Traction Treads

Fourteen people showed up today to work on the trail in Sterling Marsh. This is 13 sections of boardwalk that our chapter built in 2009-2011, and are almost a half-mile in length, total.

Here is the crew, except for Dan who took the picture. He was also our crew leader today. We got all the strips we had in place. If you go out there and wonder why we didn't "finish," it's because we have to wait a year to get enough more strips.

Because it was also Public Lands Day, and also North Country National Scenic Trail Day, Carhartt had donated quite a few of their nice orange watch caps to the Association. Anyone who became a member today got one of these free. Our chapter had five to possibly use, and five people stepped up to join and get a hat.

So, what were we doing? Well, this boardwalk has changed that entire section of trail from a continuous mudpit that everyone avoided to a "destination hike." However, because a lot of it is shaded, the wood was often wet and slippery. The Forest Service suggested we try these traction strips. They are really expensive, but the FS had some money to spend on the NCT this year. They got us about half of what we need, and we hope to get the rest next year.

They come twice as long, but Pete (who's currently on a trip) had already cut them in half and taken bundles of them out to the trail.

Our job today was to place them correctly and screw them in place. Notice the chalk line for side-to-side placement, and Pete also made the jigs so we could get them in the center of the decking board easily.

Here's what they look like- although I see that these few aren't screwed down yet. I haven't done the post yet, but I've been thinking about showing the various kinds of traction aids used on trail structures with my personal favorites. Maybe that will be a good follow-up tomorrow. However, these have to be at the top of the list. They will last much better than any of the other commonly used choices and are less likely to break and become a hazard themselves.

Of course, the open area of Sterling Marsh is almost always beautiful!

Could you tell who was screwing down that strip? My buddy Bill came for this workday! We went out for a little lunch afterwards. We had lots of trail stuff to talk about- follow up from the Adirondacks, current projects and hiking dreams.

I even did a little gardening after I got home, and worked on a couple other things a bit. Beautiful weather and a good energy day!

Miles hiked in 2025: 377.
Miles hiked on the NCT in 2025: 226.6

North Country Trail, Jenks TH south about a mile and back

See Boardwalk Dedication

Day Eleven- Low to High for the Ending

The plan for the day was 12.7 miles beginning with the nasty ford at the North Branch of Trout Brook Creek.

Will showed us a picture from just a week ago that looked about like it did three years ago, which is this view.

We all (Bill and me with Marie) hiked the 1.5 miles in to the location. That way Marie could be sure we got safely across. Ha, ha, ha! Here's what it looked like today.

It was to my crotch last time. We decided that was a no-go with the possibility it would be to my chest.

Will reports that the DNR is planning to rebuild this bridge next year. Good news for sure.

So we went to Schroon Lake and had a nice lunch. Called Matt the trail mapping guy to participate in the decision about what we could do. There was not time to hike in from the other direction and back out. Matt said the group that is going to go through later can fill in the gap.

So we decided to do a "fun hike." We went to Dirgylot parking and hiked up the east side of Jones Hill. This is brand new trail. I bushwhacked down this in 2022 (not much fun). So I wanted to see the new trail, and Bill really wanted to go to the top of Jones.

The first thing we passed on this route was the rock work that the crew I worked with in 2021 did. I have to show you the water bar again. We built this correctly, and it is still nicely diverting water off to the side. I'm a little proud of that water bar.

I'd been told that the last piece of that trail puzzle was also complete- a bridge over Platte Brook. Here it is! Made of logs.

After the bridge, the trail starts UP, and this is all new trail since 2022. It was very good building work for such a long climb. Lots of switchbacks, most grades not more than 10 percent.

Marie went part way with us, then she waited while Bill and I went on.

Part of the view from the top.

Just showing off.

Then we had to come back down, collecting Marie on the way. Three happy and satisfied hikers.

We came back to our motel, got cleaned up and ate a light dinner. Then it was out for ice cream! We know how to end a hike right.

So we missed a 7-mile stretch of trail, but I'm pretty satisfied with what we were able to accomplish.

New York, North Country Trail, Adirondacks. Loch Muller TH to the North Branch of Trout Brook Creek and back. Dirgylot TH to the top of Jones Hill and back. 11 miles total.

Miles hiked in 2025: 302.3
Miles hiked on NCT in 2025: 186.1

See Out to Pillsbury

Day Ten- and Out to Pillsbury

Almost immediately in the morning we crossed West Canada Creek, another of the memorably beautiful spots.

We were focused on doing our job, but to keep moving. We wanted to get off the trail in good time. Ate lunch at Pillsbury Lake which is perhaps my favorite shelter location on the NCT in the Adirondacks. The lake is truly beautiful.

It even has a rocky island!

This picture is for David Snoek who advised me to keep my feet dry! This pretty much sums up the day.

One really good thing I can report is that this entire stretch is at least minimally marked with NCT emblems. This includes the two intersections with the Northville-Lake Placid Trail where one might get confused. It's only a beginning, but it's good to see those reassuring markers every once in a while.

