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| View from Mt. Tremont |
Many of my bird friends spent the last three days on Block Island birding. I was supposed to go, but I have so badly wanted to go hiking that I went to New Hampshire instead. The temps in NH were going to be around seventy five degrees with no chance of rain. Around home, I have noticed the leaves quietly changing color earlier than normal. I had a feeling that there could be some pretty foliage up north. Warm weather and pretty colors were too good to pass up. The mountains were calling. I drove up Wednesday night and got a campsite at dark. In the middle of the night I got woken up by a Saw Whet Owl singing. I've been woken by Barred Owls many times, and a Screech at least once. Saw Whet was a new one for me,
I woke up early on Thursday and headed to the Mt. Tremont Trail. My plan was to do Tremont in the morning and then take pics the rest of the day. Though only about 3300 feet, Tremont is pretty tough mountain. The trail is 2.8 miles each way with over 2500 feet of elevation gain. That is more elevation than some of the four thousand footers I have done. None the less, with a nice early start I hoped to be done around 1 pm and still spend a couple hours on top. The trail was tougher than expected and I got to the top over thirty minutes later than expected.
The sky was hazy so there wasn't much point in taking photos of the view with the sky in the background. Still, it was beautiful. I could look right down on Sawyer and Little Sawyer Ponds. To the left was Church Pond where Laurie and I famously fell asleep on a picnic table sized rock Most of the view was into the wilderness. The trees had turned color as I hoped. I dare say, they are peak right now. They were just gorgeous.
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| Green Cliff, Sawyer Pond, and Little Sawyer to the right |
With shaking knees and aching ankles I made it down at 2 pm instead of the 1 pm as I hoped. Still, there was plenty of daylight. I went up to Crawford Notch and got photos. Just as I am attracted to boobs, I am drawn to red leaves. Everywhere that I saw a bright red leaf, clump of leaves, or a red tree, I felt the need to photograph it. This could possibly have lead to my delay getting down the mountain, but my knees would tell you otherwise. I spent the rest of the day taking photos of leaves, ponds, and tree lines. Not so much of mountains because of the hazy sky behind them. Near dark I went back to camp. Never was I so happy it was dark by 7:30. I was asleep by 8 pm.
I got up while it was still dark for a thirty minute ride to Pondicherry. This place is a National Wildlife Refuge. It also happens to be the last place I had seen a moose in NH. I got to the refuge just as it was light enough to walk without a headlamp. I bee lined it to Big Cherry Pond, hoping if a moose were feeding in the water during the night they would still be there. It ended up being foggy so I couldn't see the entire shoreline. However, it was pin-drop quiet and if a moose would have been feeding, I probably would have heard it.
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| Sunrise over Cherry Pond |
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| Right before sunrise |
I went to Little Cherry Pond hoping a moose might be there. I stopped for the sunrise as I was walking over the west shoreline of Big Cherry. When I got to Little Cherry, there was a guy there along with a swimming beaver. The guy was cool and he filled me in on what he had seen so far (no moose). After talking to him I went birding. I had already spooked two Ruffed Grouse on my hike toward the ponds. At this point the songbirds had woken up. They were everywhere in the woods. I saw tons of Ruby Crowned Kinglets and White Throated Sparrows. I also saw a Black Throated Green Warbler, Hairy Woodpecker, White Crowned Sparrows, Brown Creeper and a Winter Wren. There were so many birds, all moving very quickly, I'm sure I missed many more species.
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| A guy looking for animals at Little Cherry Pond |
As I was coming out of the woods and back onto the railroad track a small black movement caught my eye, it was a bear cub! It was crossing the tracks far in front of me but I had my binoculars. I only saw it for a few seconds as it was crossing the tracks. On the other side of it was a guy wheeling a canoe down to the lake. I asked him if he saw the cub. Not only did he say yes, but he said it swam across the lake and came out on this side. If I would have spent five minutes less birding, I could have watched this adorable little bear swim across the lake and get photos! Rats!
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| The guy that saw the cub out in his canoe. My favorite photo of my trip. I like how the out of focus leaves frame him. |
After seeing the bear, I walked back around the lake and ending up having a pretty cool wildlife encounter of my own. A Northern Harrier was circling the lake looking for songbirds in the bushes. It passed by me at least five times, but it was always in bad light. I was disappointed my photos were going to suck, but after downloading them, they are better than expected.
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| Northern Narrier |
I walked out of the ponds and back to my car birding along the way. I saw a Red Squirrel and a Pileated Woodpecker. Despite hearing Nuthatches for hours all morning, I never actually saw one. After I got in my car, I drove back to my tent site where I broke camp. I stopped at the Mountain Wanderer book store where I talked to owner/author Steve Smith. I bought a shirt and headed home. I am far too sore to do any afternoon hiking.
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| Wood Duck. Cropped a ton. |
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| Out of focus Pileated Woodpecker |
All in all, I needed this trip. It had been far too long since I've done a hike. My legs are burning, both my quads and hamstrings. I'm walking bowlegged and using the hand rail to walk up and (especially) down my four steps at home. And you know what? I'm okay with that. I needed to climb a mountain and look down into a valley. I needed to sweat my ass off and wonder "how much further?" I was happy to sit on top of a peak with no place I'd rather be.
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| Red Squirrel |
Because of my new-found enjoyment for learning more of my cameras features, here are some more photos of things I saw from my trip below.
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| Toad |
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| Moose Poop |
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| Pine Cones |
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| Some orange leaves for a change |
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| Washington was in the clouds and the sky was hazy anyway, so I shot the motel with the mountain as the background but below the skyline |
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| Yellow Rumped Warbler |
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| This is a new fishing platform on Profile Lake at Franconia Notch. It is very nice. The problem is Profile is a fly fishing only lake. I don't know if it is a good idea for three or four guys fly fishing side by side. Also, a non-fisherman can walk up to it. They could easily take a hook to the head by a fly fisherman's backcast. |
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