| Hiking Trail Conditions Report |
 | Peaks |
Mount Cilley - Northwest Peak, Grandview Mountain, Grandview Mountain - East Peak, Mount Cilley, NH |
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 | Trails: |
Snowmobile trail, bushwhack, Mount Cilley Road |
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 | Date of Hike: |
Sunday, January 16, 2022 |
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 | Parking/Access Road Notes: |
We parked at a plowed parking area at the start of Elbow Pond Rd. Accessible for any car. Route 118 was its usual fun, bumpy, frost heavee self. |
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 | Surface Conditions: |
Snow - Packed Powder/Loose Granular, Snow - Unpacked Powder, Snow/Ice - Frozen Granular |
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 | Recommended Equipment: |
Snowshoes |
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 | Water Crossing Notes: |
Beaver Brook was totally frozen and had pretty cool ice flows actually. Nothing at all of significance. |
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 | Trail Maintenance Notes: |
I don’t recall any blowdowns on the snowmobile trails/roads. |
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 | Dog-Related Notes: |
Sure, if you trust them to stay with you while bushwhacking. We actually saw a few on our way out: a couple people were out walking their dogs. |
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 | Bugs: |
None |
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 | Lost and Found: |
None |
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 | Comments: |
Day 77, Peaks 68, 69, and 70. Started in below zero temps just shy of 9am and finished at 2:45pm in the low 20s. Bright and sunny with minimal wind.
We walked up the snowmobile trail that leads you to Elbow Pond for about 1mi before turning left onto the snowmobile trail that connects Elbow Pond to Mount Cilley Rd. This road climbed gently to near the HOL between Cilley and NW Cilley, following just to the left (west) of a drainage. Both of these roads were trafficked but the road to Elbow Pond was more so. Shortly before the HOL, we took a left into the woods and began our bushwhack NW to NW Cilley. The contour lines looked pretty close together and like there could even be a cliff band, but the grade wasn’t that bad and the woods were open. The jar was not where we thought it would be but we found it soon enough without too much looking.
Rather than retrace our steps, we decided to save some mileage and headed just north of east off the summit back to the snowmobile trail. We went through some thicker stuff at first and then through some again as we neared the road. Nothing too bad. Some steep grades again. We hit the road and followed it to Mount Cilley Rd, another snowmobile trail. On Gaia, it shows this road splitting maybe a half mile before reaching Mount Cilley Rd (but not actually connecting to it). Meant to take the right (eastern) branch as that would’ve saved distance but we didn’t notice it. It may not have been there or perhaps it just wasn’t traveled or we weren’t paying attention. In any case, we soon reached Mount Cilley Rd and turned right (east) to follow it toward Grandview. Note that Gaia did not quite have us on the road but very close to it. Same with my friends’ GPS watch so it seems that GPS’ are just wrong here.
We followed Mt Cilley Rd east for about a mile before coming to a jct with another snowmobile trail that seemed to lead north (not shown on Gaia). It may have been slightly easier to start our whack to Grandview here but instead we followed the road for maybe another 0.25mi before jumping into the woods and whacking NE to the peak. Woods were sometimes a little tight but not bad. After signing into Grandview, we dropped into the col and visited east peak. I guess there’s two reasons to do this: 1) the fire tower list and 2) just in case east peak is actually higher than the main peak, might as well stand on both. The eastern peak has some ledges to avoid. We came off it by ending up just south of the col, nearly following our track up, then shooting south to the road.
The hope was that we’d come out near where I was hoping a road shown on Gaia as “National Forest Road Mt Cilley Spur B†would be as Gaia shows it not connecting to anything in the middle of nowhere but headed toward where we were and that we could take that to get closer to Cilley and not bushwhack quite as long. But since there was no guarantee that this road actually connected with Mt Cilley Rd and we didn’t know where it would connect if it did, we opted to just cross Mt Cilley Rd when we came to it and start whacking toward Cilley. We headed south until we crossed Beaver Brook (frozen), then more SW, generally slabbing up the mountain (we were west of the NE ridge), then, when we got close, whacked due south up to the eastern end of the ridge. If I were to do this again, I’d probably just follow the NE ridge. Looked like nice hardwoods. On this side of the ridge we were in the softwoods. They didn’t get thick like I was afraid of, but it would seem more straightforward to me to just follow the ridge.
We touched the high point on this side of the ridge, then followed it west to the true high point. Interesting mix of woods along this narrow ridge. Thicker stuff on the eastern end of it where we came up, then wide open woods as we moved west. We came to the highpoint after about 1/3mi which was actually on the southern end of the highest contour. We signed in, then headed west off the ridge. There’s another small bump you’ve got to go over on the end of this ridge and we foolishly went around it to the south rather than over it which was a bit tricky with a sidehill and all. Once off of it, it was quick and smooth sailing down to the northern end of Elbow Pond. The grade was occasionally steep on the way down but still very quick and through open woods. We enjoyed the views toward the pond on the way down. It was a treat to actually visit the shore of the pond at the end of the day too. We passed a refrigerator as we neared it and spotted a snowman someone made on the pond. It was a pretty awesome snowman and definitely one of the highlights of the day :)
A little over a mile out from the pond to the car. A group of three practicing their shooting next to the parking area when we returned. Gaia had us at about 8.5mi with 1700ft of gain bud tends to underestimate both of those. Took us 6hrs. This was my first time using snowshoes this year and they stayed on my feet the entire hike. Snow depth in this area even at lower elevation is much deeper than the other places I’ve been hiking I guess! Snow depth still isn’t ideal for snowshoes and with my larger snowshoes I was getting caught in branches and scraping the crampons on rock often enough but the snow was deep enough that if I’m not sure I would’ve been doing this hike without them. One spot coming off Cilley where the powder actually felt deep (over a foot).
288 more days and 295 more peaks to go… |
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 | Name: |
Liam Cooney |
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 | E-Mail: |
liamcooney96@gmail.com |
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| Date Submitted: |
2022-01-17 |
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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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