Now Marie has taken over the spotting and helping duties. I'll have to get a picture of her tomorrow. I'll also explain our slight change of plans then. She scoped out a church spaghetti dinner for us that was yummers! But now I have to get some things ready for tomorrow. It is our last trail day, and we can use the daypacks, but it is going to be long and difficult.

Miles hiked in 2025: 291.3
Miles hiked on NCT in 2025: 175.1

New York, Adirondacks, North Country Trail, just east of South Lake to Pillsbury Mountain TH. 9 miles

See To South Lake

Day Nine- to South Lake

Getting ready for another two days of backpacking. Diane fed us french toast and sausages for breakfast (early). We are living pretty high on the hog. Worst part of the morning was that it rained quite a bit during the night, but things looked like they were going to improve for the day.

It took three hours to spot the cars. Only 17 trail miles, but not many roads to connect them. Along the way, we had to do more tree clearing. Some sawing of limbs again (do we get paid by the road commission?), but one place there were chunks of a broken limb in the middle of the road. I hopped out to sling them off the side and discovered a small semi-casualty of the fallen limb.

It seemed to be only dazed, but barely able to fly, if at all yet. I think it's a chickadee. We moved it to the side and hope mama comes to find it.

This kind of landscape looks so much like northern Minnesota. Not a lot of places like this, but interesting.

This wetland seems to be on the way to becoming a bog with mats of sphagnum moss collecting on the surface.

A beautiful pitcher plant in full bloom.

Our main goal was to get past South Lake. This is a favorite spot of mine just because the bridge is so weird. It spans the lake, and it was damaged somehow in the past (ice?) so it's all at crazy angles. But it's sturdy, just slopey.

It was the weekend, and we saw some other hikers. Two were notable in that they seemed to not have a brain between them. They knew where they had started hiking (where we were headed), so I knew what trail they must have followed. (But they didn't know where they were hiking to.)

I asked them if they had crossed South Lake bridge. (It was less than a mile behind them). They had no clue. I ask you, "Is not that bridge memorable if you had just crossed it?" Anyway... we had hoped to stop for the night at West Canada Creek shelter. But the other hikers thought it was occupied.

So we were walking along trying to decide where we wanted to stay when this campsite appeared beside us. We had no problem making the instant decision to make it ours.

We only hiked 8 miles, but they were difficult. Lots of mud and rocks and a big climb. We were happy to eat dinner and crawl in the tents away from the bugs. However the weather was great. We are being smiled upon.

Miles hiked in 2025: 282.3
Miles hiked on NCT 2025: 166.1

New York, Adirondacks, North Country Trail, Indian River TH to just past South Lake, 8 miles

See Being Flexible

Day Seven- Food, Friends, Fire

One of the requirements for a day off is ice cream!

Then Bill and I went hunting for our next free campsite, east of where we had been. We found an adequate one that was quite nice. Next event was the arrival of Diane, here to spot us for the next few days.

Bill and I had set up our tents, and the potty cabana out in the trees. Diane quickly added her tent and we are suddenly a village.

Some actual resting occurred!

Diane wanted to bring food for us for the evenings and breakfasts. Sounded good to us! I forgot to picture the dinner, but it was a yummy bean and veggie one-pot meal, and homemade cookies for dessert.

For the first time in a long while an evening on a hike was relaxed enough that we built a campfire.

The mosquitoes haven't been as terrible as usual for June in the Adirondacks, but they ramped up a little yesterday, and the smoke helped keep them at bay.

With storms predicted or not, and every weather site disagreeing and changing every ten minutes, we will decide which phase of this trip to do next in the morning.

See Racing for the Motel

Day Five- Longest Day

If we could pull it off, this needed to be a long mileage day because the previous day we didn't make it very far. Our goal was Botheration Pond (the same area where I camped three years ago). But it was 10 miles away. That's a lot on rough trails when we are stopping to inventory things quite often.

Had to take a picture of False Hellbore Veratrum viride, also called Corn-lily. I don't think I previously had a picture of it in bud.

That was fun. The not so fun part was that it was on the bank of Humphrey Brook. This was a terrible crossing in 2022. It hasn't changed. I had decided that I'd not found the actual crossing in 2022. So this day we looked carefully. We found markers that did lead us upstream, but we couldn't find any adesignated crossing. Instead of sliding down a gravel bank and wading with the fishes, we only had to wade the space pictured here. Better.

But the other side is all grown up with alders and goldenrod and no trail. We pushed through all that. Found a trail, but no markers. It led us to this.

We were momentarily flabbergasted until we realized that someone has established a campsite there. It's good that the trail is being used. Maybe not so good that people are leaving kitchen gear already. Anyway, we followed that trail back out to the main trail and got going in the correct direction. This all chewed up a bunch of time.

Saw the biggest American Toad I may have ever seen. He was well camouflaged for the dappled sunlight. But his size- more than 4 inches- gave him away!

