Following Atticus: Forty-Eight High Peaks, One Little Dog, and an Extraordinary Friendship by Tom Ryan is published by William Morrow. It tells the story of my adventures with Atticus M. Finch, a little dog of some distinction. You can also find our column in the NorthCountry News.

Tuesday, March 04, 2008

Snow Conditions

Just to give you an idea of what the conditions are like up here right now, the following is part of a post was made today on the Views From The Top hiking website...

Bonds Traverse?
Hello all, myself and a strong group of five other experienced winter hikers have penciled this weekend in for a two-day Bonds traverse starting from Lincoln Woods and exiting Zealand Road. The theoretical plan is to stay the night Saturday at Guyot.

However, I've seen the snow conditions elsewhere in the Whites - it took me and a group of six others six hours just to make it 3.2 miles in on Dicey's Mill Trail toward Passaconaway on Sunday 3/2 before throwing in the towel and turning around. I'm thinking that my group has essentially zero chance of actually accomplishing our goal this weekend, but I'm fine with that as we're really just looking for a winter camping experience anyway. We'll see how far we can get Saturday, make camp and either push on or turn back Sunday morning, depending on our progress from the day before.But I'm also a foolish optimist. I'm wondering if there isn't a group of 20 ultra-marathoners somewhere out there in VFTT land who are planning the same traverse on Wednesday and Thursday and will kindly break the trail out for us Seriously, though, I saw the posting for the 3/1 Pemi Loop attempt by what seems to have been a very strong group. They were unsuccessful (but great job guys) but only were on the Wilderness Trail as far as the Osseo Trail, it seems.