Mountain Wandering: Spring Scenes

In April, south-facing and snow-free is a good place to be. Stay safe!

Carol and I did a five-mile loop on hiking trails and unofficial mountain bike trails in the Smarts Brook area. This gnarled old yellow birch overlooks a tiny tributary stream.

Shaggy bark on a red (?) maple.

Nice woods walking.

Black Mountain in the distance.

Local resident.

Cascade on Smarts Brook.

Another trek took me on a 7-mile lollipop loop through Dickey Notch and over Fisher Mountain. The beaver ponds in Dickey Notch have seen some recent activity.

Beavers at work.

Beautiful hardwood stand in Dickey Notch.

A pool in the forest.

The Brown Ash Swamp Mountain Bike Trail, aka Dickey Notch Trail. In the 1930s and early 1940s there was a maintained hiking trail through the notch.

From the far end of Dickey Notch, I bushwhacked up the Shattuck Brook valley. For a time I believe I was following the ghost of the old WMNF Shattuck Brook Trail, which led partway up the valley and was abandoned in the 1940s.

Shattuck Brook, well up into the valley.

Hardwoods on the south slope of Fisher Mountain.

Open forest.

Wander at will.

Carpeted with club moss.

Many interesting rocks seen along the way.

Park-like.

Rock shelves.

I bushwhacked to a couple of view ledges around the flat, scrubby summit, stepping carefully to minimize trampling of lichens. A Turkey Vulture was soaring over Tecumseh.

Bear?

Sandwich Dome and the back side of Dickey Mountain.

Haselton Brook valley and the many southern spurs of Mt. Tecumseh. In the late 1800s this was called the "Elkins Fisher," after the Elkins Farm at its base, to distinguish it from "Middle Fisher" (now called Hogback Mountain) and "Fisher Mountain," which is now a nameless SW spur of Green Mountain. An early ascent of today's Fisher was made by guidebook Moses Sweetser around 1875: "The Fisher-Mt route is entered directly from the Elkins farm by crossing long upland pastures and traversing a belt of tangled forest. Then the tourist attacks the bare white ledges of Fisher Mt., whose summit is reached after an hour's breathless clambering. Pleasant views are opened in the S. and W., and in advance is the white crest of Tecumseh."

Still some snow on the Franconias. In 1877, AMC member F.W. Clarke (who gave the three Fisher names noted above) and companions ascended all the Fisher peaks and other spurs of Tecumseh with aneroid and mercurial barometers. Fisher Mountain was measured at 2621 ft., only 12 ft. higher than the elevation shown on the current USGS map.

I descended via the sparsely-marked unofficial path, which as someone wrote, is not for the faint of heart. Here it passes over the "fissure on Fisher."