The genesis of this trip was like most others. An e-mail to a hiking bud. In this case it was, “what's left on your Adirondack list”? When you ask this question of a 777 hiker you better be ready for anything. Gérald is nearing the end of this mammoth list and my eyebrows arched when I saw he needed Alton and Moose North along with Sawtooth 3 North and Sawtooth 11. Obscure but tough and scrappy little 3K peaks for sure.
I enjoy being on the water so I suggested we take my canoe and paddle northbound the length of Lake Placid to Echo Bay. Gérald was game so at 12:30 pm on a Friday we set out into high winds and whitecaps coming at us from the west. It was also raining so until we got into the lee of Buck Island we took it on the chin and our latissimus dorsi muscles got a serious workout. Rounding the NE point of Moose Island we really took it on the chin until we were deep into Echo Bay and then we landed, emptied and flipped the canoe and followed a compass bearing all the way to the top of Moose North, which turned out to be a steep little beggar of a peak. The woods were never very tight but it never ceases to amaze me just how tough it is hiking uphill off-trail. Our MO for navigation all weekend was to be me with map, compass, and altimeter and Gérald with the GPS letting me know when I strayed too far off-course. Worked well for us.
A 12:30 departure from the public wharf in a canoe for this itinerary was a late start for sure and as such I pushed the pace non-stop. I was now seeing the weekend's itinerary as one long hike with a catnap in the middle.
We made it to Moose North in 2 hours, which was my predicted/hoped for time. From there to Alton we planned on traversing a mile-long ridge prior to dropping into the col. Would the ridge be open? Would it be blow-down hell? Only one way to find out. Turned out to be mostly open with one memorable hellish section of blowdown with interlocked new balsams. We crossed most of the bumps (there 5 or 6) but decided to go around the last one to save some elly gain. I think this was a false energy savings because the side-hilling we had to do through fricking and hatefull whitch-hobble in order to get back on track sucked away greedily at our limited energy supplies.
At the foot of Alton we noticed lots of impressive cliffs and generally steep terrain. The climb was a grind and a grunt but we always found weaknesses in the cliffs that saved us from having to deviate too widely off-route. We made the summit from Moose N. in our estimated time of 2h30m, took new bearings and kept the forward progress going. I wanted to be off the water with daylight left over but more and more the numbers weren't adding up.
The drop off Alton was steep and then it was a long walk out through fairly open woods and along the edge of two big fens. I guess we were tired because we kept tripping over sticks and branches that littered the forest floor profusely. I may have uttered a few curse words whenever branches, tangled between my feet, sent me sprawling. At 8:05 we were on the water a-paddling so the whack took us 6h20m (I had predicted 6 hours flat). We hugged the eastern shore and gandered at some ab-so-lute-ly incredible multi-million dollar summer homes before total darkness enfolded us. There was a glowing purple sunset on Kilburn that was to die for. There were no boats on the water but some Loons brightened up our paddle home.
As soon as we landed I began to shiver fairly hard so once we got the canoe on top of the car and aimed for Stewart's chile I set the car heater on max. The chile was just to hold us until we got back to our already set-up camp at South Meadows. There we consumed adult beverages and ate real food before hitting the sack 'round midnight.
At 5:30 am. mother nature's bird-song alarm clock got us up and we slowly got our act together (coffee, cereal, pack the day-packs, get in the car etc.). After a slow hike in to the Moose Pond Lean-to (hiking hang-overs) and a rest stop for vittles we began the whack to Sawtooth 3 North. Compared to the day before there was no feeling of urgency and we eased back on the throttle but then when we sat in the giant fen under the Saw-One-Saw-One East ridge we noted that we had been hiking for 5h30m and were only now about to commence ascending our first peak of the day. It was past 12. I said to Gérald that the day before we hadn't started the actual hike until an hour later so we were surely OK time-wise.
Turned out that hiking the two mountains only ate up 2 hours but nevertheless, sitting atop Saw-11at 2:30 eating lunch we were now at our furthest point from the car. Still, the time looked good and anyway, the hike out from the LT was trailed. Instead of re-climbing 3N we decided to go around its north end through a col. This saved us 300 feet of elly. Was it worth it? For the incredible upward views and subjective feelings of awe and deep pleasure that I felt, yes. Energy savings? Not sure because getting through that very gnarly col was a bear of hard work. We saw a surprising amount of snow and ice though,which was interesting.
Once past the col summit the woods opened up and we sailed back to the Moose Pond lean-to where of course we stopped for about 20 minutes to freshen up. We then hauled ass down the trail and after a 13-hour hike (Where the time goes on a bushwhack I'll never know), hit Stewarts for pizza, beer and chile before heading back to the campsite for an appreciated sit-down, chow-down, beer or two before crawling into our sleeping bags and falling asleep within seconds.
