Mount Hale and Mount Zealand

Mount Hale and Mount Zealand Hike

Distance: 14.4 milesElevation Change: 4121 feetType: Loop with a long spur (Hale Brook Trail-Lend-Hand Trail-Twinway Trail-Zealand Trail-Zealand Road)Summits: Mount Hale (4049 feet) and Mount Zealand (4265 feet)

Recently I decided to hunt all the 4000 footers in New England. If I complete the list I am eligible to buy 4000 footer patches. Actually anybody can buy the patch without showing any proof of completion. It is just how honest to yourself. I want to get a patch as a reward and for my proud. Also it is fun hunting something. 

I love patches, especially for hiking memories. So far I have a patch for John Muir Trail and Tour du Mont Blanc. Why not adding another one? 

New England 4000 footers patches are famous and a lot of people are hiking to complete the list. We even heard that somebody was talking with other hikers at one of the summit of 4000 footers saying even dogs can get a patch. In fact a lot of dogs are hiking for 4000 footers (obviously taken by owners who are doing the list). 

This day we checked off two 4000 footers: Mount Hale and Mount Zealand.
First we started from Hale Brook trail. It was only 2.2 miles to Mount Hale. Although there was no view, we saw 2 cute doggies. The owner said that it was one of the dog's first 4000 footer! Good girl :) The other dog it was the third one. Hardcore dogs.  

Then we continued hiking via Lend-a-Hand trail, which is an interesting name. Now 1500 feet down, then connected with Twinway trail. Again 1500 feet up and reached to the Zealand top. On the way we stopped at the Zealand cliff viewpoint. This was a very good view, and glad we stopped there, because there was no view at the summit.

The rain clouds were approaching. That made the scenery dramatic. 

Zealand Falls

While we were eating lunch at the summit, it started raining. We quickly put rain jackets on and started descending. The worst timing to get rain: the half way point and 5 miles to go. I was hoping that it was a shower not the rain. Luckily after a mile of hike the rain stopped! Clouds went away and blue sky came. This made the Zealand waterfall prettier, since the waterflow drastically increased. We sat down on the rock in front of falls and ate peaches and dried our rain jackets. 

After that it was only downhill via Zealand trail. Although 2 summits had no view, still falls and Zealand cliff was great spots to stop. Finally we concluded the day with sushi from our favorite Japanese supermarket. 

Welch and Dickey Loop

 In the middle of October, fall color peak is past in northern New Hampshire, and now at the peak in southern New Hampshire. To see more autumn colors, we headed for Welch and Dickey loop, which is in the southern New Hampshire. 

A day before I looked up, "10 Great Fall Color Hikes in New Hampshire" and found Welch and Dickey loop was ranked #1. The description was family hike friendly and short. It was indeed only 4.5 miles, so we were at first a little hesitant. We love a big hike like 10 miles with 3000 feet elevation gain, but the loop is half of our usual hike in terms of both distance and elevation gain. However, we prioritized the fall color and decided to check it out. 

As usual we left Boston at 4 a.m. Since this loop is closer than usual places we went and sunrise time is getting later, it was dark when we arrived at the trailhead. We ate breakfast in the car with small light. By the time we were ready to go, the light came. Perfect. We could have come later, but we were concerned that "family hike friendly" place got really crowded later in the day (in fact, when we finished hike the big parking lot was full). 

trail

sunrise

First portion is in the forest. As we hoped, it was very pretty fall color. It was pleasant to walk under orange and yellow leaves' canopy. Luckily nobody was on the trail and it was very peaceful. After a gentle climb we encounter the first viewpoint. More autumn colors can be seen. Beautiful. There we saw sun just came out from the ridge. I always love sunrise and sunset over the mountains. 

Orange!

Warm orange sunlight now started shining on the orange leaves. That made the mountain scenery more welcoming. It was a color magic. 

One little annoying stuff around here was a guy who had music on. He was at the Welch summit, so we took pictures and carried on hiking. 

