Esther

May 3, 2026

Another good rest with only the occasional rainy lullaby, I awoke at first light to a cloudy but brightening sky. Fixed up a quick breakfast, packed my things and drove up to the ASRC to take a shot at Esther before my drive home. Today was cold, but at least it was not raining. There even seemed to be a promise of a view as the weather looked like it was going to improve. I parked behind a truck adorned with many stickers, several of them proclaiming High on Life. Pretty sure this vehicle belonged to the famous Nancy LaBaff and I laced up my boots quickly, hoping I would get to meet her on the trail.

The climb up Marble mountain went quickly and I stopped at the lookout for to catch my breath before continuing on. Climbing a little bit higher, the first traces of snow appeared. At 1000m it started to get icy and I even put my spikes on at one point which make negotiating the icy slabs easier. As I approached the Esther junction, I spied the old herd path, untravelled, and covered in fresh snow. I thought, what the heck, let's see what it looks like these days. The first bit was passable, though somewhat hard to follow, but then a large field of nasty blowdown blocked all traces of the old trail. Not wanting to mess around with that, I bushwhacked back to the main trail and followed that to the marked junction to Esther. I had put away the microspikes during the brief side excursion as they were not useful in the fresh snow.

The marbley trail up Marble Mountain

View from Marble Mountain summit

Snowy trail

Obligatory photo to document the deteriation of the old shed

The path out to Esther was in good shape. In fact this "unmarked and unmaintained" trail was better marked and better maintained than the officially marked and maintained trail I took up Whiteface yesterday. The spikes remained in the pack, for this stretch. I met three other folk along the trail, all returning from the summit and stopped to chat briefly with each. At the summit the sun came out, and I enjoyed my sandwich basking in its warm embrace. The view of Whiteface however remained obscured by clouds.

Despite the warning, the trail was in great shape

A fleeting view of the big one as I approach the summit

Proof that I was there

The return journey was fairly uneventful. Did not need to put the spikes back on as the ice was melting off as the day warmed. At one point the unsettled sky threw some more graupel at me, but this was a very half hearted attempt at slowing me down compared to the stuff from yesterday.

Reached the car after 4.5 hours of walking and drove home to a warming day and sunny skies. Unfortunately did not manage to cross paths with High on Life, but found out later from the Adirondack face-palm page that indeed she was out on the mountain too.

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