Cherry Ponds & Mount Prospect

Looking for easy and scenic snowshoeing with a persistent chest cold, I headed north to Pondicherry National Wildlife Refuge - home to the two Cherry Ponds - for one hike, and Mount Prospect in Weeks State Park, near Lancaster, for another. Good choices, they were! 

 

PONDICHERRY NATIONAL WLIDLIFE REFUGE

 

The gentle trails of Pondicherry National Wildlife Refuge in Jefferson and Whitefield, on the north side of the Whites, offer some of the most scenic walking in the Whites. This 6,405-acre tract is technically the Pondicherry Division of the larger Silvio Conte National Fish and Wildlife Refuge. Plowed parking was available off Airport Rd. for the Presidential Rail Trail access to the Cherry Ponds.

The 1.5 mile approach to Cherry Pond is straight and flat on an old railroad grade that is a popular snowmobile trail in winter. On this weekday I encountered only two snowmobiles on the round trip.

View of the Pliny Range across Cherry Pond from the Tudor Richards Viewing Platform, dedicated to legendary NH ornithologist and naturalist Tudor Richards, who was instrumental in creating the refuge.

Cherry Pond is justly renowned for its views of the Presidentials.

The Northern Peaks - Madison, Adams and Jefferson - with Castle Ravine prominently displayed.

 

The Crescent Range near Randolph.

Two short paths along the NW shore of Cherry Pond provide even better views. Access is along a short section of railroad track that is active, though infrequently used.

First is the Shore Path, 0.1 mile long. The route through here is also part of the Cohos Trail. Farther along is another shoreside trail called Rampart Path.

 

More great Presy views.

Mount Adams with Cascade and Castle Ravines below.

Mount Jefferson, with the V-shape of two slides along the notorious Caps-to-Castles section of The Link.

Mount Washington.

 

A bench along Rampart Path where I hung out in the sun and took in the views.

A  glimpse of North Twin and its north slides in the distance.

 

My favorite trail at Pondicherry is the meandering woods walk that leads to wild Little Cherry Pond. The wonderful trails at Pondicherry are maintained by the volunteer Friends of Pondicherry. Thank you!

An easy and pleasant trail for snowshoeing.

Mooseway is a winter-only X-C ski and snowshoe route that leads to Mud Pond Trail on the north side of the refuge.

 

There are no mountain views where the Little Cherry Pond Trail ends at the eastern shore of the pond, but the place has a wild and remote feel to it. In summer the swamp and bog environment gives it a bayou-like aura.

I snowshoed out onto the pond to get some views, here looking at Owl's Head and Mount Martha, the highest peak of Cherry Mountain. (This was just before the big thaw, which has likely made the pond ice unsafe to cross.)

A distant glimpse of Mount Garfield and Mount Lafayette.

Making tracks on Little Cherry.

Looking back.

Heading back on Little Cherry Pond Trail, I heard a tapping on a trailside tree and got some great looks at a female Black-backed Woodpecker, an uncommon boreal species that is regularly seen on the refuge. In addition to its scenery, Pondicherry is noted as one of the top birding locales in New Hampshire, with 243 species  recorded. 

MOUNT PROSPECT/WEEKS STATE PARK

 

On a sunny spring-like day with temperatures in the high 40s I drove north towards Lancaster for a snowshoe hike up the snowmobile-packed auto road to the summit of 2058-ft. Mount Prospect. This 1.6 mile road is officially known as the Mountain Road Scenic Byway and offers some spectacular views.  It was originally built in 1911. There is plenty of plowed parking at the park entrance off US 3, at the top of the big hill just south of Lancaster. 

 

 

 

The snowshoeing up the road was pleasant through open sunny hardwoods, and I encountered only two snowmobilers during a leisurely ascent.

 

At 0.7 mile there's a partly restricted viewpoint looking SW towards Martin Meadow Pond.

My favorite spot on the mountain is the fine eastern outlook, reached at 1.1 mile. 

 

Mount Starr King and its various spurs, with rounded North Weeks peering over on the left.

An excellent view of the Presidentials, here showing the Northern Peaks and Mount Washington.

 Adams, Castle Ravine and Jefferson.

 

 

 

 

 

The view extends across to some of the Southern Peaks.

I love the profile of Mount Cabot and the three peaks of Terrace Mountain.

I sat on a dry bench for quite a while to absorb the views and the sun.

The bench.

 

A view panorama.

I continued another half-mile up to the summit of Mount Prospect. At the summit is the mansion built in 1912 by John Wingate Weeks, a Lancaster native who was a U.S. Congressman and Senator from Massachusetts and also served as Secretary of War. He sponsored the 1911 Weeks Act, which authorized the creation of National Forests in the East, including the White Mountain National Forest. The mansion is an historic site normally open to the public in summer and fall, but was closed last year for an extensive renovation. According to the NH State Parks website, this year the mansion will be open starting in July. The volunteer Weeks State Park Association sponsors an excellent series of speaker programs each summer and fall. The WSPA also runs other programs and assists in the upkeep of the park and its trails. Thank you!

