I’ve written before about my love of ridgeline hikes, so it should come as no surprise that I love Franconia Ridge trail. Unfortunately this is a trail in danger of being loved to death. It’s one of the more spectacular sections of the AT, part of the increasingly popular pemi loop, and frequently featured on lists of the best hiking trails in the state/nation/world. In good weather and on weekends I avoid it, because the last thing I want when I venture into the mountains is to join a conga line of other hikers, but on a weekday with clouds flowing through Franconia notch, I took my chance.
It’s been a dry summer, but it was still quite a shock to see how little water was flowing over the cascades that give Falling Waters trail its name.
Cloudland, in particular, is a shadow of its usual self.
When I reached the ridge atop Little Haystack, the clouds sat heavy on the ridge top and in the valleys to either side
But as I began to hike the ridge, Mt. Lincoln began to emerge from the mist ahead of me.
As I moved along the ridge past Mt. Lincoln and toward Mt. Lafayette, the clouds continued to lift, first over the Pemi wilderness to the East,
and then in Franconia Notch to the West. I caught glimpses of Cannon cliffs briefly illuminated but still in the clouds.
At the summit of Mt Lafayette, I turned reluctantly off the ridge trail to hike down through the alpine zone. A fierce wind blew the last remaining clouds out of the notch, and by the time I reached tree line I was grateful for for the shade.
Greenleaf trail lived up to its name that afternoon, passing from the fir and spruce of the krumholtz to the birches further down the mountain
Eagle pass is the highlight of Greenleaf trail. Even before I could see the cliffs towering on either side of the trail I could smell the sun-struck granite. Don’t ask me to describe what warm granite smells like because I can’t put it into words, but it smells like hiking in Yosemite, or climbing on Cathedral Ledge or Artist’s bluff, or even exploring the slabs on Welch Dickey (all things that I highly recommend!)