Mount Eisenhower

We went hiking in Mount Eisenhower in March. It is still completely covered with snow in March in the White mountains in New Hampshire. 

During COVID-19 outbreak, it is good to go hiking in the snow. People who hike in the snow is limited, so it is easy to be social distancing. 

<Mount Eisenhower Hike>

Type: Out and back 

Distance: 8.7 miles

Elevation change: +/- 3215 feet

We had actuarially hiked up to the top of Mt.Eisenhower. However that time the summit was in the clouds. It was cold, windy, and no view. This time we checked the weather forecast and hiked again on a sunny day. 

At the trailhead I went outside of the car and I was surprised. It was not so cold.  Recent winter hikes I wear Montbell winter pants: birthday gift from Ms.L( thank you!). They are so good and warm, however, I even wondered they might be too warm. On the second thought I decided to wear them because the higher the colder. 

At the parking lot there was a cute black lab dog. The owner was calling her Pollough. She must be young. She was very energetic.
The parking lot was across the highway of the trailhead. Highway was very quiet, because New Hampshire has been under stay home order. After we crossed the road we were putting microspikes on. Then Pollough came to the trailhead! Only Pollough not the owners. The owners seemed to go to the other side of the trail, so they and Pollough didn't need to cross the highway. Naughty Pollough. Then Pollough again crossed the highway back to the parking lot. Dangerous! Lucky her there was few traffic. 

Mt Eisenhower then Mt Washington in the back

Trail

The trail is continuously uphill from the beginning to the end. 3200 feet elevation gain in 4.4 miles. It was a good workout. 

The last 1 mile is above tree line. The view was nice. Over the Eisenhower, there is the highest mountain in the New England, Mount Washington. Mount Washington is pretty covered with snow. In the Presidential range it is still in winter. Surprisingly, the summit was not windy. It was extremely rare in New England!! Usually I can't eat sandwich at the top due to high wind. This time I was able to enjoy sandwich with great view.
Two guys came to the top and the guy was telling to the other guy, "Last time I was here, it was sustained 60 mile per hour wind".
I thought, "Yes that is the standard."

After a nice lunch break, we started descending. On the way Mr.N decided to get water. There was one stream where water was not frozen and flowing. Mr.N was taking out his water bottle and Steripen. Then three people with two dogs came down. The guy told his dog, "You can go in" and the doggy went into the stream where Mr.N was about to get water. I thought, "Uh oh." It was actually funny.
After they left, Mr.N got water from upstream than the place the dog went in. 

Short Hike at Cutler Park

During COVID-19 outbreak, social distancing is mandatory. Here in Massachusetts, restaurants and bars are only take out and delivery. Gathering over 25 people are prohibited. Construction in the city is prohibited. In some other states, shelter in place are ordered state wide. Now, activities on weekends are very limited to many people in the U.S. However, hiking, biking, walking, running are still allowed as long as keep 6 feet with strangers. Under this circumstances, hiking is getting popular everywhere. 

We went to Cutler Park, relatively close to Boston for a short hike. We wanted to do a short hike because we did a big hike on a previous day. This is a nice local park for hiking, walking, and biking. 0.5 mile from a parking lot was kind of crowded. It looked definitely more people than usual. Nobody can hang out at coffee shops or restaurants. So weekend's activity shifted to more walking. However, after 0.5 mile, the trail was much quieter and nice. 

The fun part of this park is that there are many dogs. One particular dog I really liked was a middle sized brown dog. The owner had two dogs. The other one and owners walked fast and they were far ahead of brown one. The owner noticed the brown was far behind and stopped.
The owner said, "Come on buddy, you can do it."
The brown one was tired and he was walking very very slow. The way he slowly walked was soooooo cute. It made us cheer him on. After the owner cheers him on, he *slightly* walked faster. That was so cute!

trail

The trail is flat and smooth, which is totally different from New Hampshire's which is super rocky and steep. Smooth dirt trail on the meadow portion reminded me of California trails. I miss them!

The right picture is a portion near highway. This depicts very well "American trail".  Highways structure is very different from Japan. This picture is very American to me. First of all cars drive left side. Right, cars drive right side in Japan....and UK, New Zealand, Australia, etc. Roads are much wider in the U.S. Roads are narrower in Japan. When we went to New Zealand, there are many signs saying New Zealand roads are narrow. The signs are for tourists. The narrowness and left side traffic made me feel home. 

As we walked, we got close to the other end of road. Then again more people were walking. Ummm. I got concerned. More occasions to pass by strangers. I was concerned about COVID-19. So we decided to turn around. 

On the way back there was another cute dog. The doggy rubbed his entire body on the dirt covered with small brown leaves. His berries and backs. He got covered with dirt and leaves. The owner, a couple, were laughing and the guy said, "This is the worst ever!" The lady was quiet.

