| Hiking Trail Conditions Report |
 | Peaks |
Mt. Roberts, Faraway Mountain, NH |
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 | Trails: |
Mt. Roberts Trail, High Ridge Trail, Faraway Mountain Spur, Faraway Mountain Trail, Faraway Mountain Cutoff, Cold Spring Trail, Cold Spring Road |
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 | Date of Hike: |
Thursday, February 9, 2023 |
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 | Parking/Access Road Notes: |
Space winter hiker lot on Ossipee Rd; maybe for 12-15 cars. |
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 | Surface Conditions: |
Snow - Packed Powder/Loose Granular, Ice - Breakable Crust, Snow - Unpacked Powder, Snow/Ice - Postholes |
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 | Recommended Equipment: |
Snowshoes, Light Traction |
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 | Water Crossing Notes: |
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 | Trail Maintenance Notes: |
Trails well marked (diamonds, often blazes, too). Faraway Mountain Spur was marked with flagging tape (orange and yellow) |
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 | Dog-Related Notes: |
Cooper and Piper had a blast hiking in the woods, trail conditions never seem to effect them. |
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 | Bugs: |
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 | Lost and Found: |
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 | Comments: |
Goal was to get to Faraway today, with views on the way up to Roberts. Trail up to Roberts was well packed. Likely, could be bare-booted, but why not benefit from the extra tracking of spikes. Lots of critter prints in recent snow around the summit. After summiting, Snow shoes were an absolute necessity, depending on your perspective. The HRT was a bit of a mess, despite that everyone who ventured in this direction used snow shoes (well, one person did not, but changed to them after about a quarter mile). Those who broke trail before us (thanks so much) had to break through the inch of crust over about 8-12" of snow (which we expected). Must have been tough. Tried to even out the trail, but, more travel is needed to give the trail an even surface. It is travelable in snowshoes.
We arrived at the spur to Faraway Mountain to find the trail broken out by 2 ATVs (mini snow cats). This made things a lot easier. Two service engineers were at the summit working on 'radio stuff' (had generators running, etc.). Not sure where they originated, but they came up the Faraway Mountain trail, so most of our intended descent was broken out. We needed to get to the hiker parking, via Cold Spring trail and road, so we took the FM cutoff to join that trail. Cold Spring trail was poorly broken out above the FM cutoff. A word of note, the ATV broke out the trail, but it is soft and snowshoes are really needed (I switched to spikes thinking the trail was sufficiently hard, but I put snowshoes back on after a few yards, it was just too soft). |
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 | Name: |
CookiesOnTop & Goldrush |
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 | E-Mail: |
schwarzmc at yahoo dot com |
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| Date Submitted: |
2023-02-09 |
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 | Link: |
 https:// |
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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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