Lower New Hampshire: April 21st-May 3rd, 2024

After getting back from New York and crashing with my lover for a few days, I decided to get back to hiking some of the peaks in Central New Hampshire with them, accompanied by my lover and occasionally other of our housemates. I started off by finally getting the main peak of Ragged, along with Cardigan the day after. A much needed rest day and then out to Prospect and then Spruce by the end of the week, making for a nice trifecta of P1Ks and a pair of fire towers in each state. Hiking with someone else and not having to stress about my van situation made for a much more easy-going experience than my last week in the Adirondacks. Anyhow, I rounded off this micro list with Cherry at the start of the month and the start of my new job!!!

East Ragged, April 21st

Me and Moss started with hiking Ragged, the peak that I thought I had hit when I skinned up it's western peak a couple months ago. Oh well. The trailhead for East Ragged starts in a church camp parking lot, and the initial stretch of the trail is wide and gradual, with the trail getting windier but still well maintained all the way to the ridge. There's a well-marked heard path to the summit, which contained no views as far as we could find. Still though, beautiful forest with no snow remaining on the trail or heard path at this time of year!

Cardigan, April 22nd

After trying and failing to skin up the eastern side of Cardigan due to an absolutely heinous ice and powder combo back in January, I decided to give it a shot now that there would either be no snow, or the snow would be packed out at this time of year. We started out approach from the western Trailhead, and the trail as always was decent, with some packed snow later on not requiring microspikes on the decent. The bald patch was fantastic, and I got my little windy photo at the top :)

Prospect Mountain, April 24th

Moss and I were looking to get out hiking after taking the previous day as a rest, so we settled on Prospect Mountain just by Plymouth. The trailhead has room for half a dozen cars max, and we saw every spot get filled at some point on a rainy Wednesday afternoon, so be aware of that if you're hiking on the weekend. The trail was well maintained and honestly would make a nice ski trail in the winter if we ever get consistent powder days bellow 1000ft again - which I am pessimistic about given the shit winter we just had. Anyhow, it rained sporadically on the ascent, and we got a good view just shy of the summit on the decent. Overall a pretty nice mountain

Spruce Mountain, April 25th

For my last free day until I started my spring job, I decided to hike Spruce Mountain in Vermont with Moss as part of my slow progression through the Northeast Kingdom Challenge. Unsure of whether the trail would be open for mud season, we planned on hiking Beldivere as an alternate, but that was unnecessary as the trail and trailhead are fully open as of at least the end of April! The trail itself was uneventful, and there wasn't any snow minus some thoroughly-packed patches and some occasional ice. Overall a delightful trail, and my seventh(?) Vermont Fire Tower to date!!!

Cherry Mountain, May 3rd

For Cherry, I drove up with my partner and a friend up to the trailhead off of 115, and started up the short, albeit steep, albeit not-scrambly-but-sandy trail up to the ridge, and then to the summit. Fantastic views of Agiocochook and it's many ravines and subpeaks from the summit. Back down was great, and we were home at a reasonable hour