August 2021 Monthly Running Challenge

Seymour 7/30/21
I had booked a place to stay in Lake Placid for Thursday night through Sunday. New hiking friends and I talked about doing Marshall on Friday and the Lower Great Range on Sunday. Well, the best laid plans and all that, neither happened as planned – but two hikes got done! Both Friday and Sunday had rain in the forecast, but Saturday was looking beautiful. We switched plans to Seymour for Friday because of the rain and concern about a water crossing on Marshall. Two of the group backed out altogether though and I thought the whole thing was a bust. But friend of a friend wanted to go rain or shine so last minute we were back on. I woke up to thunder in the early morning but the mountain forecast was still saying only light rain early on and then clearing up. I was stocked with rain pants and jacket, and a backpack cover, this time in an attempt to not be as miserable as I was on Street & Nye. Hannah was a wonderful hiking companion and we forged out in the rain – which did not stop until we were well on the way down. The hike out is a long flat to gradual trek on the Blueberry trail for about 6 miles or so before you start to really get to elevation gain. We saw just a few people out there during the flatter part, some guys that had camped at the lean to and were hoping the rain would stop before they headed up (it didn’t), and some young guys who apparently slept up near the summit. And then it starts to get serious pretty fast. There are a lot of rock slabs that were very wet which was a challenge but nothing too scary. We saw some great mushrooms including a gorgeous purple one, and there was a beautiful waterfall. I incorrectly predicted that we had come to the last rock scramble at one point – no, there were a few more waiting. And a ton of mud. Near the top was a mud pit.
We finally made it to the summit at about 4 hours in. There was absolutely no view because of the clouds and rain, although it was only very lightly raining at that point. We hung our backpacks up on branches and changed out a layer to warm dry shirts at least, and had a snack. Then we headed back down. The trip down was challenging with the wet and mud – which had gotten noticeably worse throughout the day. Sections of the trail we hadn’t remembered as muddy definitely were now. It was slow going but we kept moving as well as we could. It finally stopped raining and the sun peeked out here and there, which felt wonderful. At the Ward Brook lean to we stopped at a picnic table and did another change of clothes and snack break. And used the privy, which is a mixed blessing. I took off my rain pants which were moderately successful in that my pants were mostly dry under there but they rain pants were clingy and felt like they were falling down much of the time. Not sure I loved those. Waterproof socks were also not fully successful, but the backpack cover was a godsend. The hike out from there was still over 5 miles and it felt very long. I slipped on some boards once and fell to my knees pretty hard, which left some good bruises. And I had another slip in the mud where I fell on my side in a comical slow motion way. Fortunately not hurting anything in that one. When we finally saw the parking lot it was the hugest relief. I took off the boots as fast as I could and gratefully changed into dry clothes. We spent 8 hours 50 minutes total. Hannah is a coffee lover so took me to Nori’s in Saranac Lake where I had the best tasting hot cinnamon vanilla latte, which was heaven on a unseasonably cool and rainy day at the end of July. Peak #33 done, and a new friend made. It was a great day, despite the somewhat miserable conditions.

