Allen

November 2, 2019

Twelfth annual ACC Ottawa November hike. This year we had eleven people leave on three hikes from the Keene Valley Hostel. Paul led a duo to climb Redfield and Cliff, Ray led a group of five to climb the Wolfjaws, and finally I led a group of four to tackle Allen. I watched the weather like a hawk all week as there was a major storm on Thursday that dumped a lot of rain. This was coupled with a lot of wind on Friday. Forecast for Saturday was ideal, so we drove down Friday afternoon, and despite a small detour due to a downed power line, arrived unscathed in Keene Valley.

Early morning we convoyed to Upper works in two cars, dodging the occasional tree blocking up to a complete lane of the road, but all obstacles were easily driven around. We thought that this hike might be over before it began if the Upper Works was blocked by a fallen tree, but other than some branches, nothing major prevented us from arriving at the trailheads. Said goodbye to the Redcliff team, as Erik, Cole, Duncan and I flipped on our headlamps and wandered down to the Hudson River. The river was high, flooding the trail under about fifteen centimeters of water, so we bushwhacked around this until we reached the bridge which we discoverred was listing to one side, the fencing broken and full of debris. The river must have been more than a meter higher during the storm... impressive! I inspected the main cables (fully intact), spent some time bouncing the bridge to ensure that it was structurally sound, and then declared it safe enough. We crossed one at a time to the other side and found the stairs tipped over, so just walked down the rock using the overturned steps as a handrail.

Listing bridge over the Hudson.

We hiked on quickly, wanting to move as fast as possible on the flat approach trail. After rounding Lake Jimmy, the headlamps switched off and we saw a beautiful sunrise lighting up the Santanonis. We arrived to the Opalescent river and spotted some broken lumber on the far bank. We joked about that being the bridge, and continued hiking. A short while later we came to the crossing and to our dismay, the bridge was just simply gone! A few planks and broken cables are all that remain of this new bridge. Rather unfortunate as this was replaced fairly recently since the last time it washed out in 2011. Well the river was not too high, and we had brought water shoes in case Skylight brook needed a ford, so we stripped our boots and pants and forded the river without too much difficulty. Erik, being the shortest of our team had the most trouble, but made it safely across, though not without soaking his undershorts. We met the only person of the day here, and it just figures that my only interaction with a fellow hiker involved shouting across a river while not wearing pants. The other hiker declared that he was going home as we dressed ourselves to continue on.

The corpse of the Opalescent bridge.

It must have taken some force to bend this turnbuckle.

The hike along the DEC trail was flooded in parts, not by the storm but by some industrious beavers. The herd path was in fairly good shape, though a few extra branches littered the path thanks to the wind. No major blowdown though. As we descended towards skylight brook we somehow lost the trail, following an erroded leafy runnel created no doubt from storm run-off. Upon realizing the error, instead of backtracking I pulled the compass out and switched into bushwhack mode. A few hundred meters later we crossed the trail again and then arrived at Skylight brook. My fears of this crossing were unfounded as this was easily rock hopped, after which we sat down for a break to refuel before the climb.

Gravel clearing... start of the herd path.

Crossing Skylight Brook.

After the long flat walk the climb was a welcome sight. We followed the path along Allen brook which was very pretty with lots of water cascading down. In places the ice formations were quite beautiful, and as we climbed higher the trail became more and more icy. Maybe about 100 meters below the slide the trail became icy enough for spikes, and the slide itself was covered in a 2 cm thick coating of ice with water running underneath. Crampons would not have been overkill here, but we got by in the spikes by kicking steps and making our way carefully across and then upwards to hit a trail that ran up parallel to the remainder of the slide. Above the slide there was a lot more mountain than I remember, but finally we hit ridge and scampered the last little bit to the summit. After a few photos with the sign we wandered over to the lookout and sat down to lunch. Unfortunately the peaks had their summits in the clouds, but we were glad to be here anyway. Cole broke out a flask of bourbon which warmed the soul in the cool wind.

A bit of ice on the slide.

Summit.

View... a bit truncated.

Descending was a lot easier than expected as the ice had melted noticably in our brief absence. I am not quite sure of the physics going on here though, as Erik's underpants which he had tied to the back of his pack in a futile attempt to dry them had frozen into a solid stiff mass. Hydraulic states of matter not withstanding we appreciated the easy descent, and were happy to de-spike once the ice ran out. Another quick break at the bottom beside Skylight Brook and we began the long slog home. Other than a few false trails which we noticed quickly, we stayed on track and finally arrived at the Opalescent and prepared to ford again. An easier crossing this time as the water level had gone down noticeably in the few hours we had been gone, but halfway across I looked up and spy Erik, wearing absolutely nothing but a backpack. I then looked up at the far bank, expecting to see a troupe of girl scouts ariving on scene, but alas we were fortunately alone this time. After dressing and warming up with another shot from Cole's flask we hiked on.

Lots of mountain ash berries.

As we neared Lake Jimmy the headlamps were switched on. Finally the roar of the Hudson was heard, and we were quite happy to see that the damaged bridge was still there, which avoided this turning into an epic. In fact the bridge was in better shape than before as someone had cleaned up the fence railings a bit, and the stairs had been moved back into place. The flooded trail was now dry as the Hudson had also dropped noticeably, and we hiked that last few steps to the parking area with smiles on our faces after an 11.5 hour day. A long drive back to Keene Valley where we arrived to a dark hostel, us being the first group in. The Wolfjaw team arrived a few minutes later, completing a loop using the hostel itself as the trailhead, and the Redcliff team arrived an hour after that, tired but successful as well.

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