Crow’s Nest

Last weekend we ventured back to the trails in Shelburne, NH to hike up to the Crow’s Nest.  This little mountain at an elevation of 1287 feet, is just 1.3 miles along a trail that begins behind the Philbrook Farm Inn on North Road.  Hikers are welcome to park at the Inn if you just check in with them, which is what we did.  The man at the Inn told us where to park and instructed us on where to pick up the White Trail.

The Philbrook Farm Inn in Shelburne, NH.

To get to the white blazed trail, walk behind the Inn and then behind the white cottage, up the path to the brown cottage where the white blazes start.  The trail is in an open hardwood forest and since the trees were still void of their leaves, the sun shone down to the forest floor where spring ephemeral flowers were beginning to bloom.

Andrew hiking up the White Trail.

Along the way is a good size vernal pool that had some wood frog eggs.  After about 1 mile, the trail veers uphill toward a knoll covered in red pine trees to the Crow’s Nest.

A vernal pool along the trail.

The last part of the hike up to the Crow’s Nest.

We didn’t see any crows, but we did find evidence that the moose hang out on the top.  We took a long break and enjoyed the view to the east-northeast.

A marked rock lets you know you are there. No sign of crows, but the moose were here.

Lindsay and Alden resting at the summit.

The view from Crow’s Nest.

We followed the trail back down to the brown cottage and decided to walk the woods road down to North Road.  Instead of parking at the Inn, you could also park on the side of the road and walk up this way to the trail.

Andrew and Alden hiking back down the trail.

Andrew takes Alden off trail.

This was a very pleasant walk and would be a great one to do in the summer with the shade of the trees, and happens to be Alden’s first ‘mountain’ hike outside of the womb. I’m sure that we will be back to do this one again soon.

First Hike

It’s been a couple of months since we’ve written a blog post, but we are back with a little newborn in tow!  Alden was born just a few weeks ago and after short walks up and down the street, we were all ready to get out in the woods.  After reading about a short waterfall trail at the “Bowls and Pitchers” in Shelburne, New Hampshire by fellow blogger: 1happyhiker, we thought this would be a good first hike for Alden (thanks for the tip, John!).  The trail can be found on Mill Brook Road in Shelburne, but it isn’t signed (although it is blazed well).  We followed directions from 1happyhiker and found the trail easily.  We drove past the south end of the trail (approximately 1/2 mile from the Scudder Trail parking) and parked in the log landing where the north end of the trail can be found (approximately 0.9 mile from Scudder Trail).

The trail sign is unreadable, but the entire trail is well marked with yellow blazes.

On the Go-zzo

Two weekends ago we ventured out on a short snowshoe hike to The Rocks Estate in Bethlehem, NH.  The Rocks Estate is owned by the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests.  The big claim to fame for the property is the Christmas tree farm, but they also have trails and a visitor center.  We’ve actually never been to the buildings, but when Lindsay was looking for an easy place to snowshoe she found that they have some nice hikes on their property.  We downloaded and printed a map from their website and headed over to Bethlehem, stopping at Maia Papaya for lunch first.

From our map we saw that the Michael A. Gozzo Memorial Trail at the south end of the property, was accessible from a neighborhood road, and from there we could either walk back toward The Rocks Estate buildings or across the road and up a low hill.  There is also a power line corridor that runs through the property and we decided that we wanted to try to stay away from that if possible.

Snowy Snowshoe Hike

After a yummy lunch at Foods For Life in Gorham, NH we headed over to North Road in Shelburne to get out on our first snowshoe hike of the season.  A few days ago we go over 12″ of snow and it was snowing again.  We wanted to hike up Mount Crag, a small rock outcrop with a view of the Androscoggin River and valley below.  The farmhouse next to the Austin Brook Trail plows a small parking lot across the street for hikers and we found one other car there when we pulled in.

Heading out on the Austin Brook Trail.

Giant Fall

Last weekend, our good friend Sarah came for a visit.  With her new love of hiking, we finally convinced her to make the trek up to the White Mountains and go for a walk with us.  Lindsay insisted that we only do a shortish hike to a waterfall and suggested we hike to Giant Fall in Shelburne, NH.

We parked on the North Road where the Peabody Brook Trail starts between two houses.  Check out the house on the left, they have goats and chickens!  The trail begins on a logging road and is marked well at all junctions.

Peabody Brook Trail

Albany “Not” Trail

We did our usual- slow to get going routine – the other morning, but finally picked out a quiet hike in Evans Notch, but we were quickly denied. The Evans Notch Road (Route 113) in Maine/New Hampshire is closed for the winter season. We pulled out our maps and found that there might be a way around to get into the Wilderness Area from the other side, so we drove around to find Flat Road in West Bethel Maine. We found our next turn onto a smaller road along Miles Brook and everything looked good for a mile of so, then the road turned to dirt, snow covered, with little evidence of use. But there was just an inch of snow and there were tire tracks so we carried on further to find seasonal camps. However, just when Lindsay’s GPS said we might be just about at the trailhead, the road curved sharply uphill and turned out of sight. We stopped at the bottom of the hill and surveyed our options. The road was down to one travel lane and at the point where we had stopped there was a place to turn around, but there was no guarantee of what lay ahead up the hill and around the corner. The temperature’s were supposed to rise that day, and we started to get worried about getting stuck in the snow and mud on the way out. Maybe we were being too cautious, but we thought we better turn around and save exploring the rest of this road on a summer day.

Blue Brook

On Veterans Day weekend we headed out to the Wild River Wilderness in the White Mountain National Forest.  This area of the forest is not as popular as other areas because there are few 4,000 footers to draw in the crowds, although you can get to the Carter Mountain Range, most hike in from the Pinkham Notch side instead.  Since the Hurricane Irene floods of last year, the Wild River Road to the Wild River Campground had been closed for repairs and with it now recently opened, we wanted to see the damage.  Of course we saw the most dramatic damage from Route 113, the missing snowmobile bridge that once crossed the Wild River.  It is amazing to think that it’s even possible for the water to have reached high enough to take out that bridge.