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As part of the Sentinel festivities, I decided to approach Sentinel Mt. from the south starting from Rock & River, and then head out the trade route (Liscomb Brook). Much to their chagrin (as they later found out), Tom (TFR) and Laurie Rankin opted to join me. It was a little shy of 8.5 miles through the heart of the Sentinel Wilderness, but I knew a lot would be over "nice ground", as I have explored a bit back in there. Like all good Adirondack Bushwhacks, it was 75% pure joy and 25% pure hell.
It started out pretty miserable with light rain as we headed up the Jack Rabbit trail. We would be passing through the Black/Slide col which required about 700' of climbing in mostly open woods. By the time we approached the col, the rain was lightening to a drizzle, but we were well soaked (but warm in the mild temps. As we rounded into the col, we got the most pleasant surprise of the WHOLE trip. It was a lower lying pseudo-boggy area with open hardwoods. We found amazingly abundant clear signs of MOOSE habitation. From obvious MOOSE SCAT to too numerous to count RUTTING displays on just about every tree (some as high as 8 feet). I'm no wildlife expert, but it was clear that the whole area was home (at least part of the year) to a decent moose population of at least a few members, and probably a mating pair. WAAAAAY to much sign for a single bull. We saw it throughout the backside of the range.
we next descended about 250-300 feet of gentle slope into extraordinarily OPEN WOODS. A dream walk really as we headed for double stream cross with Clifford Brook and a parallel tributary leading toward the Sentinel/Kilburn col. The rain had stopped now, but the tree's refused to let us forget that it had. I had intended to do mostly ObNav and compass work most of the day, but with the wetness and gloominess, I said to hell with it and left the paper maps in the pocket and went ObNav/GPS. Navigationally, there really was no challenge all day, as the terrain was favorable and features given to each part of the hike were obvious.
Once we crossed the second brook at about 2600' feet, we immediately began the assault on Sentinel's summit 1250' feet above. At about 2800', we took our first sustained break of the day (3.5 hours in). The snow was in patches, but the woods still reasonable open. When the assault continued, we got up to about 3150' (still 700' below the summit), when the walls closed in. We then entered the most sustained, thickest, steepest section of conifers I've ever been in. Luckily, it was just thick and blowdown for the most part was reasonable. We actually made good time and avoided most of the cliffs. Other than the mental drain of the "snow-fence" thickness, this section (for me) wasn't too bad. Any physical effort was muted by the slowed progress of advance. We did hit one blowdown field as we came near the ridge that was easily skirted right. we made the ridge about .1 mile south of the summit proper. the walk over to the summit was open, but snow-filled, as I remembered and we reached the summit area about 5 hours after starting out.
The Sentinel gods, appreciative of our adoption efforts, rewarded us first with a majestic (and rare) partial SPRING UNDERCAST, and then a complete clearing, unveiling the full bounty of SENTINEL'S GREAT VIEWS. I had already seen them, but Laurie and Tom were happy. A quick lunch, had us on our way. I'd been this route before and I'm not sure if it was fatigue or wariness of the steep cliff bands I knew awaited on the ridge, but we ended up below and to the right. It actually worked out okay, as we easily skirted the cliffs, but it was thicker than I remember. The only other difficult spot was a massive blowdown field we encountered trying to correct over to the Liscomb Brook side. tiny conifers growing up through criss-crossed old deadfall made for a whale of a time. The deeper snow pockets thrown in certainly did not help. At this time, I knew I had to get out of the woods before Tom and Laurie killed me. We wiggled our way out and took the most open spots and came out a 120 yds S of the spotted car at Liscomb. We stayed within the wilderness line the whole way.
Not sure how much fun those guys had, but I really enjoyed their company and my time in there. We finished 8:05 after starting out. Not bad for an 8+ mile b-whack, some of which was painfully thick. Overall, it was a great, challenging and rewarding venture deep into the heart of the Sentinel Wilderness.
It started out pretty miserable with light rain as we headed up the Jack Rabbit trail. We would be passing through the Black/Slide col which required about 700' of climbing in mostly open woods. By the time we approached the col, the rain was lightening to a drizzle, but we were well soaked (but warm in the mild temps. As we rounded into the col, we got the most pleasant surprise of the WHOLE trip. It was a lower lying pseudo-boggy area with open hardwoods. We found amazingly abundant clear signs of MOOSE habitation. From obvious MOOSE SCAT to too numerous to count RUTTING displays on just about every tree (some as high as 8 feet). I'm no wildlife expert, but it was clear that the whole area was home (at least part of the year) to a decent moose population of at least a few members, and probably a mating pair. WAAAAAY to much sign for a single bull. We saw it throughout the backside of the range.
we next descended about 250-300 feet of gentle slope into extraordinarily OPEN WOODS. A dream walk really as we headed for double stream cross with Clifford Brook and a parallel tributary leading toward the Sentinel/Kilburn col. The rain had stopped now, but the tree's refused to let us forget that it had. I had intended to do mostly ObNav and compass work most of the day, but with the wetness and gloominess, I said to hell with it and left the paper maps in the pocket and went ObNav/GPS. Navigationally, there really was no challenge all day, as the terrain was favorable and features given to each part of the hike were obvious.
Once we crossed the second brook at about 2600' feet, we immediately began the assault on Sentinel's summit 1250' feet above. At about 2800', we took our first sustained break of the day (3.5 hours in). The snow was in patches, but the woods still reasonable open. When the assault continued, we got up to about 3150' (still 700' below the summit), when the walls closed in. We then entered the most sustained, thickest, steepest section of conifers I've ever been in. Luckily, it was just thick and blowdown for the most part was reasonable. We actually made good time and avoided most of the cliffs. Other than the mental drain of the "snow-fence" thickness, this section (for me) wasn't too bad. Any physical effort was muted by the slowed progress of advance. We did hit one blowdown field as we came near the ridge that was easily skirted right. we made the ridge about .1 mile south of the summit proper. the walk over to the summit was open, but snow-filled, as I remembered and we reached the summit area about 5 hours after starting out.
The Sentinel gods, appreciative of our adoption efforts, rewarded us first with a majestic (and rare) partial SPRING UNDERCAST, and then a complete clearing, unveiling the full bounty of SENTINEL'S GREAT VIEWS. I had already seen them, but Laurie and Tom were happy. A quick lunch, had us on our way. I'd been this route before and I'm not sure if it was fatigue or wariness of the steep cliff bands I knew awaited on the ridge, but we ended up below and to the right. It actually worked out okay, as we easily skirted the cliffs, but it was thicker than I remember. The only other difficult spot was a massive blowdown field we encountered trying to correct over to the Liscomb Brook side. tiny conifers growing up through criss-crossed old deadfall made for a whale of a time. The deeper snow pockets thrown in certainly did not help. At this time, I knew I had to get out of the woods before Tom and Laurie killed me. We wiggled our way out and took the most open spots and came out a 120 yds S of the spotted car at Liscomb. We stayed within the wilderness line the whole way.
Not sure how much fun those guys had, but I really enjoyed their company and my time in there. We finished 8:05 after starting out. Not bad for an 8+ mile b-whack, some of which was painfully thick. Overall, it was a great, challenging and rewarding venture deep into the heart of the Sentinel Wilderness.
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