Hiking in the White Mountains: Cannon Mountain

Showing posts with label Cannon Mountain. Show all posts

MMD 2024 Franconia Notch

8/11/24

Old Bridle Path & Greenleaf Trail: 4.0 miles / Franconia Ridge Trail: 3.5 miles / Liberty Spring Trail: 2.3 miles / Flume Slide Trail: 3.3 miles / Franconia Ridge Trail: 3.3 miles / Falling Waters Trail: 3.2 miles / Lonesome Lake Trail: 1.4 miles / Fishin’ Jimmy Trail: 2.0 miles / Kinsman Ridge Trail: 4.6 miles / Hi Cannon Trail & Lonesome Lake Trail: 2.4 miles

Total: 30.0 miles (12,500' elevation gained)

MMD Recap:

- 2024 MMD headed to Franconia Notch. This year's route originally was 34 miles a midnight start on Friday/Saturday, but the remnants of Hurricane Debby came through Friday evening until dawn on Saturday turning the trails into a mess and raising river crossings considerably. MMD stands for more and more difficult not more and more dangerous, so I decided to postpone the start until Sunday at 5:30AM and everyone was rewarded with a beautiful day in the notch.

- The day started off with a steady climb past Greenleaf Hut and above treeline to Mount Lafayette's summit. From Lafayette, everyone boogied at differing paces across Franconia Ridge past Mount Lincoln and Little Haystack before dropping back below treeline. Meanwhile, Sarge and I headed up Falling Waters Trail and across Franconia Ridge in the opposite direction to get a few pictures as the runners passed us by.

- Once back below treeline everyone made their way to the Liberty Spring Trail junction and descended a few thousand feet to the Flume Slide Trail. On Thursday I ran the course solo and just below the Liberty Spring tent site I crossed paths with a guy who asked if there was a store to buy food up ahead, I told him he was way off and the closest place to get food was in town, that was a first!

- I had not been on the Flume Slide Trail since the last MMD in Franconia Notch in 2020 and I had forgotten how forgiving the first two miles was until reaching the foot of the slide. However, the slide is still as gnarly and steep as ever, ascending 1,400' in 0.7 miles to the junction of Franconia Ridge Trail. The slide itself is completed in the woods so unlike most slides in the Whites there are no views and it's a real slog and usually wet. There is now a prevalent eroded herd path for almost the entire length of the slide for those who get in over their heads. My first time hiking the slide in 2009 there was maybe one or two ten-to-twenty-foot go-arounds at the two tough spots when the slide was too wet to safely ascend. Everyone, except for Jason made it through the slide unscathed, he unfortunately had a small fall gashing up his forearm but luckily just ended up with just minor bumps and bruises and was able to continue on.

- After gaining the ridge the runners headed over the summit of Flume and Liberty before making their way back along Franconia Ridge to Little Haystack before descending Falling Waters Trail all the way down to an aid station I had setup at Lafayette Place Campground. When I ran down this trail on Thursday, I passed well over 100 hikers heading up so I warned the runners to be patient when they were descending what is commonly referred to as Falling Peoples Trail.

- The aid station was a big success for the runners. It was at mile twenty and had water, soda, Gatorade, and several types of munchies for everyone to pick at. Fruit, especially watermelon was the top aid station snack. I was shocked that out of everything, Pop-Tarts were not taken as a food restock for the remainder of the route, big upset there.

- The last ten miles consisted of a short burst up to Lonesome Lake where runners could top off water at the hut before heading up the Fishin' Jimmy Trail up to Kinsman Ridge. Once on the ridge, runners did a quick out and back to North Kinsman's summit then continued across the Cannonballs to Coppermine Col before one last steep blast up to Cannon Mountain's summit. From the Cannon Mountain tower it was all downhill back to the campground via the Hi-Cannon and Lonesome Lake trails.

- At the campground runners were welcomed with hamburgers, hotdogs, chips, cookies, and plenty of other food to stuff their faces with after a grinding day in Franconia Notch. MMD 2024 was a rough and rugged routes seeing participants finish anywhere from 8 hours 30 minutes to 12 hours 30 minutes.

- the day turned out great with an enthusiastic easy-going group who made organizing this fun gathering incredible easy to pull off!

Google Photos Album

Group shot, 5:30AM start. All quiet at Lafayette Place with Franconia Ridge rising high above us

After 2.9 miles Old Bridle Path reaches Greenleaf Hut and Greenleaf Trail

It's 1.1 miles from the hut to the summit of Mount Lafayette. Looking back at Greenleaf Hut and Cannon Mountain

Sarge takes in the views from Mount Lafayette

Runners have now formed their own groups of two or four and are spread out over a mile + at this point

Sarge paces Ryan across the ridge

Will, Andy, Chad, and Joe run the ridge with Kinsmans and Cannon across the notch

Sarge taking in the views from Mount Lincoln

Ascending the steep Flume Slide

Summit of Flume looking north to Liberty, Lincoln, and Lafayette

Mount Liberty Summit with Cannon Mountain in the background

A well-placed ladder heading back to Little Haystack along Franconia Ridge Trail

Sarge at the alpine zone sign on Falling Waters Trail

Cloudland Falls on Falling Waters Trail

Lonesome Lake

Cara gets a great picture of Joffrey on North Kinsman summit looking across at Franconia Ridge were they spent the morning going up, across, down, up, across, and down!

