This past Saturday we hiked Flume and Liberty mountains on Franconia Ridge. 6:30 in the morning we started out and went up the Flume Slide Trail which was incredibly steep for the last half mile or mile. Lots of leaves on the ground and a little slippery in some areas. It was a stiff climb. Thankfully we were doing a lollipop hike and not coming down that way.
It was warm out for this time of year but not horrendous. Just unusual as 2 years ago on the same weekend we had frost and some snow up on Lincoln and Lafayette.
The foliage was probably past peak as I guess it happened earlier due to dry conditions. It was still beautiful out but the colors were more muted and mostly brown and yellow.
Flume has some incredible views and when we got to Liberty we hung out for probably an hour and had some snacks and a beverage.
Down the Liberty Spring Trail and back to the car. It was a lot of people on top of Liberty but we managed to get a boulder to sit on facing One Direction and there was crystal clear views. I think a lot of people were coming up Liberty spring Trail. As I could understand because The Flume Slide Trail was mega steep and people are looking for the easier way.
if I did it again I'd probably come with the Liberty Spring Trail go over to Flume and just double back.
Anyway it was a good trip. Friday night when we got into New Hampshire we did a short 15 minute climb over byoArtists Bluff. However seeing all the people on Artists Bluff we broke left on the trail and went up BaldMountain which had less people. We could see from the road there was a thousand people up on artist Bluff and we caught the sunset up there on Bald Mountain. It's a nothing climb but good enough for a beverage and sunset when you've driven all the way from New Jersey.
In August I climbed the Bigelows in Maine which was a great trip and had incredible weather and views of Flagstaff Lake. Labor Day weekend we climbed Camel's Hump and finished our Vermont 5.
Being a family man is hard for me to get out that often, but I'm trying....