I checked with Jacob in the Spring to see if he wanted to go to NH this year and he was incredulous that I even had to ask. He wants to keep the quest to finish the 4000 footers going. I was very happy to hear that summer trips to NH have just become part of his life and he looks forward to them. He’s going to be 20 years old in a couple months, finished his first year at UVA, and has a wonderful girlfriend Addy. She will be joining us next week when she comes up with Jennifer and Ana Sofia.

The weather was looking like it could be wet so we planned on tackling Owl’s Head thinking that it would be a long boring hike in woods. It is the longest day hike for the 4000 footers and doesn’t get much of a mention. It barely qualifies at 4005’ with a 8 mile hike in followed by a 1 mile scramble up an unofficial trail whose first part is 0.3 mile and 850ft straight up a rock slide.

I was not looking forward to this and was a little anxious. At 18 miles round trip, that’s a challenge to just walk, never mind through the woods on uneven terrain, ascending, descending, wet roots and rocks, traversing streams, and a scramble hands and feet up a rock slide. A serious injury that far in the woods would be a very long wait for help. There was also the worry of thunderstorms that can be dangerous, but we were not going to be above treeline and so we would probably only get soaking wet. We were carrying rain gear so we could toughen out rain, but if you are going to have a long wet hike you might as well do it on a hike that doesn’t have much for views.

It turned out that this hike was very enjoyable. Not only did the weather cooperate, with mild temperatures, but there wasn’t any thunderstorms until after we were off the trail. It was a long walk in the woods with a chance to have great conversations with Jacob. A beautiful view of Black Pond and a comforting hike along rivers the entire way. This was the first time we did a “bushwhack”, but in reality they were pretty much established trails. We were both sore after the 17 miles and 8.5 hours on the hike. It would be an entire day for me to recover with very sore ankles and calves.

We took a look at the mountains we have left on the list after Owl’s Head and plan on doing North and South Kinsman this year with his girlfriend Addy to complete 35. That leaves 13 with 2 more day hikes and 2 peaks next year, followed by 2 day hikes and 3 peaks after his Junior year. That will leave 8 peaks to finish after his Senior year and we have it planned out as a single 3 day 2 hut night trip across the Presidential Range. An epic conclusion to our quest finishing with the highest mountains in the northeast.

The standard route to Owl’s Head peak is Lincoln Woods Tr to Franconia Brook Tr to Lincoln Brook Tr to Owl’s Head Path. This is 18.2 mile round trip. We saw that you can cut off a mile each direction by taking the Black Pond Tr which removes the Franconia Brook Tr segment from traditional route. By taking the Black Pond Tr to Black Pond, you must then continue on an unmaintained trail called a “bushwhack” past Black Pond that brings you onto the Lincoln Brook Tr. This “bushwhack” may not be maintained, but it is so well travelled that following it was pretty easy.

We decided that with such a long hike we’d try to keep our loads light for a day hike. We brought lunch and plenty of munchies, but I also carried a change of shirts and rain gear for both of us. I had a spare battery for phone, knife, and medical kit. Still ended up carrying too much food as a big breakfast keeps you well fueled. This trip I decided to bring a water filter and carry just 3 48 oz bottles of Gatorade. We were well hydrated starting the trip and being in the woods with cloud cover in low 70’s we didn’t really sweat much until the strenuous rock slide prior to peak. We didn’t need to filter water until we returned from the peak and lunched beside the Franconia Brook around noon. We filtered two 48oz bottles and that was plenty to get us to end of hike. Not sure we would even need the filter on future hikes unless it was going to be hot out. If you are well hydrated, 64 oz of water each will take you a long way unless you were above treeline in very hot weather.

I got up at 3:50 am and drove from Dad’s over to Beth’s to pick up Jacob. I brought him back to Dad’s around 4:20am. We cooked up some very hearty egg, Canadian bacon, cheese sandwches. I had coffee and Jacob drank water. We also packed up bread, ham, salami, cheese for lunch and a small tupperware and plastic knife for mayo. The rest of food was Raisinets, trail mix, energy bars, and a couple apples.