Later on we passed the couple again. We don't talk with strangers these days because of social distancing, but I overheard their conversation. It was around 3 p.m. Sunday.
The guy: We can have fresh bread with XX cream. (I didn't catch what he wanted with bread)
I couldn't hear the lady's voice.
The guy said, "That sounds good for afternoon snack?"
I didn't hear the lady's voice again. 

At first I thought that they are a married couple. After overhearing the conversation, I thought that the guy might be still approaching the lady. By suggesting afternoon snack with fresh bread, he might be trying to spend more time with her Sunday afternoon. They are probably 50's or 60's. 

It is not scientific, but sometimes I like to imagine strangers' lives. Mr.N suggested asking them. I said, "NO!"

Geese

Lastly we saw geese eating plants in the lake. cute!

Nice short hike, but I decided not to hike in local park in Mass. Concerned about COVID-19. 

Mount Moriah in New Hampshire

After a couple of weeks of no hiking (had been busy, still did BODYPUMP at the gym on the weekend, but now the gym is closed due to COVID-19), we went out for hiking to climb Mount Moriah in New Hampshire.

During COVID-19 outbreak, hiking is a great activity. Somehow all over the U.S, hiking got more popular than usual. People everywhere are talking how crowded (much more than usual) the hiking trails and running trails are. In California some state parks got closed, because it was impossible to keep 6 feet apart from strangers. Luckily trails in New Hampshire in snow are not crowded. 

<Mount Moriah Hike>

Type: Out and back 

Distance: 8.8 miles

Elevation change: +/- 3274 feet

Mount Surprise

Started at the trailhead and climbed via Carter Moriah trail. On the half way of 2.2 mile point is the Mount Surprise. I actually knew it was a mountain after I went home and checked a map again. Surprising. 

final sign to the summit

At the mount surprise, there was a nice view. Big mountain range could be seen including Mount Washington. The range is covered with snow massively. It was pretty. I thought that Mount Surprise was the top of Mount Moriah, but Mr.N said it should be further. He checked the App and said it was a half way. I had to mentally prepared again. Thinking 100% and it turned out 50% of the way is a bit psychologically hard, but I continued. Last 0.5 mile was ups and down, and final steep climb led us to the summit. The picture above left is the sign before 0.2-0.3 mile from the summit. Due to snow the sign is now so low. The view was great. Not only Presidential range, but also other range was in the view. We enjoyed the view for 5 minutes and I took some pictures. I needed to take out my gloves to take pictures and my hands got numb due to coldness. Frigid! Due to that we couldn't stay for a long time there, but it was worth climbing there. 

Summit

On the way back near the summit a couple were hiking up and we passed each other. The lady talked to us and she said, "You are the first people we see today!" She wanted to continue conversation more after several additional sentences, but Mr.N tried to leave as soon as possible for social distancing. It seems that New Hampshires people are not as concerned as Mass people. Hope at least New Hampshire won't get so many cases and mountain trails will keep open to everyone. 

We hiked down to the Mount Surprise and had sandwiches. Good times. 

Snowshoeing in Pittsfield State Forest

In mid-January in New England it snowed a lot. One weekend we went snowshoeing to enjoy fresh snow. 

LULU trail

Snowshoe

Pretty

New England snow is known for not good quality. The reason is temperature goes down and up regularly. It snows and then melt when temperature goes above freezing point (0C). Then temperature goes below the freezing point. Then the melted snow now gets ice. Ice is not good for snowshoe or skiing or walking. So it is rare to have fresh snow in New England. 

<Pittsfield State Forest Snowshoeing>

Type: Loop (Honwee loop trail-Berry Lake-Tower Mountain-Vosburgh trail)

Distance: 6 miles

Elevation change: +/- 1286 feet

We went to Pittsfield State Forest. This Forest is in Massachusetts, but really close to New York state border. We started on LULU trail. The trail is narrow and steep. Snowshoe is the best for this kind of trail. Nobody had snowed on it yet. It is fun to break a trail covered with soft fluffy snow. Besides, there were only a couple of people snowshoeing on the day.  You can get an idea about the snow quality in the left picture. On this day there were only a couple of snowshoers. 

Berry Pond

Small stream was not completely frozen. It was nice to hear some stream sound in the snow. Pretty view. After a few miles the trail met with a wider trail. The wide trail is open for snowmobilers as well. It seems snowmobile is popular in New England. It is not my favorite to snowshoe on the trail that allow snowmobiling, but this day it was only limited portion. Besides I found snowmobiling people are nice in general.  

We ate sandwiches for lunch at frozen Berry Pond and went back to the trailhead. 

Nice snowhike!

#snowshoe #newengland #pittsfieldstateforest