Presidents Day weekend, Saturday 7AM: It was snowing hard. The view from the window of the plow berm left by the frustrated rocket scientist (wasting his talent driving snowplow) made it clear that it would take 20 minutes just to drive out to the street, let alone make time on the trek up to Mt. Cardigan NH, since Jan had taken the SUV for the day.
The rock skis were at the ready, a pre-prepped pack waited with beacon, shovel & probe-poles on board at the prospect of skiing A few steeper lines on Cardigan. All dressed up, and nowhere to go... Aw heck, the avi-hazard was bound to be maxed out on the better stuff anyhow!
Hmmm...*&^%*&^.... what to do... Figuring messy driving would keep my buddy Sandy from driving up from Rhode Island to mix it up with hordes of school vacationers at the local Mt. Wachusett, lift served yo-yos held negative appeal. And, as much new snow had fallen, the snow pack in the woods at Wachusett still was inadequate for skiing the ledgy bouldery back bowls...
Then, epiphany! In the flash of inspiration where the caffeine hits the sugar, transcendence, the sudden realization that I live in the State of Grace! (Mount Grace, Massachusetts, that is!) A quintessentially New England un-inspiring bump of a hill spittin’ distance from the NH border, Mt. Grace rises to a mere 1610’ above the Atlantic, but it’s blessed with one very fun skiable hiking trail! The Metacomet-Monadnock trail wends its way from Connecticut to New Hampshire cutting a SW-NE diagonal across Mt. Grace’s summit, and the run NE from the summit is a great ski tour. Wide enough to make turns on the steeper sections, and straight runouts below the tight spots it would make an ideal consolation prize on a high-avalanche hazard day, if only I could con a buddy with a 4WD to go along.
I know, call Aaron- he’s easy, especially if backcountry skiing is involved!
At the turnout just north of where the M-M crosses route 78 Aaron gunned it to crash through the plow berm and spin-out facing the road. Parked! He strapped the nearly glideless Voile’ Snakeskins to his beaten Atomic Tourcaps, while I applied Swix Universal Red wax to the bases of my trash picked Dynastar Verticals. The ascent was going to be a contest of competing technologies...
A snowmobiler had beaten us to the punch, leaving a well-groomed path up the middle of the M-M. That made climbing easier, but was bound to rob us of some fun on the downhill run. As might be expected, the waxed skis left the skins in the dust on the flatter portions, while the skins cruised easily up the steeper shots as I herringboned, backslipped & sidestepped up the whoop-de-dos left by the snowmobile’s scramble.
Eleven hundred feet above the car we summited. The unspectacular summit adorned by a large boulder and a fire tower is fully wooded providing no panorama-payoff for hikers, which may account for the phenomenally good condition of the hiking trail. Whereas most New England hiking trails are eroded into bouldery drainages by swarms of summer hikers, the M-M on Mt. Grace is smooth and even, almost made for skiing!
Right: Aaron stripping his snake-skins
A few glugs from the water jugs and donning our shell clothing we were off. Trading leads every couple hundred yards so as not to lose track, we burned off the first 200’ of vertical in exhilarating tight turns across the snowmachine spoor. At an intersection with a traversing trail we opted to explore a bit, hoping to find a decent glade shot into the drainage alongside the M-M. Paydirt! In less than ¼ mile our quarry was spotted- untracked 10-18” fluff in widely spaced trees!
Taking it slowly to avoid the numerous shin-bangers the next 400’ of vertical included some of the sweetest low-angle glade skiing on earth. Eventually the grade petered out and we angled the bushwhack through somewhat tighter under story of mountain laurel and young hemlocks to rejoin the M-M. The remainder of the M-M was a hoot- fast and rippin’ in the track, sweet & silken on the trail edges, it was hard not to have fun!
Blasting into the open clearing by the Adirondack shelter near the bottom of the trail we had our first encounter of the day with hominids: 3 guys & a ½ rack of volume brew, in the care of a friendly pair of black labradors. Chatting for a few minutes we bid them adieu, setting off for further explorations.
A quarter mile south on the Round the Mountain trail, paralleling the road is an abandoned ski area. The remains of a rope tow drive abuts the snowmobile-groomed hiking trail. But the open lines on what remains of the ski trail was untracked! This was skinnin’ & grinnin’ territory!
Right: The rope tow drive still has .the stove-bolt Chevy motor
Starting out fairly flat, the grade rises quickly to a sustained 15-20 degrees as the line narrows. The open line ends almost 200 vertical feet above the bottom, but picking our way though the denser trees we searched in vain for more skiable open glades. Heading toward the light, I skinned and sidestepped below a 10’ granite boulder for a better view. With one ski edged on granite & moss the other wedged between 2 small trees on a sloughing 35 degree side hill I called back to Aaron, “Doesn’t look like this is the ski trail!” He had to grab a tree to keep from falling he was laughing so hard.
Pressing on and doubling back though a thicket of small hemlock & birch I nearly bonked my head on the top pole of the lift! We’d found the top of the resort, but the lines immediately below weren’t exactly skiable. Turn, stop. push branches away, repeat... but shortly we were stopped atop the remaining open line, pausing to contemplate the dozen available turns.
Aaron took first tracks, bottoming out on a rain-crust every other turn in 8-12” of fluff. Ducking the pungee-stick dead lower branches of the numerous spruce trees I took a slightly different line, gobbling up the 200’ vertical in short order. It was a sweet but technical run with little room for error (a bit of “trail maintenance” may be in order), but not unduly hazardous in the given conditions.
Right: Dana ducks! Photo: Aaron Dewar
It was getting late, as I had much to do before dark, so with a short kick’n’glide on the snowmobile track we were ready to blast back through the freshly reinforced plow berm back onto the highway. “I wonder how many runs at it we will have to make?” Aaron mused. (The answer: Seven! And the dealer always comments at trade in time on how well he takes car of his cars- if he only knew!)
All in all, for a short day trip, it wasn’t a bad consolation prize at all!