July 19, 2008
For two years I have been watching the postings in AMC's Outdoors magazine hoping to find someone bushwhacking Scar Ridge, but I've had no luck. Becca Munroe and Dave Thompson have come to my rescue by deciding to join me. Dave is working on New England's 100 Highest for the second time. Becca says she is willing to do something crazy like this once a year. Why is this crazy? Although West Scar is far down on the New England 100 Highest list (#97 in elevation), it is considered by many to be the toughest. Why? It can be a very nasty, thick bushwhack. Although I only need West Scar for the New England 100 Highest, the plan is to hit the whole ridge. This also includes Loon Mountain (a New Hampshire 3000 footer), Middle Scar (a New Hampshire 3000 footer), and East Scar (a New Hampshire 100 Highest). With lots of determination and some luck hopefully we can hit all the peaks, and therefore never have to come back again. After spotting a car at the East Pond Trailhead, we spotted a second car near Big Rock Campground as a potential bail out point if the ridge got too nasty. After that we drove to the parking area at the base of Loon Mountain. Let's get started. Here's today's track.
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We lost a few minutes right off the bat. Loon Mountain has a ski slope on it. Ski slopes are not as easy to hike up as you might think. It's the 5 feet or more of snow that makes them so smooth. We were looking for the dirt road that led up the mountain. Both the GPS that I had and Becca had showed a road. We took it but it twisted and turned as it lead us through some condominiums. It brought as up part way, but then dead ended. We then found a dirt road but we had to loose a little in elevation. We probably waisted about 10 minutes in this little side trip.
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We had a fairly significant amount of elevation gain heading up to Loon.
"This is a lot of work," said Dave.
"I'm going to quote you on that later," said Becca.
We all knew that although it was a lot of work going up, at least we were in the clear. We were prepared for the worst.
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We reached the Gondola Summit but the true summit of this mountain was the North Peak.
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There was even a cafeteria.
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I went in to get something cold to drink.
"This is probably our last chance for a cold drink," I said.
I then corrected myself, "No, I know this is our last chance for a cold drink."
"There's no Ben and Jerry's on Scar Ridge," said Becca.
We sat for a few minutes at the picnic table, walked around on some walkways, climbed the tower, used the restrooms. These were all luxuries that we would soon no longer have.
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Looking down to Loon Pond
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Off we go to the North Peak of Loon Mountain
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We were still in the open as we headed up the ski slope
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It was overcast and hazy so we weren't able to enjoy the views that Loon Mountain offered. We reached the top of the ski slope and then followed a herd path for a hundred feet or so to the 3065' summit of Loon. I looked briefly for a geocache that was supposed to be there. I usually look more thoroughly, but I knew I had hours of fighting through bushes ahead. We retraced our steps back to the top of the ski lift. Now the bushwhack was about to start and the woods looked thick. I read that key to this approach to West Scar was to stay to the north. We followed the ski trail down the mountain just a little (I'd guess about a tenth of a mile). The ski slope really started to drop. We didn't want to lose too much elevation so we prepared to cut into the woods.
"Wait," said Becca. "I need to put on my goggles. Wait I need more bug spray. These are all delay tactics. Oh wait, I can't do this I forgot my crampons." FYI - Crampons are for winter hiking.
We all got a good laugh before heading into the wilderness. Within a few minutes we stumbled across a herd path. This was sweet. We followed this for about a half mile until it began to cut to the left and take us down the mountain. Perhaps this herd path goes over to Black Mountain. Who knows? I got a new compass bearing, and we headed up to West Scar. Still, the bushwhacking wasn't too bad. Near the top we hit some thick stuff but pushed through. West Scar has two bumps on the summit. There is the east bump of West Scar which has the cannister. The west bump of West Scar is a large flat area. It is too difficult to pick the exact spot of the summit which is why the cannister is on the east bump. So we walked to the highest area. I was busy plotting our course and studying the terrain when Dave spotted the cannister. All the reports I read said that there was no cannister here. Well folks, there is now. It is labeled "West" West Scar.
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Dave and Becca on the summit of "West" West Scar.
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Becca took a picture of me on the 3774' summit.
