This was the first 4000 footer that we climbed and decided to get in another peak on the same hike by making a side trip over to E. Osceola assuming we were not too wore out after getting to the top of Osceola. It was Wed. Aug 6, 2014, a very nice day, partly sunny, good visibility with some haze, and about 70 degrees at the trailhead falling to low 50’s at the top of mountain. This trail had a lot of large rocks on the trail and so we found ourselves hopping from one rock to the other for much of the trail. We took the Mt. Osceola trail from Tripoli Rd. (in Waterville Valley). I carried all of the water because I wasn’t sure how well Jacob was going to do (he was 11). Turned out he was fine and would carry his own water for future hikes. I was the one that wasn’t as well prepared because I had only brought some old cross training sneakers with me to hike in. They are normally fine for something like Morgan, but don’t have the needed support for all of the rock stepping.

The Osceola trailhead

It took us 1:40 to summit Mt. Osceola, starting at 10:45am and reaching top at 12:25pm. There was one other woman at the top who we chatted with and she took pictures for us. We had great views of Tecumseh, the Sandwich range, and the Tripyramids, as well as many peaks we couldn’t name. We had some lunch at the top and I shared the Ahi tuna I had caught that past summer with the woman we met at the top, she was very excited about eating fresh tuna on the top of a mountain.

Mt. Osceola peak looking N.E.

We were joined by an older group of gentleman who came over from E. Osceola. They told us about the steep chimney we would need to navigate to get to E. Osceola. The weren’t kidding, it was the steepest thing I had seen yet on a hiking trail, thank goodness it wasn’t that long. We left the top of Osceola and headed to E. Osceola.

The chimney between Osceola and E. Osceola

Mt. East Osceola peak

It took us 45 min to get to E. Osceola and while the peak was actually in the woods, the woman we had met on Osceola had left us a message in the dirt of the trail bidding us a good day and pointing out the cairn marking the peak of E. Osceola. We turned right back around and went back to Osceola. Back at Osceola we lingered for 10 minutes and I couldn’t help but notice the 2 young college girls doing downward dog yoga pose will all the mountains in the background.

Panorama view on Osceola

It took us 1:30 to get back to the trailhead from the Osceola peak. We high fived the completion of our first 4000 footer and he couldn’t wait to plan the next one.