I’m kind of lazy. I could have gotten up earlier this morning, and headed up north to hike, but I didn’t feel like driving that far. So, I set out for Monadnock again, having planned a nice long and largely new-to-me route.

I started out from the state park HQ, and headed up the Cascade Link to Pumpelly Trail. It was snowing and blowing pretty strong when I got up onto the ridge, which made life interesting. At one point, the trail kept heading down and I was convinced I must have taken a wrong turn. I could see the trail fine, but I couldn’t see the mountain at all to get my bearings. I backtracked a way to check it out, and concluded I must have been right the first time. On my way back, I ran into two downward bound hikers who confirmed it. Normally, I’d be annoyed at losing time, but while I doubled back, the snow had let up. That made it nice and easy to pick out the cairns once I got above tree line. Here’s a view looking back at the Pumpelly Ridge (or whatever the ridge is called):

http://blogs.nashuatelegraph.com/off_track/resource/offtrack/IMG_0064.JPG

The snow started up again near the summit, which was a nice touch. It looked like a moonscape up there, and the wind was strong enough to tip me off balance. Here’s me up top:

http://blogs.nashuatelegraph.com/off_track/resource/offtrack/IMG_0070.JPG

And here’s the nice fellow who took the photo:

http://blogs.nashuatelegraph.com/off_track/resource/offtrack/IMG_0068.JPG 

I’d planned a different route for my way down. I was going to head down one of the main trails (White Arrow or White Cross, it didn’t really matter which) to the Smith Connector, then Cliff Walk to Lost Farm. I chickened out of the White Arrow; it’s wicked steep up there, and I’d noticed that every other hiker I’d seen was wearing crampons. I just had my studded slip-ons and poles. I carried my snowshoes, which turned out to be entirely unnecessary. So, I headed down White Cross instead, and never caught the slightest glimpse of Smith. When I got down to the next junction (Spruce Link and the Cascade Trail), I didn’t feel ready to call it day, so I headed back up Cascade, and this time turned off on the Red Dot where I got to make fresh tracks. I didn’t care to go all the way back up too much further, so when I saw a likely looking spot I bushwacked back westward to the White Cross. It was very easy going, and between the sun, which was hanging low, and the slope, I wasn’t worried about going too far astray. I came out, as it happened, exactly at the half-way mark on the White Cross trail. Here’s a trail map:

http://www.qcc.mass.edu/brink/Trav-rec/mt_monad/interactive_map.htm

On my way back down I saw a trio of trail runners heading up, and felt a passing twinge of jealousy. It helped that I was pretty bushed by then; I wouldn’t have felt like running anyhow.