We left the house at 5 am for the 35 minute drive to the Lincoln Woods Trailhead parking lot. It is a large parking lot as it gets many tourists walking the Lincoln Woods Tr up to Franconia Falls. The parking lot is about 8 miles from I-93 just outside Lincoln on the Kancamagus Hwy (rte 112). It is adjacent to the East branch of the Pemigewasset River. Surprisingly there were probably 20 cars in the parking lot at 5:40am. Many were likely overnighters camping up in the many campsites deep in the White Mtn National Forest. This parking lot required a $5 fee to be paid into a lock box. There was no cell service in the parking lot and we wouldn’t have any cell service except for a brief moment when climbing the rock slide to the Owl’s Head peak.

I tried to start my All Trails app with the route for the hike we had planned, but found out that with no cell service it wouldn’t load properly, even though I had previously downloaded it. That is a really bad design unless I was doing something wrong. I had a backup with the Gaia app and started that app for our hike. I also started by Apple Watch activity for a hike. This would be the first time we used GPS for a hike instead of just following a map. I will say that it did come in handy a couple of time on the bushwhack just to make sure we were heading in the right direction.

We started the hike at 5:55 am and the trail immediately crosses the East Pemigewasset River. The trail was flat and nicely maintained. We would see a warning sign that said a brook crossing at 1.8 miles had a bridge that was under repair and that you would need to traverse the brook. I was a concerned that this could be an issue with us getting our feet wet with the rains the previous night but when we got there it wasn’t much of a brook. We were both waking up and it was cool and quiet out. Jacob put his headphones on and I just enjoyed the solitude of walking in the woods.

After 25 minutes and 1.3 mi we came to the Osseo Tr intersection.

Another 1.2 mi and 12 minutes would get us to the Black Pond Tr. Along the way we traversed around the bridge under repair. 2.5 miles on the hike and 6:42 am, this was seeming too easy!

Another 20 minutes and 0.8 miles and we would be at Black Pond at 7:02 am. We hung out there for 10 minutes enjoying the view. It was magical at that time in the morning. The only thing missing was a moose along the shore of the pond.

We continued past Black Pond on the bushwhack called Black Pond cutoff. It was pretty well travelled and easy to follow, a little bit of up and down and slippery footing on rocks and roots. Plenty of trees to hold onto. I looked at the Gaia app a couple of time and the GPS navigation on it said we were right on the trail. After 0.7 mile walk in the woods we intersected with the Lincoln Brook Tr. at 7:40 am and had travelled about 4.2 mi.

At 5 miles and 7:55 am we came across a huge boulder in the Lincoln Brook. We took some pictures. We were 1.5 miles from the intersection of the Brutus Bushwhack, but we would miss that intersection somehow. The hike up to Owl’s Head path was really nice. Trail was easy with a few water crossings posing a little challenge. I slipped off one rock and my foot went in river. Damn!

At 6.4 miles at 8:40 am and 2:45 into hike we crossed a brook just before the Brutus Bushwhack, we would have lunch here on the way down. Tough little crossing and I scoped out multiple ways to get across. Made it without falling in this time. At 7 miles and 8:56 am we came to the cairn marking the Owl’s Head path to summit the peak. We had been hiking for 3:01, it was a nice hike up and we both felt good. We took a break to hydrate and eat an apple (didn’t want to carry them up the mountain) and we started up the rock slide at 9:07 am. My Apple Watch said we had gained 1450ft elevation since the start of the hike.

10 minutes into the hike up the slide and I was drenched in sweat. My heart rate was at a steady 135 bpm. You needed both hands to help with the climb and making sure you had a solid foothold was imperative. Rocks would tumble down. At 9:38 am and 3:48 into the hike, my watch said we had just gained 850ft in 30 minutes. I was breathing heavy as we came to the large boulder that marked the intersection with the Brutus Bushwhack that we would take down. There is no way I would want to go back down that slide. If I had to, it would be on my butt. Yes that is a picture of a snake Jacob saw on the way up. I assume it was a garter snake, he saw a whole nest of six. Just past the rock/cairn marking the Brutus bushwhack we came across a hiker coming down, it was 9:52 am. It was the first person we had seen the entire hike and I think we were both surprised to see each other. The only reason to be up this trail is to peak bag the 48 4000 footers as there is no view at the top and trail dead ends.