John W. Weeks had a stone observation tower built at the summit. It's closed during the off-season, but is open Wednesday - Sunday from 10 am to 4:30 pm.  in summer and fall. The Weeks family donated the 438-acre Mount Prospect estate to the State of NH in 1941.

More fine views up here. In the foreground is a bench that honors the late Iris W. Baird, longtime supporter of Weeks State Park, and an authority on New Hampshire fire tower history.

There is a nice little network of trails around the summit area. The Ken Jordan Nature Trail (KJNT) makes a loop on the south side of the summit, then leads north to the North Overlook.

The North Overlook viewing platform was rebuilt in 2021.

A great perspective on the wild, trailless Pilot Range extending NW from Mount Cabot.

Zoom on Hutchins Mountain.

Long view out to peaks in the Nash Stream Forest: Mount Muise, Percy Peaks and Long Mountain.

North Percy is a prominent snow cone in winter.

More Nash Stream summits: Teapot, Savage, West, Sugarloaf.

For the descent I went 0.3 mile down the road and turned left onto the Old Carriage Road.

This trail provides a moderate, then easy descent down the north side of the mountain.

I then headed west and south on the Around-the-Mountain Trail, which makes a three-mile loop around the base of Mount Prospect.

I checked out the NW vista from the Mount Prospect Ski Tow slope, then headed back to the trailhead. This little trail network is a gem, highly recommended!

 

 

Lower Tripyramid North Slide

Probably not the smartest thing to do with a bad chest cold, but I decided to do an all-day snowshoe hike anyway. I wanted easy grades with minimal steep climbing, so I opted to return to Waterville Valley and head out Livermore Trail to Avalanche Ravine, as Daniel Newton and I had done a few days earlier for his powder ski run on the East Fork of Tripyramid's North Slide. This time I intended to climb the lower part of the main North Slide to its first views out to Mt. Osceola and Mt. Moosilauke. I knew there had been some recent skier traffic on the slide, which would mean a packed snow surface for climbing.

The sun was pouring down on the Depot Camp clearing along Livermore Trail, with Middle and South Tripyramid peering over in the distance.

Beautifully groomed. I stay along the edges and yield to oncoming skiers when snowshoeing here.

Livermore Trail beyond the groomed section had a wonderful smooth, firm track fashioned by snowshoers and backcountry skiers.

A glimpse of North Tripyramid and the top of the North Slide.

 

Brilliant sun out here in the hardwoods, absolutely quiet with no one around.

A familiar sign.

The trail to the North Slide starts with a steep down-and-up crossing of Avalanche Brook - gateway to the Sandwich Range Wilderness.

Looking down at the crossing from the other side.

 

 

These old yellow birches welcome you to Avalanche Ravine.

 

The skiers were having some fun while descending the trail.

 

Into conifers for the final approach to the slide, 0.5 mile from Livermore Trail.

Onto the foot of the slide at 2740 ft. The lower part is pretty low angle, with a slope in the low to mid 20s for degrees. As expected, the snow was well-packed by skiers.

Steeper grades ahead.

 

Zoom on the top of the slide. Not going anywhere near that this day, but I did climb all the way up on snowshoes back in 2020. Due to very crusty snow, I kept along the left edge and in places went into the woods.

 

Snow enhances the steepness on the upper slide, which ranges up to a slope angle of 35 degrees.

Back down low, fun climbing on the ski tracks. This part of the slide track is not actually part of the trail as it is a slick gully in summer. Here the trail runs parallel through the woods to the left.

The first view, at ~3000 ft., is up in the scrubby area to the left. Here the slope angle ramps up to ~30 degrees.

 

Looking back down, with Scaur Ridge closing in the other side of the ravine.

Luckily a skier had carved a swath down from the view spot, saving me from breaking trail in three feet of powder.

A nice view to Mt. Osceola, with Mt. Moosilauke in the distance through Thornton Gap.

Zoom on Osceola, with the tip of East Osceola on the right.

The Moose.

 

Looking up the slide from the viewspot. It gets progressively steeper from here.

A steep little choke point below my perch.

Looking down from my perch. The North Slide rumbled down this steep slope during an intense rainstorm in August, 1885. A hundred years ago the area where I was standing was wide open. The slide initially bared an area of more than 20 acres. Today the lower half is mostly revegetated, with only a narrow open swath. The upper part remains open, though considerably narrower than it once was.

Parting shot.

Going down a slide on snowshoes is trickier than going up, so I used the trail to bypass the steeper uppermost portion that I had climbed.

This involved some heavy trail breaking, even going downhill steeply.

 

A peek at the slide from the "Inner Sanctum Glade" on the floor of the ravine.

Oh, those beautiful yellow birches!

Homeward bound on Livermore Trail. I was sorry to miss the release party at Basecamp Brewery for the new Mountain Wanderer beer, organized by store owners Forrest and Caroline, but I did not want to be a super-spreader of this nasty cold. It sounds like it was a great event - congratulations!