| Hiking Trail Conditions Report |
 | Peaks |
Mt. Moriah, NH |
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 | Trails: |
Stony Brook Trail, Carter-Moriah Trail |
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 | Date of Hike: |
Sunday, February 24, 2013 |
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 | Parking/Access Road Notes: |
Parking lot at trailhead hadn't been plowed, but only 1" of new snow, so not an issue getting in or out. Plenty of room for a dozen or more cars, mine was the only one. |
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 | Surface Conditions: |
Snow - Unpacked Powder, Snow - Drifts |
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 | Recommended Equipment: |
Snowshoes |
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 | Water Crossing Notes: |
2 crossings right after parking lot have footbridges over them. The 3 major crossings above on Stoney Brook were all well bridged, though the water sounded like it was running pretty good underneath the lwoest crossing. Most feeder streams were bridged, but a few were open, but easy step-overs. |
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 | Trail Maintenance Notes: |
Pulled out most of one blowdown ~3/4 mile above the crossing at 1mi. Some of it remains buried and frozen in ice/snow, so as the snowpack recedes, this will be a hazard to watch out for. There is a numerous-limbed blowdown about 1/4 mile above the same crossing which I left as there was a good bypass, and I don't know what this spot looks like in summer (looked like it might be a mud pit, so perhaps this bypass should be permanent? I'll let the trail maintainers decide). One other blowdown remains between these two, a 6" easy step-over.
An extra carin on the upper ledge before the short dip on the final ridge to Moriah marking the left turn would be helpful. I'm guessing there might be a paint blaze on the rock here, but white paint on the ground in winter is less than useful... |
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 | Dog-Related Notes: |
Should be a perfectly good dog hike. |
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 | Bugs: |
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 | Lost and Found: |
Found: about 3 pounds of snow in my pack's pockets at the TH... |
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 | Comments: |
This was a first for me: I saw NO ONE the entire hike. Granted, it was snowing most of the day, and there were no views to be had. But it was a really nice snowshoe!
Snow depth at the trailhead was less than 1" on top of super hard-pack, so I barebooted the first mile to just past the main crossing without damage. Soon after that, I put the snowshoes on and they stayed on until back at the car. Depth gradually increased and I had to contend with ankle-twisting postholes from some genius barebooter who descended last night, but soon even these were gone thanks to drifting. The upper 1.5 miles was very deep overall, with little to no trace of the old snowshoe track, so I had to re-break it out through 10-12" of powder. Hard work, but I was very happy to see that the Carter-Moriah Trail wasn't drifted too badly overall after this tough stretch. I made better time through there, and the final steep ledge to the summit spur had plenty of snow for easy snowshoeing both up and down.
Aside from briefly (a dozen or two feet) going off-trail on the upper ledge a couple tenths of a mile from the summit (where the trail turns LEFT after a second carin when ascending, but the third carin is behind scrub so I initially went straight where there appeared to be a corridor), navigation wasn't too bad despite the limited visibility.
No one had yet been up Carter-Moriah Trail from Bangor Road, though it certainly had had traffic yesterday. Carter-Moriah from the Stoney Brook junction towards Imp looked to be decently broken out, though I didn't follow it to see how far it continued. None of the other trails (Moriah Brook, Kenduskeag) looked to have had any traffic in a long time.
While my snowshoe down left the trail decently trenched out, with the snow falling all day (about 1-2" fell while I was on-trail) and more tonight, I'm afraid it might all need a do-over again come tomorrow. Some spots had already drifted back in on the Carter-Moriah Trail in the short time between my trips through. Both on ascent and descent, the "snow" down low was more of a sleet, so there hadn't been any new accumulation in the last mile nor at the trailhead yet (this was 2PM).
Despite the lack of views, it was a nice hike. Snow-caked trees, lightly falling snow, soft trailbed, it had plenty going for it. |
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 | Name: |
madmattd |
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 | E-Mail: |
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| Date Submitted: |
2013-02-24 |
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 | Link: |
 https://mattshikes.blogspot.com |
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Disclaimer: Reports are not verified - conditions may vary. Use at own risk. Always be prepared when hiking. Observe all signs. Trail conditions reports are not substitutes for weather reports or common sense. |
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