After a while I declare here that today I had my favorite fall color view of the year. That is the picture below. The color was magnificent. It was literally like a painting!!! This was a great hike!

Colorful

Buck Pond Kayaking in Upstate New York

Labor Day is the first Monday of September. Labor day is a holiday in the U.S. to recognize labor movement. Since the Labor Day is always Monday, it will be a 3-day weekend. It is kind of the last good opportunity for summer outing for many people. 

Usually we plan something big trip in summer, sometimes including Labor Day weekend, however this year we didn't have a big summer trip due to COVID-19 pandemic. A little disappointing, so we wanted to plan something for labor day weekend. Of course anytime we can go hiking and backpacking without reservation in New Hampshire, but this time we wanted to have "something" for sure. So we looked up campground reservation over labor day weekend. The only one campground is available for booking on labor day weekend in the entire New England. The only one campground. Wow. We booked it. 

Buckpond campground is located in upstate New York. It is actually very close to Canada. When I searched it on the internet, it seems that the campground is popular not only Americans but also Canadians, especially from Quebec residents. This summer in 2020, US-Canada border is closed for traveling. That seems to be a reason it is less people this year. 

On Saturday before going to the campground we hike up to McKenzie Mountain near the campground. It is nice to hike in upstate New York which has more lakes around, compared to the White Mountain area in New Hampshire. 

Nice Forest

The first 2 miles are relatively flat in the nice forest. On a sunny day, sunlight came through between the trees. I really like sunlight arrived on the dirt. It made the forest more welcoming and warm. The last mile and a half was steep, but good workout. From the summit there are a number of lakes could be seen. Great place to stay for a couple of days to kayak. 

From the top

In the evening we arrived at our campsite and started fun: cooking over the fire. This time we cooked asparagus with lemon, sausages and bell pepper with lemon. Asparagus was an experimental dish and it was not really good, but sausages and lemons were delicious! After we got full, we went to the beach of the lake. It is 3 minute walk from our campsite. 

The evening lake is extremely calm and beautiful. The shadow of mountains are pretty. Oh wow. We discussed the plan that next evening we would paddle here in the evening. Somehow a lot of lakes get calm in the evening with much less winds. It is a great opportunity to paddle at sunset if you don't need to go home after paddling: we had to walk just 3 minutes there!

Looking at the lake in the evening

And........we paddled in the evening at sunset on the next day. It was super peaceful. Evening orange light reflect on the lake. It was very pretty. The trees at the shore also shined orange by receiving orange light and it was reflected on the lake surface. Wow. It was time sensitive and beautiful. Definitely evening kayaking is the highlight of this camping trip!  
After we enjoyed a lot with kayaking, we went back to the campsite and had fun with fire more. 

One downside of our site was the site across the road from our site was noisy. There were 4 people there. It looked like they were friends. 2 Indian guys (from their accents) and a Chinese female and an Indian female. They drank a lot and chatting so loud. It was annoying for people like us to enjoy peaceful night. Quiet time for the campground was 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. Mr.N was planning to tell them once it gets 10 p.m. to be quiet. Luckily they got quiet at 9:50 p.m., but this is one of the cons of car camping. You never know your neighbors are loud or quiet. Of course there are pros: you can cook over the campfire, you can bring a lot of futon and comfy pillow, and as much as jackets. In contrast, in the remote backpacking, it WILL be extremely quiet, but can't be super luxury with nice pillow. 

Mother with fish

Mother giving baby fish

On the third day we paddled again. The highlight of the paddle was a loon and her baby. Although the body size of the baby is identical with mother, the fur color was still brown, which is baby color. The mom is sometimes dive into water and then she found fish. The baby was big enough to learn to dive into water but couldn't find any fish. Every time the baby got out of water, he just cried a lot. It sounded like he was whining to mother that he couldn't catch fish. Then mother with fish swam to baby and gave it to him. The baby looked like satisfied.