Day 301 July
31, 2018
Jason’s alarm sounded at 05:15 am but I was not feeling it
at all and neither was Jason. My lower
back hurt which was causing me to feel nauseous and I was also freezing cold to
where I was wearing my jacket. We got
going either way for we both wanted to do the hike and not waste a day. So, by 06:15 am we were driving the 23
minutes to the Franconia State Forest where our mission was to hike Mount
Lafayette and the Franconia Ridge Trail.
The trail would follow Falling Waters Trail to the peak of Little
Haystack Mountain (4, 760 feet) and then traverse the ridge to Mount Lincoln
(5,089 feet) and finally to Mount Lafayette (5, 260 feet) before going down the
Old Bridle Path.
The trail started off easy enough but soon it became quite
difficult. It was all uphill and
majority of it was a rock scramble.
Whether from being out of shape or due to the fatigue of Mt. Washington
my legs felt like they weighted 500 pounds and I was breathing heavy. It probably didn’t help either that I did not
feel the greatest. In either case, I was
doing nowhere near as well as I did on Mount Washington. Going up we passed several waterfalls and
talked with a couple people that we passed.
When we finally reached above the tree line at Little Haystack mountain
the view was phenomenal!! Blue mountains
surrounded us in all directions as far as the eye could see. There was hardly any wind and the temperature
were perfect! Walking along the ridge
line afforded one views on all sides.
Lifting my feet though to continue the climb to Mount Lafayette was a
whole different story. I was beat!
Once at the summit the view was even better if that was even
possible. Though the flies were horrible
we sat down to eat our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and soak in the view. Overhead a dark ominous cloud was brewing so
we decided to head down the mountain.
Thankfully, we had a wonderful view as we descended and looked back up
at the mountain which was now covered in fog. We took the old bridle path down which went
quiet well suing one walking pole and as we neared the end my knee barely
hurt. In total we did 9.4 miles in 7
hours which ironically was the same distance as the Mt. Washington hike.
At the RV, both our feet were sore, but we ate an ice cream
cone as we drove back to the campsite we were at last night. Once we parked in the same site we ate a bag
of salad while watching Deadpool. With
the salad devoured we took an hour and a half nap before getting back up and
playing skip-bo on the floor while finishing the movie. As the sun slowly sank
in the sky we meandered about doing various activities and while Jason got a
fire started I worked on our dinner.
Dinner turned out wonderfully with jalapeno cheddar burgers layered with
mushrooms and onions and covered with BBQ sauce, chipotle southwestern dressing
and gouda cheese! For sides I threw
together stuffed mushrooms and baked beans.
We ate that all in front of a warm, cozy fire.
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