The last 0.3 mi meandered through the woods and at 10:11 am, 8.37 mi on the Apple watch and 4:16 into the hike we had reached the top of Owl’s Head at 4005’. It was our 33rd of 48 peaks to climb.

I was relieved to have made it to the top without any falls and feeling pretty good. All I had to do was make it back down to the Lincoln Brook Tr. and I was home free worrying about injury. We had some water and ate a snack. There was no view, just hanging out in the woods. As I stared around, I noticed something on the ground about 30 ft away that didn’t look normal. I walked over and it was a pair of folded shorts and rolled up belt. Perplexed I kicked them thinking they had been left by someone who had soiled them and didn’t want to bring them back down. They seemed to be fine though wet. Picking them up and checking the pockets revealed a NH driver’s license, Amazon credit card, and a medical ID card for an aortic implant. I have no idea how Gary ended up leaving his pants up here and we made jokes about why he may have taken them off and why he wouldn’t have put them back on. I was able to find a number for Gary’s son and contact him. It turn’s out he had hiked up there 5 days prior to us and changed his shorts in the woods because a woman he didn’t know was also up there. About half way down Brutus he realized he had left them up there but kept going because he didn’t realize his ID and CC were in them. He drove up to Campton from Derry and picked up his stuff.

At 10:27, after a 15 minute break at the peak, we started back down. It would take an hour to get down to the Lincoln Brook Tr. The watch said 11:30 am and 10.14 mi into hike. It would take us another 3 hours to get back to the parking lot. We took the Brutus bushwhack down to the Lincoln Brook Tr in order to avoid the very steep rock slide. Just below the junction with Lincoln Brook Tr we stopped at Lincoln Brook and had lunch. It was a great spot. I went ahead a filtered two 48 oz bottles of water. The first we had filtered. We ended up drinking it all.

In another hour after lunch at 12:42pm we made it to the Black Pond cutoff intersection with 12.43 mi on watch. We were at Black Pond at 1:15pm and 13.25 mi on watch. We would get back to the Lincoln Woods Tr at 1:37pm 7:46 into the hike and 14.3 mi on watch. We got to the parking lot at 2:30 pm for a total of 8:35 and 16.6 miles. My watch said 35,000 steps!

Had some good conversations with Jacob. He’s maturing quite a bit and is a grown man. Somehow we got talking about physics and I mentioned that I couldn’t figure out what I had seen in a book about Mars being 1/2 the diameter of Earth and .71 the density and had 1/11th the mass. I was doing calculation of pi*r^2 to get Mars at 1/4 the volume and multiplying by .71 did not get 1/11 of Earth mass. He corrected the old man as volume is 4/3*pi*r^3….I was using formula for area instead of volume. A senior moment. So Mars at 1/2 the diameter and thus 1/2 the radius is 1/8 the volume. Take .125 * .71 =0.08875 which is much closer to the known mass of Mars being near 1/11th (0.09) that of Earth.

This time at the end of the hike, instead of Jacob passing out from exhaustion, he offered to drive me home. My how things change. I was happy to have him drive. We would stop at Chesley’s in Campton and pick up some beer and say Hi to Wayne. We got home about 3:45 and Gramp was home with his Fried Dough stand in the front yard. He was prepping it for a festival the next day. We sat on the new front porch of his home and had a great conversation with 3 generations of Chesley men, drinking some beers! It was a good day. A heavy thunderstorm and downpour hit around 5pm and we were glad we were not on the mountain. We decided to keep the day going by heading up to Gramps favorite Asian restaurant in Woodstock, the Imperial Palace. Yes, he and I got a Mai Thai and Jacob would drive us home after dinner and ice cream across the street. It was a guys dinner but we brought home takeout for the girls. Lauren, Ariela, and Madison where at Beth’s taking care of Henley.