Early Winter on Tecumseh - 22/Nov/98
We were staying at a friend's house in VT after a party, and Sunday dawned clear
and cold, perfect early season hiking conditions. We were looking for one more
4000'er with a relatively short hike since we'd be getting on the trail late.
The only one that fit the bill was Tecumseh. After a fine breakfast of waffles and
strawberries, we hopped in the car and headed to Tripoli Road.
Only Tripoli Road was gated, it must have just happened that week cause it was
open the previous weekend. Oh well, we drove south on I-93 to NH 49 and headed
into the Waterville Valley ski area, to find the other side of the Tecumseh
trail. We had to stop in at the ski area and ask where the trail starts but
we found it easily, just 100 yards from the skier drop off spot. We didn't hit
the trail until 12:00, but it was only 2.2 miles, a beautiful day, and we had
lots of gear including headlamps, we'd be fine as long as we didn't get lost.
Only we did get lost. It seems that the trail was recently relocated and it's
not marked very well. We were following footprints in the 1" of snow and they
completely missed the stream crossing so we missed it as well. They followed
the old trail, then lost it, then they petered out, and we bushwacked up hill
until we found the old trail again, which dropped us off on a closed ski slope.
Along the way we hooked up with a father/daughter team, Joe and Sam from Bedford
NH (Hi guys!) who had the new map and trail description. With the help of a
hiker coming down we found where the trail heads back into the woods and we
vowed not to lose it again.
Yea! We didn't lose it again. The trail takes a pretty steady angle up, staying
to the east of the ski area. It passes very close to one lift but other than
that you don't get too distracted by the ski area. By now there was maybe 2" of
snow and a bit of ice. We met a group coming down, some in shorts (!), who made
the tracks that we followed. They told us to take the left hand loop to the
summit instead of the right hand loop. A short while later we met another
father/daughter pair stopped for a rest. As I said hi the father called me by
name and said that he'd read my trip reports on the web and recognized Brenda
and me. So much for
anonimity. The Sosman trail comes in from the top of the ski area about here,
then
we hit the loop junction just .3 miles from the summit.
Here we ate a Cliffbar and drank water, talking to the various groups going up
and down. The final push to the
summit is a little steeper, with some nice views
west towards Moosilauke. The
summit itself is wooded with some nice views to
the east and north, especially from a
small ledge just 20' to the north. Mt
Washington was brilliant, as were the Osceolas and Carrigain. After a lunch
that was shared with the Canadian Jays, we packed back up and
headed down. We
decided to take the Sosman trail, thinking it was a short distance to the ski
area. It's actually about .6 miles, taking you over a good sized bump with
views
back to the real summit
and north and west. The view here is slightly
better than that from the actual summit.
When we hit the ski area by a tower of some sort,
we were a bit worried about walking down the ski slopes.
The first part was on a closed trail, but we quickly were dumped out onto an
active slope, dodging the snowboarders while making practice
telemark turns on the manmade base. Actually, the skiing looked pretty good.
A ski patroller
headed our way, we thought to tell us to stay off the ski trails, but he
said we were fine and to have a great trip down. The rest of the journey was
on closed trails and we had fun with the boot skiing
and the views. We hooked back into the
trail near the chairlift we heard on the way up, this time following the
new
relocation. Back down at the stream crossing, which is about .3 miles up from
the trailhead, we built an obvious barrier so others wouldn't miss the turn.
Even with getting lost and playing on the ski slopes, we were back down in
about 4 hours. It's a nice hike, much better than I remembered from my trip
up from Tripoli Road. You have to deal with the sounds of a ski area in the
winter, but the walk in the woods is worth it. To get to the trailhead, drive
to the Waterville Valley Ski Area and park in the skier parking lot. The
trailhead is to the right of the ski area, 2 tenths of a mile from the drop
off area.
Back to White Mountains home page