And that's it!
I enjoy being on the water so I suggested we take my canoe and paddle northbound the length of Lake Placid to Echo Bay. Gérald was game so at 12:30 pm on a Friday we set out into high winds and whitecaps coming at us from the west. It was also raining so until we got into the lee of Buck Island we took it on the chin and our latissimus dorsi muscles got a serious workout. Rounding the NE point of Moose Island we really took it on the chin until we were deep into Echo Bay and then we landed, emptied and flipped the canoe and followed a compass bearing all the way to the top of Moose North, which turned out to be a steep little beggar of a peak. The woods were never very tight but it never ceases to amaze me just how tough it is hiking uphill off-trail. Our MO for navigation all weekend was to be me with map, compass, and altimeter and Gérald with the GPS letting me know when I strayed too far off-course. Worked well for us.
A 12:30 departure from the public wharf in a canoe for this itinerary was a late start for sure and as such I pushed the pace non-stop. I was now seeing the weekend's itinerary as one long hike with a catnap in the middle.
We made it to Moose North in 2 hours, which was my predicted/hoped for time. From there to Alton we planned on traversing a mile-long ridge prior to dropping into the col. Would the ridge be open? Would it be blow-down hell? Only one way to find out. Turned out to be mostly open with one memorable hellish section of blowdown with interlocked new balsams. We crossed most of the bumps (there 5 or 6) but decided to go around the last one to save some elly gain. I think this was a false energy savings because the side-hilling we had to do through fricking and hatefull whitch-hobble in order to get back on track sucked away greedily at our limited energy supplies.
At the foot of Alton we noticed lots of impressive cliffs and generally steep terrain. The climb was a grind and a grunt but we always found weaknesses in the cliffs that saved us from having to deviate too widely off-route. We made the summit from Moose N. in our estimated time of 2h30m, took new bearings and kept the forward progress going. I wanted to be off the water with daylight left over but more and more the numbers weren't adding up.
The drop off Alton was steep and then it was a long walk out through fairly open woods and along the edge of two big fens. I guess we were tired because we kept tripping over sticks and branches that littered the forest floor profusely. I may have uttered a few curse words whenever branches, tangled between my feet, sent me sprawling. At 8:05 we were on the water a-paddling so the whack took us 6h20m (I had predicted 6 hours flat). We hugged the eastern shore and gandered at some ab-so-lute-ly incredible multi-million dollar summer homes before total darkness enfolded us. There was a glowing purple sunset on Kilburn that was to die for. There were no boats on the water but some Loons brightened up our paddle home.
As soon as we landed I began to shiver fairly hard so once we got the canoe on top of the car and aimed for Stewart's chile I set the car heater on max. The chile was just to hold us until we got back to our already set-up camp at South Meadows. There we consumed adult beverages and ate real food before hitting the sack 'round midnight.
At 5:30 am. mother nature's bird-song alarm clock got us up and we slowly got our act together (coffee, cereal, pack the day-packs, get in the car etc.). After a slow hike in to the Moose Pond Lean-to (hiking hang-overs) and a rest stop for vittles we began the whack to Sawtooth 3 North. Compared to the day before there was no feeling of urgency and we eased back on the throttle but then when we sat in the giant fen under the Saw-One-Saw-One East ridge we noted that we had been hiking for 5h30m and were only now about to commence ascending our first peak of the day. It was past 12. I said to Gérald that the day before we hadn't started the actual hike until an hour later so we were surely OK time-wise.
Turned out that hiking the two mountains only ate up 2 hours but nevertheless, sitting atop Saw-11at 2:30 eating lunch we were now at our furthest point from the car. Still, the time looked good and anyway, the hike out from the LT was trailed. Instead of re-climbing 3N we decided to go around its north end through a col. This saved us 300 feet of elly. Was it worth it? For the incredible upward views and subjective feelings of awe and deep pleasure that I felt, yes. Energy savings? Not sure because getting through that very gnarly col was a bear of hard work. We saw a surprising amount of snow and ice though,which was interesting.
Once past the col summit the woods opened up and we sailed back to the Moose Pond lean-to where of course we stopped for about 20 minutes to freshen up. We then hauled ass down the trail and after a 13-hour hike (Where the time goes on a bushwhack I'll never know), hit Stewarts for pizza, beer and chile before heading back to the campsite for an appreciated sit-down, chow-down, beer or two before crawling into our sleeping bags and falling asleep within seconds.
And that's it!
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