Santanoni Range

January 28, 2012

Twelve of us rented a couple fantastic cabins in Newcomb. We awoke at 05:00 and got ready. Krista and Glenn drove off early to climb Blake and Colvin while the rest of us intended to spend the day in the Santanonis. Debbie, Pat, Liesha, and Ivan drove ahead earlier to scout the trail, while Rob, Katharina, Marc, Matt, Isa, and myself followed shortly thereafter. The snow conditions were good thanks to the storm the night before so we strapped on skis and sped off down the approach road. At the trail turnoff we decided to separate into a fast team consisting of Debbie, Marc, and myself, and a normal speed team of the others. We left and skied another 500m or so until we decided to switch to walking at the ladder. The others caught up and we said a second goodbye as we began walking. We went all the way to the express trail on well trodden path. No one had been down the express route so we switched to snowshoes here. A father and son team came up behind us and decided to follow too. We did not get far as Santanoni Brook was raging, unfrozen, and uncrossable. After unsuccessfully scouting for a place to cross for a few minutes, we returned to the main trail just as the other group arrived. We climbed up to Bradley Pond, and then the normal Panther Brook route up to the ridgeline. The trail was well broken so no navigation was required and we could focus mainly on moving quickly. At one point Debbie dropped her camera. She did not know where, so confident that someone else would find it we continued on. After a brief break at Times Square, we pushed on along the ridge to Santanoni Peak. Lots of ice on the trees made travel difficult with some sections having to be crawled under the bending branches. As we climbed the final few feet to the summit I smelled tobacco smoke, and sure enough we met a fellow smoking a cigarette on the top of the mountain. The view was fabulous as the day was clear. After a short break we descended and ran into the father/son team who had indeed found Debbie's camera. Another while later we met our other team. Back at Times Square, we sat down for lunch. Debbie announced that she was not feeling couchie today, so we decided to climb Panther next. An older fellow returning from Couchie sat down with us for lunch too, and declared that Couchsachraga was ripe for the picking today. This got Marc thinking as we scooted over to Panther which only took a few minutes. The final scramble would have been better with crampons, but we got by on snowshoes. Summit stay was brief as it was windy up here. On the way down we met two women who were happy to hike back with Debbie, so Marc and I decided to tackle Couchie. We also met the smoking dude again, and Debbie ended up hiking some of the way back with him as well. We made fast progress down off the ridge, making lots of jokes about climbing down to get to a summit with an unpronouceable name, which does not even meet the requirements to be on the 46er list, but is there anyway. An hour later we found ourselves on top of the Couch, looking back up from where we came from. Going back was harder as it was mostly uphill, but we still finished this off in another hour. Yet another break at Times Square and we began descending. I commented that we were probably the last party on the mountain as we had been hiking alone for some time. About two minutes later we passed a couple which turned out to be the last party. Going down was fast and we dropped the first thousand feet in about twenty minutes. The slog from Bradley Pond seemed to take forever as we were now getting tired. At long last we arrived back at our skis, strapped them, flipped on headlamps, and flew down the road. The icy snow was fast and my light batteries were getting low, but we made it back without mishap. Arrived back to an empty parking lot just under an eleven hour time. Back at the cabins we had a great amount of excellent food, beer, and excellent company with good friends.

Breakfast at five am.