go hike a mountain

We left for Mt. Greylock on Saturday at around 2pm. I had to work in the morning, so Jesse took care of an oil change and cleaned the car before our trip. We stopped for sandwiches on our way out, unlike the usual chippis, and took turns driving out to western Mass. When we got to the park headquarters, we realized we weren’t going to be able to visit the falls we were planning on seeing for an easy hike in the evening, so we drove to Pittsfield State Forest to pitch our tent and settle in for the night. You can read about our evening here.

After waking up the next morning, we drove the car to the bathroom and parked there to organize our packs and cook breakfast. I made some really plain oat bran hot cereal that we decided could use some cinnamon and maybe raisins the next time.

We had to drive through Cheshire and Adams to get to the trailhead and along the way, we stopped the car to take our first good look at what appeared to be Greylock.

We were taking the Thunderbolt Ski Trail to the Appalachian Trail to the top, and when we first saw the line of cutout trees in this view, we believed this was going to be what we were hiking up. We later realized the cutout must have been where the abandoned ski lift was. Greylock used to be popular for skiing until weather conditions became too unpredictable, apparently.The trailhead was relatively easy to find and there were no other cars parked when we arrived. We got geared up and left the parking lot at about 8am.

The trail description was very accurate. We were on the trail for about .25 mile and it suddenly became very steep. The trail had up to a 35 degree grade in some sections. Thankfully, most of the trail was well-shaded and had a few areas that leveled out so we could catch our breath without taking a major break. I don’t think the photographs come close to showing you how steep the trail was.

At some point at a bridge crossing, we took a break for water and a Mojo bar, but continued on, determined to reach the top. After climbing 2100 ft in less than 1.5 miles, we reached Hadley’s Lookout which gave us a beautiful view of Adams, the town we had to drive through to reach the trailhead.

We also noticed another hiker making his way up the mountain, the first person we had seen all morning. He had hiking poles, some sunglasses, a hat, and the clothes he was wearing. Nothing else. Not even water. I had already consumed 1.5 liters of water myself! He said he hiked in the area often and he like that this trail was nice and short. He also mentioned that he was hiking to all the high points of only the New England states. We didn’t happen to catch his name. He let us know we were close to where the trail met up with the AT and continued on his way. We gathered ourselves and pushed forward also.

The AT led us to the summit road that is closed for construction until 2009. When we crossed the road to continue, some more hikers were coming up behind us. We all made our way the remaining 100 ft to the top and set down our packs near the memorial tower.

It was nice and quiet at the summit and we spotted during our hour-long break a total of about 15 people. I can imagine how busy it may get when the summit road is open, but we pretty much had the whole place to ourselves. I found this metal scale model of the surrounding forest and I marked out the trail we took.

Treeson also had to stand on the mountain for a little while.

In my search for a benchmark for the high point, I found some information and markers for the AT.

There was also this rock with an inscription chiseled into it about Greylock.

I joined back up with Jesse at the tower and he was chatting with Fresh (trail name), a southbound AT thru-hiker. Fresh was traveling with trail mix and peanut butter, a hammock for sleeping, and about a 20 pound pack. Pretty lightweight for a 6 month trip, huh? We talked about our goals, about the AT and about high points. Archimedes (trail name), a section hiker, soon joined us at the tower. Some congratulations are in order because Archimedes will be completing his last section hike of the AT this Saturday! We all exchanged online journal information and Fresh and Archimedes conferred about the directions they were each heading. They bid us farewell and took off together down the path.

Now, because Jesse and I are both hoping to be stable enough to hike the AT in 2009 and are planning on going southbound, it was nice to be able to meet Fresh, who had already come over 600 miles to this point and still seemed to be sane. You can read about his journey here.

We hung out for a bit longer at the memorial tower and walked down a bit to check out some of the views.

On our way back to the Thunderbolt Ski Trail, we found a little warming shelter with this plaque on the outside.

About halfway down the Thunderbolt, we decided to take a detour and head down the Bellows Pipe Trail to see a waterfall and make a more gradual descent. The falls were nothing spectacular, but I almost fell into the water trying to get down to it.

We returned to the car at 1pm, meaning we took the steepest route possible, hiked a total of 5.5 miles, and did it in 5 hours, including our hour-long break at the summit. We were both tired and salty, but happy. We stopped at a few outdoor stores in town before hitting the Masspike and stopped for celebratory milkshakes at some point, too.

For our 5th high point, we traveled about 400 miles in the car and spent only $100, including gas. We didn’t exactly go scumbag this time, but at least we cooked two meals on the road, instead of stopping. Our next plan for a high point is not until Labor Day weekend, but I’m sure we’ll have adventures from now until then, so please continue checking our site!