Nippletop & Dial 7/31/21
Day two of my pre-booked weekend in Lake Placid. We knew the forecast for Sunday looked even worse than Friday for rain, while Saturday looked beautiful. So I decided I would attempt to do back-to-back hikes. I had a reservation for parking at AMR so Jenn and I aimed for Nippletop and Dial. Hannah considered but ultimately decided she wasn’t up for two in a row, which I can’t blame her for. I didn’t sleep as well as a I wanted but I woke up not feeling too stiff and sore. I did some yoga stretching and put on my dry trail shoes and chose from my overpacked selection of hiking clothes my capri hiking tights and layers on top. I was very happy to have brought an extra jacket and lots of socks and shirts.
We started off from the parking lot right at 7 am and headed up the Lake Road – making this my third trip up and down this road for hikes. This time we did not get on the Gil Brook scenic or easy route trails at the first intersection, although those are much nicer scenery we had just done them a few weeks ago and in the interest of saving time and energy we went with the road farther up to the cutoff trail. Once we got on the trail, it started to easy to moderately steep but I knew it definitely was going to get much steeper. We had some good therapy style conversation along the way which helped the time go quickly until we got to that steeper part, and then it was a fun climb up the scrambles. I really enjoyed this part of the hike – although it was relentlessly long! We kept thinking we had to be very near the summit. And then we would see there was something higher above us. When we came to the junction where we had to turn right to go to Nippletop we saw it was still .2 miles, but then we saw what looked like a whole separate mountain ahead and thought that surely couldn’t be it. But it was! It went surprisingly quickly though and suddenly we were at the (unmarked) summit. And the views were incredible. It was a gorgeous day, cool with vivid patches of blue sky among the clouds. We could see mountains everywhere as we looked over at the entire Great Range and mountains beyond in all directions. The colors of the sky and all the shades of mountains and shadows were just amazing. It was chilly up there so we sat down in a bit of valley between rocks and had some lunch. It was about 4 hours in (how are they all about 4 hours?) and were ready for a nice break. A group of two younger couples we had leapfrogged with along the trail arrived and we chatted for a bit and took each other’s photos. Then we said see you on Dial and headed back to the junction.
I think the sign said Dial was 1.9 miles from there, and we were about 6 hours in when we reached it. On the way there we ran into a solo hiker coming from the other direction playing music on his phone fairly loudly. He said hello and asked us how close to the junction he was and then asked if we had seen any bears. I thought he was making a joke but turns out he had seen a bear cub right on the trail coming up to Bear Den trail (appropriately I guess). It ran off and he didn’t see a mama bear, but he was clearly freaked out about it. And now we were a little bit concerned but hoped the bear had moved well out of the area by this time. But reaching the summit of Dial offered another just incredible view on this perfect day. The couples were there again and we all lounged on the big rock for a while and chatted while fueling up some more and taking many photos. Truly a place to just marvel at what you’ve done and the reward of the climb.
At this point in the hike I was starting to feel the effects of two difficult hikes, the fall I had taken, and a new injury when I jammed my left knee into a point branch on the way up Nippletop. My knee hurt going down and my back was also feeling very tight and starting to twinge when I stepped certain ways. I took some Aleve on the way to Dial so I hoped that would kick in, and just kept moving. The hike out was tougher than we expected though. I didn’t anticipate going up Bear’s Den adding so much additional elevation, and then some other nameless peak after that. And then it was a pretty steep trail on the descent after that. Meenu had told me how the great thing about Dial was how much shorter the hike out on Lake Road was, but I neglected to study up on the fact that it was not a short or easy hike down before you get to that point. I was really slowing Jenn down, which I felt bad about, so I tried to just keep going as fast as I could and tried to keep from irritating my back by taking shorter strides. The steep trail made it hard. Finally we reached a more gradual section and I really tried to pick up the pace. Then we saw the Lake Road and I was so relieved. As an extra bonus there was a deer and her fawn right there and they did not seem concerned with us at all, even though we were quite close.
We hit the road and I was able to kick it up a notch, with the even surface making it less stressful on my back, and I knew it was .7 miles to the gate and another .8 miles to the car. We talked about food and anything we could think of for distraction and were so excited to see the gate and sign out of the log book. We were fast enough on this route out for Garmin to tell me I had a Lake Road PR. Finally to the car at 9 hours and 45 minutes total. I was expecting 10 hours or more, so this was a relief. As was changing into my recovery sandals (dry feet this time though thank goodness – and I really liked my trail shoes for this hike). It was an awesome day with perfect weather and it felt like an incredible accomplishment to finish peaks 34 and 35. Not having to drive back to Syracuse and not having to hike again the next day also felt amazing.

Seymour mountain - rainy day, no view


Nippletop mountain - gorgeous day, gorgeous view


Dial mountain - same gorgeous day, another incredible view