Franconia Notch from Cannon Mountain summit tower

Lonesome Lake from Hi-Cannon Trail

Post run cookout!

Elevation over distance profile

Mild Day on Cannon

Date of Hike: 12/27/16

Kinsman Ridge Trail: 4.4 miles (2,320 feet elevation gained)

Trip Report:
- Mild weather has hit the White Mountain region for the most of the past ten days, with the exception of two bone chilling but snow free days last week. Because of this the trails have taken on a spring feel again, luckily with the good early season snowfall the trails have a decent amount of snow and are snowshoe-able.
- On Tuesday afternoon I headed to Franconia Notch to meet up with Whitney, Tim & Gryffin. They had hiked Mount Hale in the morning while I took care of completing my work projects for the day so I could meet up for the Cannon hike.
- What can I say about Cannon Mountain from the Kinsman Ridge Trail, well, it's still steep as it ever was, but is definitely more enjoyable in the winter as the eroded trail is buried in the snow.
- We had a very pleasant hike up to the summit, even running into Mark, who we have hiked with before, and his friend Tom.
- The views were pretty muted as the cloud deck was at 4,000 feet, although there was a nice glow to the sky fifty miles to the south toward the Belknap Range.
- Nothing much else to add to this hike, other than Gryffin the Golden Retriever loved it, and as always it was nice to sneak in an afternoon hike!
- Good news, a monster of a snowstorm is baring down on the mountains, looking like a foot to two feet are about to wallop the White Mountains on Thursday into Friday, setting up for a perfect winter wonderland in the mountains for the New Year!!

The Kinsman Ridge Trail criss-crosses through some ski glades on the way up. After Thursday snowstorm watch out for skiers!

There's a great view of Echo Lake about a mile up the trail, a great place to catch your breath on the way up the steep trail

Gryffin enjoys the view! After a mile-and-a-half the trail pops out of the woods and is partially open to open the rest of the way up to the ridge

Heading up to the summit of Cannon Mountain

Who's a good boy!!

Cannon Mountain's summit tower

Heading back down into a cloudy abyss

Some ice flows as a result of the recent mild temperatures

Gryffin leads the way back down

Nice glow to the south, notice how thick the clouds are, just a blanket of gray

Whitney and Gryffin play in the snow

Heading back down through the glades

Yes it's steep, no need to write that on the sign. As much as I love the mini explosion in hiking due mostly to social media, this sometimes is a result of that explosion. Unfortunately, an idiot is an idiot no matter where they are. :(

Spikes & Ice . . . Mount Tecumseh & Cannon Mountain

Date of Hike: 3/16/16

Mount Tecumseh Trail: 4.6 miles / Kinsman Ridge Trail: 3.7 miles
Total Miles 8.3 (4,431 feet elevation gained) Garmin Forerunner 910XT

Trip Report:
- Wednesday's forecast called for a beautiful sunny and warm day, which was sandwiched in-between two crummy weather days. I took advantage of the mid spring temperatures and headed to Waterville Valley for a quick hike before work, followed by a jaunt up Cannon Mountain during an extended lunch break.
- Conditions on Tecumseh were pretty slippery in spots but with the warm temperatures it was a pretty straight forward hike in microspikes. Cannon, on the other hand was still as steep as it ever was with some murderous icy sections over the first mile and a quarter. I managed to get up in down in my microspikes, which are still very sharp since they are new, but crampons would have not been an overkill at all.
- As a side note, both these hikes ended up finishing my grid for these two peaks. Tecumseh, I have hiked fourteen times, while there aren't many ways to mix up this hike I've tried my best over the past twenty-four years to do so, yes you read that correctly it took twenty-four years to grid this peak! Anyway, I tried different approaches over the years, from both ends of the Tecumseh Trail, up the ski slopes, down them, up the tower access road, trail running the mountain. I still have yet to bushwhack over from the Welch-Dickey col where there used to be an old trail so I look forward to that.
- As for Cannon, it took seven years to grid, and it was my sixteenth time overall summiting the 'Freak' of Franconia Notch from just about every direction, Kinsman Ridge, Mittersill-Cannon, Hi-Cannon, via Kinsman Junction and the Cannon Balls, Lonesome Lake and Coppermine Col, Franconia Notch Loop, MMD 50K Ultra trail run, etc. The Mittersill-Cannon approach is my favorite, however that trail is only opened on a limited basis due to it going up the ski slopes.