Snow, Rain, Snow … Ski, Hike, Ski

PHOTO: This wintery scene was the first Sunday in December. Bria and Charlie cross country skiing in Franconia Notch beneath Cannon Cliff. Think Snow and Merry Christmas.

by Amy Patenaude
Outdoor/Ski Writer

“If you don’t like the weather in New England now, just wait a few minutes”
–Mark Twain

I am pretty sure Mark Twain wasn’t a skier and he wasn’t wishing for snow. But his famous quote sums up how I am feeling about the weather the past couple of weeks. I know it is normal, or it has been this way for as long as I can remember–Snow, Rain, Snow in December.
Mother Nature had decorated the mountains with some snow and it was pretty and it felt like winter. During the cold nights the ski areas turned on their snow making guns full blast and covered their trails with more snow. The ski areas opened up and continued to make more snow.
Then we had a warm-up and I skied in the rain. Yes, I skied in the rain and you know what, I wasn’t the only one. Lots of other people love skiing and snowboarding enough to put on their raincoats and brave the elements. The conditions were good and the corn snow was nice and soft for making good turns.
Thankfully it only rained in the morning and then we went back to more winter-like conditions.

As I sit here typing away the forecast for the weekend is more snow. I have my fingers crossed for a big storm. We all want the best snow conditions for Christmas week.
Zachary and I took advantage of one of the warmer days last week to go hiking. We spotted a car at Mt. Langdon Trailhead in Bartlett and then drove up to the bottom of Crawford Notch to the Davis Path trailhead.
Our goal was to visit four peaks on the 52 with a view list.

There was just one other car in the Davis Path lot. The temperature was above freezing but the nights have been cold. We knew we would find plenty of snow and ice along the way.
I wore my boots with the carbide spikes in the treads and Zachary put on a pair of “rock” micro-spikes, a pair of spikes already dulled from walking on bare rocks. Ice surrounded the tops of bare rocks in the trail.
As we headed up the trail I joked about how easy it is to miss the spur path up to the summit of Mt. Crawford and I had once turned back some people who were looking for it. About a mile later I turned around and pointed and Zachary looked. Yikes, we were looking back at Mt. Crawford! We were concentrating so hard on stepping carefully that we walked right past the spur path.
We turned back and found the path and it wasn’t easy making our way up the ice covered steep granite slabs to Mt Crawford. We enjoyed big views all the way to Mt.Washington. We could see our next destination, the big steps of Stairs Mountain.

Up the Davis path all the way to Stairs Mountain it was more of the same ice and bare rock with some snow in low areas. After taking in the view we headed back down the Davis Path to the Mt. Parker Trail intersection.
Soon we were on top of Mt. Resolution and enjoyed more big mountain views. The trail doesn’t go over the true highpoint so we bushwhacked about a tenth of a mile through some thick brush and trees to find it. There is a neat gravely area with fine views of the Stairs Mountain cliff.
Next up we walked over Mount Parker and from its open summit we had a good view of Attitash’s ski trails that looked like white ribbons down the mountain.
Zachary got his peaks for December and I guess I did too. Both of us want to return to these peaks this winter and hopefully we’ll be on snowshoes.
Have fun.