A sunny day with temperatures rising into the 80s seemed like a good time to revisit a bushwhack I did almost exactly 25 years ago: across the sweeping western slope of North Kinsman to a great expanse of ledge high on a ridgecrest overlooking the deep ravine of Slide Brook.
I was surprised to see perhaps a dozen cars in the parking lot for Mount Kinsman Trail on a Tuesday. Then again, it was the first good hiking weather we'd had in a while.
Morning sun was dappling the pleasant first section of the trail, which was opened in 2009 from a new trailhead. Thanks go to the landowners who allow access on the first mile of the trail.
The old sugarhouse has been a trail landmark for many years.
This rock staircase was built by the Trailwrights a few years ago, working with trail adopter Bruce Richards, a stalwart member of that fine trail maintenance group.
One of several excellent waterbars placed by the USFS Pemi District trail crew.
A stout yellow birch overlooks another waterbar.
Mossy Falls Brook was running well.
The drainages all looked freshly cleaned, so I knew that Mount Kinsman Trail adopter Bruce Richards was somewhere up ahead. I caught up to Bruce (on the right) and his new co-adopter, Peter Thorne, not far above Mossy Falls Brook. Bruce's dedication to trail work is second to none. In addition to numerous work trips on his adopted trail, he joins many Trailwrights work days on other trails, and is volunteering on the Old Bridle Path reconstruction project. He also serves as the trail maintenance volunteer coordinator for the USFS Pemi Ranger District. (If you want to adopt a trail, contact Bruce at bruce4trails@gmail.com.) Thanks, Bruce and Peter!
If time permits while on a climb of the Kinsmans, a side trip to Bald Peak is well worthwhile. It also makes a fine destination on its own for a half-day hike.
At the junction I chatted with Mike and Katie Maciel and their friend Brady. The Kinsmans were two new peaks for Katie as she pursues her completion of the 4Ks. Mike, of Redline Guiding fame, has been up there once or twice. Brady is an AT thru-hike completer. He had not been to Bald Peak before, so he joined me for the side trip while Mike and Katie headed down.
View were hazy from Canadian wildfire smoke but still good from Bald Peak's expanse of ledge. The vista looking SW takes in Mount Moosilauke, Mount Clough and the Benton Range.
North Kinsman looms close by to the SE. I would soon be bushwhacking across that slope to the ridgecrest on the right.
Beyond the Bald Peak junction, Mount Kinsman Trail is nearly level for a bit, then climbs moderately with a few rough ledgy pitches.
A half mile or so above the junction, I headed into the woods where passage looked reasonable.
This whack was a little unusual in that the route was an ascending traverse across a long slope, rather than a straightforward climb up a ridge or valley. I checked my compass frequently.
This blocky boulder resides in one of several small streams that flow down the slope.
The woods were varied on this mile-long middle elevation traverse.
The forest was fairly open much of the way, but the footing was rough
and uneven, with numerous rocks and holes seen and unseen. Careful
attention to foot placement was needed, especially where the forest
floor was masked by low growth.
Onward and upward.
Blowdowns often blocked the way.
Wild and wooly.
Good woods here.
Moose poop littered the forest floor. I saw plenty of moose postholes in the turf, too.
About three-quarters of the way across I ran into a band of awful woods, very dense and riddled with blowdown.
Some gymnastics accompanied by cussing got me through this area.
Thankfully, the final approach to the main expanse of ledge at 3400 ft. was through a wonderfully open boreal forest.
It took me 1 hour, 40 minutes to cover the mile from the trail to the ledges, compared to 1 hour, 18 minutes back in 1999. Chalk it up to aging and caution.
A destination well worth the trouble! The view looking west across the Easton valley, with Vermont's Signal Mountain Range on the horizon..
The northwestern view, with Burke and Umpire Mountains in the Northeast Kingdom on the far right.
Another angle.
I went across to a perch I remembered from my 1999 visit, peering down into the deep ravine of Slide Brook. There are many cascades down there, but they are difficult to access due to private land at the base of the mountain. Moosilauke, Clough and the Benton Range in the distance.
One of the highlights of the view is the massive close-up of South Kinsman, with the scars of two slides on the steep slope above Slide Brook. The long sinuous slide on the left fell at an unknown time and may have been "refreshed" in the October 1995 storm. The ledgy patches just to its right are the remnants of an old slide that dates back to the late 1800s. In August, 1877, AMC member Gaetano Lanza and a companion ascended South Kinsman from the west via Slide Brook and this slide on the south side of the ravine. Writing in Appalachia, Lanza noted the brook as “remarkable for its beauty; its bed being composed of immense ledges of granite, and containing a great number of picturesque cascades and basins.” About 1 ¾ miles from the road the pair came to “the foot of a short, but well-marked slide, coming from the right-hand ridge. There is a similar slide on the left-hand side also…it appears as if the earth and vegetation had slid down from the top, leaving bare a single convex rock sloping at nearly 35 degrees to the horizon; the rock, of course, is more or less in the form of ledges, but there are no signs of a gully or water-course in it.” Lanza noted that the slide was short - no more than a quarter-mile in length, requiring just 26 minutes to ascend - but steep enough that it was “necessary in some places to cling to the bushes on the side.” Above the slide they battled through “as bad scrubs, rotten and fallen timber and moss-covered rocks as one often meets with.” In 1878 this slide route up South Kinsman was repeated by a party of five that included AMC notables George A. Sargent, Marian Pychowska, Lucia Pychowska, Eugene B. Cook and Rev. Henry G. Spaulding.
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