Here's some of the kind of thing we are doing. Most of the junctions have the familiar brown and gold Adirondack signs which we inventory. But some junctions aren't marked at all, like this one. The picture probably isn't big enough that you can see there is an NCT emblem along the trail Bill is standing on. But the left fork is part of a loop called King's Flow and it only has a DEC yellow disc. We need to collect info so that NCT hikers won't be confused at junctions.

At Puffer Pond, we ate lunch at a shelter. There was a man setting up camp there who portages his canoe (a very light one, but still over 50 pounds total) and his pack all over the Adirondacks so he can fish. He had at least heard of the North Country Trail. We had a nice visit and then we moved on. Beautiful spot.

We still had over 2 miles to go and for sure a couple more rocky stream crossings. Thankfully we knew that the worst missing-bridge crossing had been rebuilt since 2022. We actually make it to the Botheration Pond official campsite about 5:30.

This is the longest backpack I've done since being sick. A little over 10 miles. But we made it, and I wasn't even totally exhausted.

Miles hiked in 2025: 259.3
Miles hiked on NCT in 2025:141.1

New York, Adirondacks, North Country Trail, Wakely Brook to Botheration Pond, 10 plus miles.

See Day Four

On the Road, Day 1

Once again, I did not get all the appropriate pictures. I'll start at the end point. Tonight I'm at Bill's house.

His wife Anne fixed a yummy dinner. Bill and I, of course, spent our time yakking about maps, testing (again) electronic maps, and telling trail stories.

But on the way I stopped to see blogger buddies, Chuck and Sylvia. Again, it's been two years since I visited them. Hard to believe. And I forgot to take a picture of them, or of the nice lunch they fed me.

But I did get pictures of some of Sylvia's flowers. She's embarrassed about the weeds. Ha. She's 82, and hasn't had time to get to the flowers beds yet because she's been putting in their vegetable garden.

Peonies and iris.

The rhododendron bush is spectacular.

We had a great visit, although it really seemed too short. Better than nothing.

The car is packed. Bill and I head east in the morning. I'll be able to blog tomorrow night, not sure about after that. See you then.

See Letting You In on the Plan

Letting You In on the Plan

Three years ago to the day (I did not plan this, and was pleasantly surprised to discover the matching dates), here I was, poised to step into...



Did you remember? ...the Adirondack Park. I knew the NCT maps were inadequate. I mostly found my way, but lost the trail several times, bushwhacked, backtracked, did whatever I had to to get through.

There are currently 174 miles of North Country Trail in the Adirondack Park. Here's a long shot of the area. The medium green is the 6-million acre park.

Ever since this hike, Matt Rowbotham (NCTA GIS Specialist, eg. he does the maps) and I have been trying to cook up a way to get me back there to get good tracks of the trails without my needing to pay for everything on my own.

Last year, that was a no-go. This year, I applied for and got a NCTA Field Grant. It will cover some of the expenses.

Why? Now that Mary Coffin unexpectedly died last fall, it's pretty certain that there is no one who knows the current Adirondack Route as well as I do. I could wait until the organization has enough money to fully pay for this project. But the older I get, the less likely it is that I would be able to be the one to hike all these miles again. Insert ego. I, I, want to be the one who does this.

More why? People are getting increasingly interested in the Adirondack portion of the trail, but the maps are so inaccurate they are possibly dangerous. There are no accurate GPS tracks of hardly anything. We need to fix that.

Who? Bill and I will be doing this together.



What? We will be hiking and mapping 89 miles of off-road trail. Some of this will eventually change, but hey, the NCT changes all the time. Meanwhile, people need accurate maps. Part of what we are going to do will need to be backpacked because there is no road access. We are also going to do structure inventory (bridges, puncheon, etc)

Whether they look like this, or better.



We are being spotted in our endeavor by several people. Sarah (on the left), who hiked with me for three days in 2022.



and Joyce (left) who hosted Marie (right) and me last year. And Marie (of course)



And Diane, shown here completing her Hike 100 last year.



I am highlighting all of them, because they are chosing to travel quite a long distance to help in this endeavor. Yes, it will all count as volunteer time for us and them, but it's a huge project with a lot of moving parts that have to work smoothly because the locations are so remote.

I'll also get to meet the new NCTA Vermont-New York Regional Trail Coordinator, Will Brazill, who is spotting us one day.

So, perhaps you can sense my concerns about being in good enough shape to do this. There will be 5 days of backpacking (split into two sections), and the rest is day hiking. But it will be much more continual and intense hiking than I've done since the big hike and certainly since I've been sick. I'm feeling pretty confident that I won't endanger us by being unable to complete the task, but I'm not getting younger, eh? And I'd prefer not to be in continual pain.

Just as an aside, when I backpacked with David a couple of weeks ago, I asked him who was the oldest person he knows that backpacks. I was NOT fishing for compliments. He got a funny look on his face and said, "You."

As a final reminder of the Daks, and a glorious reminder of what may be ahead (if it's not a gray day when we get there), here is the view from Jones Hill. This will be on our last day!



Only 2.5 weeks to finish preparations, do a few more conditioning hikes, and then... WOW... it will be off to New York!

See Here I Go