Not the summit, but still a spectacular view!
In somewhat typical fashion for our family (beginning our time in New Hampshire with a bang (read: high mileage)), this trip started out with us attempting back to back 4,000 footers. Why? I'm not totally sure. Perhaps we were feeling energetic having recently arrived, or more likely, the questionable weather forecast forced us to tackle some of our biggest hikes right away, before the impending rain. Now, I know what you are thinking. Yes, some hikes are completely doable in rain. Soft trail, even trails that have tree roots are manageable, but steep and rocky terrain becomes dangerous in wet weather. As do trails that feature cliffs or are otherwise described as "ledge-y." I'd imagine that is what actually motivated us to check another of the 48 4,000 footers off of our list so soon: to take the weather out of the equation.
We settled on the East Peak of Mt. Osceola. Most people hike both the main summit and the East Peak (both are 4,000 footers on the list of 48) in one outing, but Mt. Osceola was actually the very first hike we did on our first full day in New Hampshire, when I didn't even know there was a list of 48. East Osceola also has the reputation for being uninspiring. We heard about it firsthand chatting with a couple last summer while sitting atop Mt. Osceola's main summit. They had just returned having hiked over to the East summit and I'm paraphrasing here but their description of the summit was essentially "meh" with a side of "not worth it." In fairness, the summit of East Osceola is wooded and pales in comparison to Osceola's grand, sweeping views (look back on our original ascent here).
In hindsight, it wasn't surprising that in weighing "meh" and "not worth it" we took a hard pass on continuing on to East Osceola that first day.
This trip, however, East Osceola's relative "ease" and geographic "closeness" made the decision for us. You only have two choices to summit East Osceola. First, would be by hiking Osceola's main summit again and continuing on to East Osceola and turning around and coming back for a total of 8.4 miles round trip. That's a lot considering we arrived and hiked about 7 or 8 miles, followed by Mt. Moosilauke the next day which was another 8 or 9 miles. Three 8 milers in a row sounded a bit much, so we decided on the alternate approach which requires a 45 min drive around the other side of the mountain but gave us a modest 5.6 mile hike roundtrip.
It seemed like the better choice. Alright, only 5 and a half-ish miles to a "meh" summit. The first 1.3 miles of the Greeley Ponds trail from the Kancamagus Highway are easy-going with some fun stream crossings and a few bridges over boggy sections.
One of the first water crossings
"I do my hair toss..."
After 1.3 miles, we arrived at the Mt. Osceola trail where the grade gets pretty steep pretty fast, but all in all remains manageable.
Only 1.5 miles to go! Score!
Pink Lady's Slipper
That is until the trail begins a "very steep .5 mile climb up a slide" (a slide is a landslide where rock has broken away from the mountainside).
The boys navigating the huge portions of broken rock
It continues on...
Imagine climbing a half a mile of such pitch.
If you are thinking, "that sounds bananas," it was. My poor husband got vertigo like symptoms as the view back down, if you made the mistake of looking back down, was a little disconcerting to say the least.
The hubs poor knees (he has had two knee surgeries) were giving him trouble as well. He eventually made the right decision and opted to stop and head back to the bottom and wait for us there. Honestly, even if he had continued the climb, he would have had to descend back down all of the slides and
ledge-y sections and that is FAR MORE DANGEROUS then ascending. Rhys was very nervous and almost bailed out with his father, but thankfully daddy was able to gently convince him to carry on. It was actually R's competitiveness that truly made him continue as he didn't want me to "beat" him by having summited more of the 4,000 footers than him.
The trail then continues to climb "steep, rough pitches across broken ledges. Trail remains steep, ending with slippery scramble up (so steep it requires the use of both hands to climb up) eroded gully..." (The quotes are taken from Smith and Dickerman's The 4,000 footers of the White Mountains- who describe the trail a lot better than I ever could.)
You can see a tiny sliver of Upper Greeley Pond
The view from this ledge was gorgeous but there was still a steep climb, and then some, to go.
Sadly, we did indeed continue on without daddy, and, as the boys got used to scrambling, they really began enjoying themselves. I was thrilled at how careful and precise they were both being. I even had the urge to rock climb satiated by all the scrambling. Nick declared it his favorite hike of all time, and Rhys said he wanted to do ten 4,000 footers (in total) before we went back home. That's not happening with all we have planned (and all the predicted rain), but yay! It was fun, and guys, there were insane views. Absolutely gorgeous...just not at the summit and that is ok. When we finally made our way to the summit cairn, we took some summit shots, ate, and made our way back down with stories to tell 😏
Silly Summit Selfie-
Crane Kick Prep (Leftie and Righty versions)
And the Requisite-Mom-Pleasing Summit Shot
And please note the descent:
Sharp angles but unbeatable views
This is known as the "Booty Scooty"
(Bonus points if you know that reference- you are likely a boy mom (parent!)
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