imarchant
10-11-2006, 10:45 PM
I lead a small group of Boyscouts on an overnight traverse of the classic Wittenburg, Cornel and Slide Mountains. I had originally planned this a a two night loop, but due one of the other leaders not being able to go I had to make last minute changes. We had spotted a car at the Slide Mouintain PA. On the way up I noticed the Giant Ledge Parking area overflowing with cars. This was before 8:00 AM so it must have been a crowded night up there.
Four scouts and two leaders started from the Woodland Valley Parking area at about 9:30 AM. The weather was cool, but the sky was perfectly clear. At the trail register I noticed that a full page had signed in for Saturday. We made steady progress at a easy pace, since we were all carrying overnight packs. Shortly after 11:00 we reached the Terrace Mountain Trail junction. We took a break and ate a good snack for energy up the final steep mile. It took a little over an hour to reach the summit. We were rewarded with the best views I have experienced from that summit in my previous four ascents :tup: although the fall colors were not as vivid as I had hoped for. The defoiliation from this summers caterpillars obviuosly had taken its toll. The sun was warm and there was no wind and not a single cloud could be seen. We lounged and chatted on the summit. We had an interesting conversation with a man we met. He was an Earth Science teacher and talked with the boys about scholl. I also talked about the Catskills with him.
We still had a few more miles to cover, so we left around 2:00 PM. I noticed that the trail from the summit had been recently been side cut. This made the going easy. We continued on, eventually reaching the famous Cornell chute. We needed to remove our packs and pass them up to the top to enable the scramble up the tricky cleft in the rocks. Just as the last of our team completed the task a large group from Daytop Village, Swan Lake approached. They were all in jeans and tee shirts with little equipment. It was 3:00pm and 5 milles from either trail head. I could only wonderrt if they woul make it out by dark? Soon after we reached the summit of Cornell and stopped for another short break. Bythis time the boys were anxious to know how much further we had to go and we we would reach our camping spot. We set out again on the final leg of the day.
At 4:00 PM we reached our planned camping spot in the col between Cornell & Slide. I was a little worried that we would not find a good site on such a nice, holiday weekend, but we were the first party there. After claiming our spot, we started searching for the reported spring in the area. Shortly we located a small flow a few hundred feet from our camp site. The water was slighted discolored, but tasted fine after filtering. We set-up camp, collected fire wood and cooked our meals. There was a nice supply of cut fire wood at tyhe camp site. We also found a large bag filled with garbage hidden behind a rock. The previous campers must have though that there was weekly garbage service at the primative camp site. :rolleyes: We met a young man from Washington DC, who was doing the loop from Woodland Valley in the CCW direction. He worked in a Texas senators office. We learned about the day-to-day working in the office. By 8:30 it was dark, with an almost full moon rising. Everyone was tired and we retired for the night. There was no wind and there was total silence, except for an ocasional overhead airplane. Everone slept well.
It did not get light until after 7:00 AM. We slept a little later than I had planned. We cooked breakfast, cleaned up, filter more water and got ready to depart. We also divided up and packed out the large bag of garbage we had found. "Do a good turn daily." Shortly after 8:30 we departed for Slide. I took about an hour and a half to reach the summit including a stop to filter water from the excellent spring at the base of the ladders.
Monday was warmer than Sunday and we enjoyed the summit to ourselves for almost 1/2 an hour. I had a planned parking lot arrival of Noon so we headed on. We headed down the trail. The foliage on this side of the mountain was the best I had seen all weekend. The beech leaves were all a bright yellow color. We reached the parking area as planned and started our return drive.
As I reflect on this trip I am pleased how well it went. How well behaved the boys were. While we crossed paths with quite a few people over the two days I was still surprised we were able to enjoy the solitude of nature for two of the niced days of the year.
Pictures (http://outdoors.webshots.com/album/548011943BFKhzW?start=18)
Four scouts and two leaders started from the Woodland Valley Parking area at about 9:30 AM. The weather was cool, but the sky was perfectly clear. At the trail register I noticed that a full page had signed in for Saturday. We made steady progress at a easy pace, since we were all carrying overnight packs. Shortly after 11:00 we reached the Terrace Mountain Trail junction. We took a break and ate a good snack for energy up the final steep mile. It took a little over an hour to reach the summit. We were rewarded with the best views I have experienced from that summit in my previous four ascents :tup: although the fall colors were not as vivid as I had hoped for. The defoiliation from this summers caterpillars obviuosly had taken its toll. The sun was warm and there was no wind and not a single cloud could be seen. We lounged and chatted on the summit. We had an interesting conversation with a man we met. He was an Earth Science teacher and talked with the boys about scholl. I also talked about the Catskills with him.
We still had a few more miles to cover, so we left around 2:00 PM. I noticed that the trail from the summit had been recently been side cut. This made the going easy. We continued on, eventually reaching the famous Cornell chute. We needed to remove our packs and pass them up to the top to enable the scramble up the tricky cleft in the rocks. Just as the last of our team completed the task a large group from Daytop Village, Swan Lake approached. They were all in jeans and tee shirts with little equipment. It was 3:00pm and 5 milles from either trail head. I could only wonderrt if they woul make it out by dark? Soon after we reached the summit of Cornell and stopped for another short break. Bythis time the boys were anxious to know how much further we had to go and we we would reach our camping spot. We set out again on the final leg of the day.
At 4:00 PM we reached our planned camping spot in the col between Cornell & Slide. I was a little worried that we would not find a good site on such a nice, holiday weekend, but we were the first party there. After claiming our spot, we started searching for the reported spring in the area. Shortly we located a small flow a few hundred feet from our camp site. The water was slighted discolored, but tasted fine after filtering. We set-up camp, collected fire wood and cooked our meals. There was a nice supply of cut fire wood at tyhe camp site. We also found a large bag filled with garbage hidden behind a rock. The previous campers must have though that there was weekly garbage service at the primative camp site. :rolleyes: We met a young man from Washington DC, who was doing the loop from Woodland Valley in the CCW direction. He worked in a Texas senators office. We learned about the day-to-day working in the office. By 8:30 it was dark, with an almost full moon rising. Everyone was tired and we retired for the night. There was no wind and there was total silence, except for an ocasional overhead airplane. Everone slept well.
It did not get light until after 7:00 AM. We slept a little later than I had planned. We cooked breakfast, cleaned up, filter more water and got ready to depart. We also divided up and packed out the large bag of garbage we had found. "Do a good turn daily." Shortly after 8:30 we departed for Slide. I took about an hour and a half to reach the summit including a stop to filter water from the excellent spring at the base of the ladders.
Monday was warmer than Sunday and we enjoyed the summit to ourselves for almost 1/2 an hour. I had a planned parking lot arrival of Noon so we headed on. We headed down the trail. The foliage on this side of the mountain was the best I had seen all weekend. The beech leaves were all a bright yellow color. We reached the parking area as planned and started our return drive.
As I reflect on this trip I am pleased how well it went. How well behaved the boys were. While we crossed paths with quite a few people over the two days I was still surprised we were able to enjoy the solitude of nature for two of the niced days of the year.
Pictures (http://outdoors.webshots.com/album/548011943BFKhzW?start=18)