| Hiking Trail Conditions Report |
 | Peaks |
Mt. Whiteface, NH |
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 | Trails: |
Flat Mountain Pond Trail, McCrillis Trail, Rollins Trail, Blueberry Ledge Trail, McCrillis Path, bushwhack, road walk |
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 | Date of Hike: |
Thursday, August 4, 2016 |
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 | Parking/Access Road Notes: |
Plenty of parking at the trailhead for the eastern end of the Flat Mountain Pond Trail, off of Whiteface Intervale Road. |
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 | Surface Conditions: |
Dry Trail |
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 | Recommended Equipment: |
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 | Water Crossing Notes: |
Water crossings are not an issue, especially the Whiteface River crossing -- water levels are pretty low right now with the drought. |
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 | Trail Maintenance Notes: |
Even for a wilderness route with standards for a narrower corridor, some sections of the McCrillis Trail could use a bit of brushing. A few chest-high blowdowns on this trail require a few minutes of picking through slash to bushwhack around. On McCrillis Path about 0.5 miles from intersection with Blueberry Ledge Trail, one recent chest-high duck under blowdown, about 12-14 inches in diameter. All other sections of other trails are in very good shape. |
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 | Dog-Related Notes: |
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 | Bugs: |
A few deer flies on Flat Mountain Pond Trail, and a few eye flies here and there at lower elevations. Otherwise, bugs weren't too bad. |
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 | Lost and Found: |
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 | Comments: |
We had wanted to do this loop (with a quick tag of the Mt. Whiteface summit) for a while now. McCrillis Trail is really nice -- rough, very steep in some sections, and quiet. The first section (off of the Flat Mountain Pond Trail), where the trail twists and turns a bit, is blazed relatively frequently. After that, once the corridor straightens a bit, blazes disappear all the way until the ledges near the summit.
We did something boneheaded toward the end of the day, on the last leg of the hike, on the McCrillis Path. This trail is such a fine way to end the day -- soft footing, wide corridor, beautiful. We were tired, too, and not paying attention: we missed the recent re-route/right-hand turn that takes the trail off of the section that was closed a number of years ago. The result was that we continued on that old section of trail, which was less than pleasant (including one swathe of about 50 yards of 10-foot tall raspberry canes). By the time we confirmed we had missed a turn, we could see off in the distance a dirt road, so we headed for that rather than re-trace steps and use the new section of trail.
We lucked out. The dirt road meandered downhill to a Class VI road and eventually connected with the last section of the re-routed trail, and then back to the parking area. It's a pleasant walk past some nice farmland and old houses -- it almost made us forget the nightmare of the Attack of the Raspberry Canes.
Overall, great day out -- we saw very few people out and almost all were headed up on the Blueberry Ledge Trail while we were headed down. |
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 | Name: |
Pancks and Tesco Heaney |
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 | E-Mail: |
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| Date Submitted: |
2016-08-05 |
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 | Link: |
 https:// |
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Disclaimer: Reports are not verified - conditions may vary. Use at own risk. Always be prepared when hiking. Observe all signs. Trail conditions reports are not substitutes for weather reports or common sense. |
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