Started out with a light snowfall at the Loj parking lot at 8:35. Saw that there was an extensive group of people heading out to Tabletop so had no concern about the herd-path. Unfortunately, we did not notice that anyone had signed on to hike Phelps at the time....
Hiked out to the Marcy Dam, enjoyed the views, stopped by a lean-to probably populated by backcountry skiers earlier in the day since all their equipment was left, including snowshoes, trekking poles, sleeping bags and backcountry stove was left in the lean-to. At the lean-to we simply took a minute to adjust the straps on our gear and headed out.
Reached the Phelps trail at 9:30. We saw that only one person had gone ahead of us, and decided to go on up anyways since we had passed who we believed to be the Tabletop group earlier in the day. A short while later, we reached the hiker who was trudging through the snow ahead of us. We offered to break up the task of breaking out the trail. That went well, despite the difficulties of the steep sections. Although it took an hour and a half to clear out one mile of trail, it seemed to go by fairly quickly and we reached the summit stretches to find we were almost entirely clouded in with fairly intense winds and blowing snow, which hit us as we were sweating with the work of ascending the unbroken trail.
On the ascent...
The summit was interesting as we watched clouds blow and swirl past us and the adjacent mountainous silhouettes peak in and out (no pun intended) while drinking some coffee, but soon tired of the intense wind chill and began the descent of snowshoes-skiing and one 10-foot buttslide (which we justified by having broken out the trail).
The summit of Phelps...
Our fellow hiker stayed behind for a few minutes, but as we passed groups of people going up and warned them of the possibly dangerously cold winds, he managed to catch up with us about a quarter of a mile from the hookup with the Marcy Trail. We chatted, passed a group of backcountry skiers headed up Phelps (:eek:) and soon got on the Marcy trail and headed out to Tabletop. Along the way we chatted amongst ourselves and with the occasional group of backcountry skiers. We split up as we needed to hydrate and have a quick breather, but he decided to wait until the junction, so he went on. Shortly, we reached the junction to find him, and then shortly, the group that had broken the herd-path came barreling down the mountain. We chatted with them for a few minutes, then headed up Tabletop, and our hiker friend passed us as we stopped to adjust gear and take pictures.
We found the summit sooner than expected, and found our friend again, and this time we properly introduced ourselves. He left about five or ten minutes ahead of us on the summit, we wished each other luck, and we tried to see anything off Tabletop, but the woods and the clouds blocked in everything.
On Tabletop...
Soon we headed off, moving down the mountain like wild horses, while avoiding collisions with skiers, until we reached the Marcy Dam about 6 hours and 30 minutes into the hike. On the final stretch, we decided to take it easy and did it in about 50 minutes and finally got back to the car.
Hiked out to the Marcy Dam, enjoyed the views, stopped by a lean-to probably populated by backcountry skiers earlier in the day since all their equipment was left, including snowshoes, trekking poles, sleeping bags and backcountry stove was left in the lean-to. At the lean-to we simply took a minute to adjust the straps on our gear and headed out.
Reached the Phelps trail at 9:30. We saw that only one person had gone ahead of us, and decided to go on up anyways since we had passed who we believed to be the Tabletop group earlier in the day. A short while later, we reached the hiker who was trudging through the snow ahead of us. We offered to break up the task of breaking out the trail. That went well, despite the difficulties of the steep sections. Although it took an hour and a half to clear out one mile of trail, it seemed to go by fairly quickly and we reached the summit stretches to find we were almost entirely clouded in with fairly intense winds and blowing snow, which hit us as we were sweating with the work of ascending the unbroken trail.
On the ascent...
The summit was interesting as we watched clouds blow and swirl past us and the adjacent mountainous silhouettes peak in and out (no pun intended) while drinking some coffee, but soon tired of the intense wind chill and began the descent of snowshoes-skiing and one 10-foot buttslide (which we justified by having broken out the trail).
The summit of Phelps...
Our fellow hiker stayed behind for a few minutes, but as we passed groups of people going up and warned them of the possibly dangerously cold winds, he managed to catch up with us about a quarter of a mile from the hookup with the Marcy Trail. We chatted, passed a group of backcountry skiers headed up Phelps (:eek:) and soon got on the Marcy trail and headed out to Tabletop. Along the way we chatted amongst ourselves and with the occasional group of backcountry skiers. We split up as we needed to hydrate and have a quick breather, but he decided to wait until the junction, so he went on. Shortly, we reached the junction to find him, and then shortly, the group that had broken the herd-path came barreling down the mountain. We chatted with them for a few minutes, then headed up Tabletop, and our hiker friend passed us as we stopped to adjust gear and take pictures.
We found the summit sooner than expected, and found our friend again, and this time we properly introduced ourselves. He left about five or ten minutes ahead of us on the summit, we wished each other luck, and we tried to see anything off Tabletop, but the woods and the clouds blocked in everything.
On Tabletop...
Soon we headed off, moving down the mountain like wild horses, while avoiding collisions with skiers, until we reached the Marcy Dam about 6 hours and 30 minutes into the hike. On the final stretch, we decided to take it easy and did it in about 50 minutes and finally got back to the car.
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