Tripyramid South Slides Snowshoe: 1/6/25

On a cold but sunny day I returned to Waterville Valley for more snowshoeing to slides on the flank of Mount Tripyramid - this time on the SW side of the mountain. The Waterville Valley Nordic Center had groomed the first 2.2 miles of Livermore Trail - quite an accomplishment considering the thin cover. It made for a fast and easy approach.

 

Thanks to a spell of cold weather, the upper part of White Cascade on Slide Brook had largely iced over. Three days earlier it was pretty much free-flowing.

The mellow approach to the South Slide is one of my favorite trail sections.

The crossing of Avalanche Brook required some careful foot placement.

Into the Wilderness.

The gateway glade. I was pleased to find a snowshoe track, albeit a choppy one, on the trail. No boot holes!

 

Probing with poles revealed the thickest ice at this tributary crossing.

A small cascade on Slide Brook.

I didn't like the look of the trail crossing over Cold Brook.

Found a better spot upstream.

The snow off-trail in the hardwoods was firm and ideal for bushwhacking.

I enjoyed some meandering parallel to the trail.

These yellow birches have seen many hard winters.

Bushwhacking up through one of my favorite hardwood glades, unusually high at 2900 ft.

I returned to the trail briefly, then went off-trail again where it turns up to ascend the First (1869) South Slide. From here I headed south across the slope to visit the Second (1885) and Third (2011) South Slides. First I wandered across the lowest remaining open patch of the largely revegetated 1885 slide.

Then I cut back to the lower end of the 2011 slide, which was triggered by Tropical Storm Irene.

I climbed partway up it, but the cover was too thin and bony on the steeper part for snowshoeing.

I climbed up the bank at the edge of the slide for a good overlook.

Side view.

A view out to Mt. Tecumseh.

From there I whacked up and across the slope to two open patches on the 1885 slide. The snowshoeing was excellent on a deep firm base with a few inches of powder on top.

A nice vista from the top of this swath.

Respectable snow depth here.

Back into the woods to climb to the next open area.

An inviting corridor.

Pristine snowshoeing.

The best view is up there.

Due to a late morning start, I didn't get up here til mid-afternoon. It was cold, but with no wind I was able to have a half-hour second lunch break while admiring the view of Sandwich Dome and the remote Lost Pass region.

Some nice colors on the way back down the lower slide patch. At the base of this patch are two of the largest white pines I've seen on a slide at an elevation above 3000 ft. I made it down to Livermore Trail at dusk and snowshoed the last hour by the light of a half-moon hovering high overhead.