This makes #97 on my list of New England's 100 Highest.
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This was the big prize of the day and is the peak that most people go after on this ridge. If I was just working on the New England 100 Highest list, I could go back. For anyone who wants to bag this peak and isn't interested in the rest of the ridge, I highly recommend taking the route we took. If you stay to the north and hit the herd path like we did, you should have less than a mile of real bushwhacking and only a tenth of a mile or so of thick stuff. I checked the morale of the group and reassured them that we could bail at any point. Everyone was for continuing. We headed over to the east bump known as "East" West Scar. Anybody confused yet? It was only a quarter of a mile away but we went through some thick, thick stuff. We found the cannister and signed in even though this wasn't an official peak. Time to head to Middle Scar. We dropped down quick through some short thick spruce trees. We were stuck in this patch of "Christmas" trees for quite a while. Becca says she will never look at a Christmas tree the same way again. We made our way down into the col before heading up to Middle Scar. This section was more open, and we made much better time. As far as the weather we had some thunder, some lightning, and some light rain. The rain actually felt good and kept us cool on this hot day. By the time we reached the 3500' summit of Middle Scar, we were all soaked.
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In the picture above, note the 'open' woods behind me. This was one of the easiest sections of the bushwhack. We could actually walk around. The group was still for continuing so we began the trek toward East Scar. We would have an unnamed bump to go over first. Our pace slowed significantly again. We went up and over the bump tagging the top just in case it is ever on some type of list. We dropped a little in elevation before making our final assault of the day.
East Scar threw everything it had us. It was not going down without a fight. The woods got thicker and thicker. The blow downs were so thick that we were walking on all the dead wood rather than ground. It was a little scary walking on this rotting wood cracking beneath our feet not knowing if the ground was a foot below us or ten feet below us. Everything I read about the trip reports was true. I would check our progress on our GPS. I would think, "That can't be right. We've been working for 20 minutes and only have gone a hundred yards." At times we were on our bellies, crawling under the blowdowns.
Somehow, someway, we finally reached a flat spot on the summit. East Scar has a wide flat summit and it is tough to find the exact top. I'm usually a stickler for finding the cannister, but I was getting a little concerned about the time. I originally wanted to hit one more tiny bump south of us to complete the ridge. The bump didn't count towards anything, and it would have brought us further south. We decided to skip the last bump as well as not waste anymore time looking for the cannister on this bump. We were here, we bagged it.
We plotted our course to East Pond Trail. I noticed one spot that was possibly slightly higher than where we were. Since it was in the general direction of where we were going we worked our way to it. Low and behold, we found the cannister. That was a relief. Even though I had already made the decision to claim the summit, I felt better about finding the cannister on this 3620' summit`.
Now for the steep climb down. More thick stuff. You have to be so careful especially on the descents. When you climb over a blowdown and can't see on the other side, it could be a 10 foot drop. Becca took a turn in front. Dave and I had more or less been alternating in the front. It is mentally exhausting being in the point position on a bushwhack like this, Becca took over at just the right time. The woods gradually become more open, and we walk at a semi normal pace.
I told Becca to keep working her way to the right as she dropped. She heeded my instructions, but no matter how much she went to the right we just couldn't seem to get to the trail. Finally, Becca spotted the trail ahead. What a relief!
Normally a trail like this I would describe as fairly rocky, but let me tell you, this trail looked like a four lane highway to me. We made great time as we followed the trail out for about 2-2.5 miles. We had all brought headlamps but were able to get out without using them. It had been a long, exhausting 13 hour hike/bushwhack.
I'm usually not too sore the day after a hike, but the next morning every square inch of my body ached. Scar Ridge had lived up to its name. Scar Ridge had left its mark. I'm left with physical, mental, and emotional scars. But we did it. It's done!! We hit all the major peaks. There's the old expression that says "never say never", so I won't say never. But I found a loophole around not saying never. "I won't ever go back." We maintained our sense of humor the whole time and will use this hike as a point of reference. Whenever a hike is tough, I will say to myself, "At least I am not on Scar Ridge."
Many, many thanks to Becca and Dave for their help on this. I couldn't have done it without you!
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