A New Home for "Off On Adventure" - 11/27/11

Even "Off On Adventure" needs a home once in a while...

Just a note to say that offonadventure.blogspot.com moved today to its own domain, www.offonadventure.com.  The new site will still have the same blog content, I just wanted to secure the domain to have flexibility in the future.

It appears I'll have to recreate my blog roll of blogs I follow, otherwise everything else looks to be working as before (I'm keeping my fingers crossed).

Those of you who were following my old page may have to update your links.

Thanks for reading and stay tuned for more posts!

~Telemarkmike

Treadway Mountain - 11/27/11

One more day to the long weekend meant one more adventure.  Schroon Lake had received about 8" of snow on 11/22 and we took advantage of that by getting out the snowshoes for the first time this season.  They weren't really necessary yet, but we were anxious to pull them out.

Our destination was Treadway Mountain (elevation 2244') in the Pharaoh Lake Wilderness of the Adirondacks.   Not a real steep climb, but we wanted to go a little easy the first time on the snowshoes this season.

We drove to Putnam Pond to park at the trailhead and soon discovered that we should have taken the 4Runner.  The campground road had not been plowed and it looked like the Jetta would not have made it.  That meant we had to walk an additional mile or so each way to get to the trailhead.

We took the trail that loops south around the southern end of Putnam Pond and followed that to the Treadway Mountain trail.  .4 miles before the Treadway Mountain Trail, the trail to Grizzle Ocean leanto split off to the left.

It was a little tricky snowshoeing.  In some parts of the trail you didn't need snowshoes.  In other parts, they were handy.  We ended up taking them on and off three times, and probably should have done so a couple more times.

Putnam Pond.... no ice yet

Trailhead sign

The split between the Putnam Pond trail and the Grizzle Ocean trail

Onward to Treadway Mountain!

As you approach the shoulder of Treadway Mountain, you reach large rock faces

Leesa on the summit

Pharaoh Lake in the distance from the summit

Treadway Mountain summit

Beavers have been quite busy near a small pond along the trail

Hike Stats:

Hike Distance: 9.4 miles (includes hike distance on road)

Hike Time:  7 hours

Total Vertical Gain:  1970'

Summit Elev:  2244'

Min. Elev:  1247'

Our route in blue

Google Earth image

Most of the trail was pretty nondescript. The summit, however, was quite interesting. There are large veins of rose quartz in the rock and you could spend quite a bit of time exploring at the summit and looking at the rock. The views are also quite nice, and on a clear day you can see in all directions.

Pilot Knob Shoulder - 11/26/11

First things first.  Pilot Knob Shoulder is a fantastic hike.... much better than the summit itself (see yesterday's post ).  The hike is on the eastern side of Lake George.  Parking is on Pilot Knob Road, near the northern end (same parking lot as used for ascending Buck Mountain). 

The trail is actually an unofficial trail and is not shown on trail maps, although there were yellow blazes throughout the hike.  The trailhead is at the Pilot Knob parking lot.  The trail leads eastward and rises gradually on an old jeep road.  After a short distance, the Buck Mountain Trail branches off to the left travelling 3.1 miles to the summit of Buck Mountain.  Continuing on the jeep road a little further, a yellow blaze trail veers off to the right.  There are no signs, but this is the trail to Pilot Knob Shoulder.  If you were to continue on the jeep road, it would continue eastward past Inman Pond to Hogtown.

The yellow blaze trail rises quickly and continues up a steep ascent the entire way.  The trail winds through fantastic rock outcroppings and offers spectacular views at many locations.

Hike Stats:
Hike Distance: 3.75 miles
Hike Time:  3 hrs, 30 minutes
Total Vertical Gain:  1700'

Lindsay always attaches herself to a tree

The kids were home from school for the Thanksgiving weekend so they joined us for this hike.

Look at the size of these rocks!

Nick, Zack and Lindsay at one of the early viewpoints

Mike and Leesa

Zack doing a heel grab

Lindsay

Nick's heel grab

Mike's not so good version

Looking south to Long Island and Assembly Point

Looking north towards Dome Island and Tongue Mountain

Leesa

Zack, Nick and Lindsay

Lindsay enjoying the view

Snack time

Pilot Knob Shoulder with the actual summit in the background

Our trip on Google Earth

View Pilot Knob Shoulder 20111126.kml in a larger map

I think this trail is my new favorite trail in the Lake George Region.  The Tongue Mountain Range Trail is nice also, but it is a much longer trail.  This trail was 3.75 miles round trip, yet offered the same spectacular scenery and the trail was quite interesting.  Kids would love the rocks.

Be sure to try it out if you're looking for a hike in the Lake George area.   If you'd like to see more images from this trip, please see my Picasa web album.

Pilot Knob Mountain - 11/25/11

We were up early today to work off some calories from our great Thanksgiving meal.  Our destination was Pilot Knob Mountain on the lower eastern shore of Lake George.  The hike was part trail, part bushwhack. 

Tuesday night's storm had delivered 5 inches of snow to our area, with 8-10 inches in the hills.  We had our snowshoes in the car, but chose not to use them.  Leesa wished we had, since the hiking got tougher as we climbed.  The weather was sunny and it was about 40 degrees.  The snow had a crunchy top layer adding to the difficulty walking.

Trip Stats:

Hike Distance:  4.3 miles

Total Vertical Gain: 1250'

Hike Time:  3 hrs 40 minutes

Summit Elevation:  2159'

The trailhead sign

  

Our route shown in blue

The sun was quick to burn off the morning fog

Approaching the summit...

A small rock cairn marks the summit

  

Leesa at the summit

Have to show that we made it...

 

The view to the south

Google Earth image of our route

View Pilot Knob Mountain in a larger map

 

Next time we decided we need to hike from the Pilot Knob trailhead to the shoulder of Pilot Knob Mountain (just NW from the actual summit). The shoulder has a rocky top and a view, whereas the actual summit is mostly in the trees. Anyways, we claimed a peak and had a nice hike.

Pharaoh Lake - 11/19/11

What a nice weather day it was on Saturday.  Temperatures were in the high 40's and the sun was out.  Leesa and I were in Schroon Lake, NY and we chose a relatively flat hike for the day.  Our destination was Pharaoh Lake, just north of Brant Lake.  We parked off of Beaver Pond Road and hiked north to the lake.  Pharaoh Lake is one of the largest lakes that lies entirely within the Adirondack Park.  It is a beautiful lake and there are several leantos located along the shore (see the map below).  Unfortunately, leanto #6 recently burned down, and all that remains are a couple charred timbers.

Hike Stats:

Lowest Elev.:  953'

Highest Elev.:  1221'

Hike Distance:  10.5 miles

Total Vertical Gain:  1172'

Hike Time:  5 hrs

Our route, highlighted in blue

A new bridge over Mill Brook

A tombstone of sorts, marking the boundary between Warren County and Essex County

Another new bridge, this one crossing Pharaoh Lake Brook

Looking north, Pharaoh Mountain in the background

Looking down to the water from what we decided was the nicest spot to camp

Our lunch spot and a nice camping location

If we were camping, we would have chosen this as our spot.  It was near the southwestern corner of the lake. 

The remains of leanto #6

Looking west to Pharaoh Mountain from Watch Rock

Looking north from Watch Rock

Mike near leanto #2

View Pharoah Lake Hike in a larger map

It really felt like an early fall day and we finished this day wondering if it would be the last one.  Time will tell!