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[Coulter]

This is a repost from another forum...

My Daughter Tori and I had big plans to hit Marcy, Skylight, Grey, Redfield and Cliff last weekend. As we were signing in at the Loj we chatted with a stranger about our plans and got a squirrelly eye from her and that you "You guys are biting off way more than you can chew" look. We failed to mention we were splitting the trip up and not carrying our full packs over Marcy. The plan was to head to Feldspar LT and drop the packs THEN do some climbing. As Alpinelamb chewed on our plans I mentioned learning that lesson on our last trip to the Sewards and it dawned on her that she read my last TR here. Then she introduced herself and flew off down the trail to Colden...It was nice to meet you, hope ya had a great day up there!

We took the Feldspar Trail down the east side of Colden... My hat is off to all of you that put time in on the trails! Without you guys and gals this would have been one messy, wet muddy trip. Tori thought she was walking on water here...



There were all kinds of interesting mushrooms on the trail I don't recall ever seeing before. I had to take pictures of those ya know...because there's more to see up there than just mountains...



Anyway, we made it to Feldspar LT, dropped our packs as planned and were relieved to finally be able to use the little day packs for climbing. And then it happened...our first peak at our first target - Mt. Marcy



And some more plant life that was rather eye catching...



Love the shot from Lake Tear of the Clouds...this is actually the headwaters of the Hudson River



Finally...above timberline!


And Tori showing her youth and running on up ahead...Well, she wasn't really running, but you get the idea...



Marcy Benchmark...



View from the top back towards Colden and the Macs...



Admittedely, Tori is in much better shape than I am so I opted out of Skylight figuring I wouldn't be able to hit both Skylight AND Grey. I'll be back another day for those two. I stayed at Four Corners to relax and let Tori venture off off on a solo ascent of Skylight. That was her first solo and I thought that would be a good one to start with...being pretty straightforward and all. She was back down in short order and we sauntered back to Feldspar LT for the night. We shared the shelter with a Mom and Daughter team from NYC, they had just ascended Marcy for their first Peak. That's Tori - all smiles...



The fauna (Yogi Chipmunk or Messin' w/ Chipsquatch...you pick) seemed to have a fondness for Peanut Butter M&M's. That ain't jerky in his cheeks. This was away from the LT I had just emptied a few things out of my bag to get my toothbrush out. I turned my back for a minute and instantly had a hole in my M & M bag.



Another interesting 'shroom...



A good nights sleep a quick hike over to Uphill leanto to drop the big bags and its off to Redfield...Love that waterfall!



The hike up was a bit muddy in some spots and rocky in others, but overall not too bad. Great views of Skylight, Allen from the summit as well as views going up of Marcy, colden and the Macs.



Tori pretending she knows how to read a map at the Redfield / Cliff Junction...she's still in navigational training...



And off to Cliff we go...The mud! Holy Smokes! Then the Cliffs, now those were fun!





And of course another funky 'shroom...



But we made it, not much to look at up there though. That or we were just too tired to notice...



We had originally planned to start the hike out after climbing for the day, but I was exhausted so we opted to stay at Uphill LT instead. Not so sure that was such a good idea now.

Along about 1 in the morning I heard branching breaking and flashlights and guys hollering in the tent site next to us.

"Holy crap, There's one right there!" Is what I heard when I woke up. I tried looking at my watch with my flashlight and I could've sworn it said 6 am, not 1 am. The guys making all the ruckus saw my liught and yelled over to us that there were bears in the area. I thanked them and told Tori it was about time to get rolling anyway. Remember, I'm half asleep still thinking it's around 6am and going to get light soon. So we packed everything up got our bags on and walked over to talk to the guys for a sec. They thought we were nuts heading out at 1am without a gun or bear spray for protection. It finally dawned on me what time it was. Ummmm, well...you guys have a good night. We're still leaving. He informed us there was a sow with two cubs around the LT, as well as a bigger bear wandering around. He last saw the cubs heading back towards th creek, fortunately the opposite direction of where we were heading. The one guy was quite proud of the 12 gauge he was toting with him too. That was evidenced by the gun shot we heard halfway to Lake Colden!

We made it to the Lake Colden tent sites about 2:30 am...we made lots of noise walking through the woods including yelling, singing, blowing on whistles and clacking our hiking poles together. We never saw a bear or heard anything other than the gunshot. Well, Tori did get the bejeebers scared out of her when a mouse crossed the trail in front of her. I thought that was pretty amusing.

I decided not to continue on any further since we were in completely unfamiliar territory and I knew Lake Colden was coming with some really rough terrain through Avalanche Pass, not something I wanted to try for the first time in the dark. We dug our tents and and quietly found a spot to catch a few hours of sleep in them. I have to say, that was the first time either of us had put a tent up at 2:30 am.

So, all in all a very adventurous trip. As Tori told Alpinelamb at the beginning of the hike, we always make overly ambitious plans. We fared pretty on this trip though. I hit 3 of the 5 peaks we set out for and Tori was able to scratch 4 of the 5.

Planning another doozy of a trip around Labor Day. I'll try to keep that TR a bit shorter though. This one got a bit out of hand...thanks for sticking with me.

Steve

[slagmaker]

man that sounds like a great time and from the pics it looked even better


thank you fir taking.us along

[Todd Rahm]

That's an awesome trip!!! Thanks for taking the time to share it and the pics with us.

[Hawks Feather]

Thanks for taking me along.  Great images.

Jerry

[nastygunz]

Awesome!

[HaMeR]

Way cool!!



I'm really tired now!! 

[KySongDog]

That sounds like a great trip!  I'm not sure I could hike anywhere with out a gun let alone at 1 am with bears around!   Great pics too! 

[Coulter]

Thanks guys...It was a lot of fun, but very exhausting. Back to the shop now...gotta get some calls done before we go back up for Labor Day.

Steve