up with myron, thinking this must be how pam feels following me. just as i was going to suggest he save a little gas in the tank he stops and turns, "i should stop sprinting!" that worked for me.



the higher we got, the more the snow accumulated. after a while, it was a pretty much all white save for a protected spot or two. going along at a reasonable pace, i was enjoying the 'local view' and was able to snap a picture.


up not too higher, as it got deeper & steeper, i snapped another. it kept deepening & steepening. myron stopped shortly after and took a selfie with both of us looking like we had almost been exerting ourselves. i do remember him saying, "smile koby." the open mouth was my poor attempt.




we kept going up. at one point i assured him that there was a ridge above us and we would get there. the glencliff / AT runs into the carriage road and they all go together for about a mile to the summit. half of that is through a slot of short spruce and half out in the open alpine zone. myron's picture looks down the carriage road.

i ski by this junction coming up and going down on the carriage road, but have never pointed them down glenncliff. now i remember why. it would take a significant dump to navigate with any hope of not bashing into trees at high speed.

we continued toward the top after water and a bite of an energy bar. as we got out of the trees we felt the full force of the wind in our faces that had been raging above us. following the rimed up cairns and post-holing through some knee high drifts, we passed two other groups of two. the first just looked at us and smiled, or maybe that was a grimace. the second seemed a bit confused coming off the summit and was asking where the carriage trail was. not always the best sign in these conditions.

we took a second to snap a photo after i brushed of the summit sign.

the wind pushed us back down the exposed part. my anemometer read 20-30mph steady, with gust into the 40s. you could call that a good stiff breeze and as it was blowing snow too, we were happy to get back into the trees along the ridge. 

it dawned on me that myron had been living and working in panama until sunday. i was guessing it was still high humidity, and around 30°C near the equator--that's a big change from -6 or -7°C, snow, and wind here. he confirmed that. 

we passed the confused group on their way down. this time they asked how far it was to the snapper trail. a bit sketchy, but the group in front of them had left boot marks and at least they were on the carriage road now. if they missed the snapper it would be a long way out, but doable. 

back on glenncliff and descending, i stopped thinking about them and concentrated on not tripping over the rocks and roots under the fluffy, slippery snow. between seasons like this that is a definite issue. my friend mariel broke her wrist last week on mount chocorua--she and kevin had just gotten home from hiking the whole of the PCT, from mexico to canada!

we made i all the way down without injury. after a bit of cheese & apple, with a cup of hot tea, myron admitted to at one point wondering "what the hell am i doing this for?" but as we pulled out of the parking lot, he announced, "i am happy we did that!"

to me that sounds like an endorsement to 'go outside and play!'

digging, hiking, biking, and otherwise outside playing...

a wonderfully busy four days!

a week ago, on thursday and friday, i spent the day digging holes. actually, the excavator with pat operating dug the holes. jason and i helped place them and the piers to go in them, level & plum the latter at proper distances; we did a little hand digging and back-filling, maybe some raking. at one point i tried bashing some ledge that was in the way--that had mixed returns. in the end though, we placed 8 cement piers to hold up the posts of the timber framed pavilion shinnlinger's building and construction class fabricated last school year, second semester. here is a picture of the roof truss for one of the middle bents--we left out the posts for ease of raising this up as a demo.

that is some of the class that cut things. they were pretty happy that everything fit together so well--so was i.

early thursday morning mtd's started clearing the site and digging. the first corner--south west--went in like a dream. not too long after the second corner--north west--was in as well and pat was digging at the north east corner. that was were we first hit ledge, the same ledge i took a sledge hammer too. oh, that is when the laser level went on the fritz as well. with the day waning, we left that hole to futz with in the morning. we did get the south east corner in before calling it quits.



friday was a chilly start but we went back and adjusted the base of the pier at the north east corner and set it. we decided to dig trenches between corners. we hit more ledge on the north side and ended up raising the piers. the posts will just have to be shorter. the south side went in with a little bit of 'extra' digging. in the end we were pretty happy with the job--i even got pat and jason to pose on the 'high' piers!





on saturday, i pedaled over to drummond custom cycles to join my chiropractor, susan, for a long-ish test ride. while i was on her "table" for an adjustment the week prior, i had told her about my new 'gravel bike' and sent her a link to its maiden voyage in my august posts. she was impressed enough to give it a ride solo and a longer one with me. as i went over the shaker bridge, i stopped to say hi to the stuffed fishing person. the clouds and lake looked so cool i snapped a picture of it all.

susan was getting set up with pedals and such when i got there. we decided on a route to include some gravel downhill as she really wanted to know whether to trust the bikes control and stopping power. we took off toward enfield center, east on 4A. the gravel downhill led us to grafton pond where we stopped for a photo. 

not the best lighting, but susan's smile was there as she feeling a bit more confident going along even in the washboardy areas. she also reported feeling comfortable with the bike's geometry, which was new and different from her current road bike. we pedaled on, climbing and descending, gravel and pavement. and stopping once more for a water and picture break.

the clouds were breaking up and the blue sky made for a nice contrast with cardigan mtn off in the distance. it was a fine ride for me and i assume for susan--she bought the bike!

when i got home, pam and i up town hill with the intent of finishing some trail maintenance we had started the week before. we had spent a good couple hours clearing a path along a stone wall which takes us straight down to bear pond road. there was a trail there before, but it hadn't been cleaned up in ages. one major blow down took cutting a heavy leaver stick from another fallen hardwood. it worked pretty well, but i had to stop myself from 'over-pushing', remembering just a week before i had been getting readjusted on sue's chiropractic table.

on bear pond road, we headed toward the boggy area where i spent another good hour sawing blowdowns. one particular oak maxed me out again. as it was getting dark, we pushed the last log aside and headed back up and over town hill.



sunday dawned cloudy and cold again, but pam was game for another go at moose mtn. this time we went to the section of AT leaving from goose pond road--there would be no granite state off road-ers on that! (if you missed 'a quiet hike...' you might get a laugh.) we love that part for a number of reasons: it's rarely crowded, has some fine lookouts, really interesting features--like the bridge, railing, and AT symbol marked in the ash on the right.



as we hiked along it kept spitting snow. in the mid 20's it was just about right so we didn't get overheated, but weren't cold either. at least i wasn't, even in knickers and crocs.  and pam seemed cozy in her long undies/pants, fleece/jacket, wooly hat and gloves...




i snapped a picture of her at one of those fine lookouts--the one she dubbed "smelly boys ledge" after a group of through hikers parked there when she wanted to use it once. sometimes she can get a bit possessive. but there were no hikers jockeying for space today--we had it all to our snacking and viewing selves.


as we were coming back down to 'sbl', i took a series of photos of one of my favorite features--what i call the spine. for quite a ways along the top section, there is a rock outcropping at times parallel with the trail, or the actual trail in places. i keep meaning to take simon up there and have him explain its geologic significance to me. it is pretty cool. the pictures capture about 200 yards or so.







when ever i try to place a series in blogger, it is a struggle. but you should at least get the idea.




it was a grand four days to go outside and play! --in the dirt, on the trails, and in the leaves!!!