Hogback Mountain Bushwhack

Thursday, March 1st, Randy and I met up with hiking friend Kathy and 2 guys from the Schenectady ADK Chapter (Walt the hike master and Norm) to bushwhack up to Hogback Mountain. This is a 2400 foot summit but our climb was only about 1500 feet. We started from the Irving Pond trail head and left the trail almost immediately. What a great snowshoeing day! The sun was shining, it was about 30 degrees and the snow was about 2 feet deep. We started about 9am and climbed up a small hill before easing down the other side and heading up Hogback. By the time we were halfway up, I stripped down to my silk long john shirt and tee. We made it to the top about noon and had a nice lunch and took a group photo. We hiked down across the top of the ridge, following the contours down toward Irving Pond. We picked up the snow machine trail at the pond, just groomed and took off our snow shoes. The groomed trail was firm enough for us to walk on without the snow shoes. We got back to the trail head about 2pm. Overall, about 4 hours of snow shoeing and much better than using a stairmaster.

I'm really getting into the planning for this years' hiking. The general plan is do finish up the NPT in May or June, do some sort of 7 - 10 day loop thru the Siamese Ponds Wilderness area, then the Long Trail in August. I'm also on tap for a 4H hike project, 1 afternoon only, in April as well as a 2 day survival course the last Saturday in April and 1st Saturday in May. My 4H club also wants to continue the hiking project so I should be planning out a series of classroom instruction and hiking for that too. I'm so excited!