Wittenberg, Cornell, Friday, Balsam Cap, Cornell, Wittenberg 04-16-11

[Hear the Footsteps]

On Saturday, Claudia our leader, Mr Universe Hiker , and I ventured out on an Albany ADK outing, ignoring the forecast for rain, to make a trip into the Burroughs Range. The route went over Wittenberg and Cornell from Woodland Valley before dropping down a bit to continue over the range that leads to Friday and Balsam Cap. From there we turned back north dropping into the valley of the east branch of the Neversink and then climbing out to the col on the trail between Cornell and Slide and backtracking to the parking area the way be came.

We started early, at first light, and benefited from a temperature in mid to upper 20’s most of the day. Though it was cloudy and windy with showers of sleet at times and very few views we kept saying how lucky we are to be out there on this cold day. Maybe it would be raining in the valley but up top conditions were so much better than we’d readied ourselves for.

The trail conditions out of Woodland valley were dry the snow mostly melted and barely any remnants of packed snow in the trail. The first snow we encountered was packed trail covered with little boughs of pine above the turnoff to Terrace Mt before the second rock ledge. From then on coverage on trail was good and firm and pine boughs gave good traction.

We made great time to both Wittenberg and Cornell. A whole winter of climbing in snowshoes was paying off as we’d conditioned ourselves for this trip. The only difficult terrain we encountered the whole day was at the Cornell crack. We’d not taken crampons and the crack was filled with hard ice, not passable for us. Fortunately, the snowpack was still enough to open up another ledge that bypasses the crack and having climbed that we were on our way.

The trip to Friday from just below Cornell went well. The trees were dense and our pace reduced by half. The snow off trail was firm about 18" depth, and though we occasionally post holed (well more than occasionally) there was no need to put on our snowshoes. Claudia found the canister on Friday with ease and then we were on our way to Balsam Cap.

Dropping down a bit off of Friday and turning south we found our way onto the ridge. Claudia said there were old showshoe tracks. Maybe by SkiDoc who was the last to sign-in at the canister two weeks before us. Along the way this changed over to a packed herd path that became our highway to Balsam Cap. The only hitch was when the highway stopped we couldn’t find the canister. It took us about 15 minutes of wandering around but finally we found it.

From there turned back north dropping down first through spruce then into open hardwood where there was a lot of open space in-between trees and also the mounds of snow. Making our way to the Neversink’s East Branch we found the water flowing strong.

It took longer than we expected to get out to the trail because the slope levels out substantially here. When we arrived it was far away from what I’ve considered the to be the col, actually about 0.2 mile toward Cornell from the GPS track. Checking the maps carefully it seems that the low spot on this section of trail is not located where the natural contours takes you climbing out of the valley.

By now there’s freezing rain and though we had had thoughts of climbing Slide too we decided the weather had finally turned against us and decided to return to the parking area. Along the way another delicate climb down the Cornell crack. We encounter two would be hikers turning back climbing down one of the ledges guarding Wittenberg. The trail from the Terrace mountain turnoff is wet and muddy. Near the conclusion we pass three young women also calling it a day. Finally as we get lower and closer to Woodland Creek the rain starts to pick up but it isn’t until we’re making our way back to Phoneica that encounter the hard rain.

The combination of early start and a lucky break in the forecast weather was the making of a great day for the three of us.

[sparty]

Nice one! The Neversink is special up there. - Doug

[niceguyted]

Sweet! That's a pretty impressive yo-yo. Love that dink.

[skidoc]

Originally Posted by Hear the Footsteps

Dropping down a bit off of Friday and turning south we found our way onto the ridge. Claudia said there were old showshoe tracks. Maybe by SkiDoc who was the last to sign-in at the canister two weeks before us. Along the way this changed over to a packed herd path that became our highway to Balsam Cap. The only hitch was when the highway stopped we couldn’t find the canister. It took us about 15 minutes of wandering around but finally we found it.

Sounds like you guys had a great day. My tracks didn't follow the ridge for long as I went down below the cliffs in the Friday/BC col and traversed east of/below the ridge. There were many paths through the spruce and fir but they led to the immediate vicinity of the canister when I was there on 3/30. Too bad you were thwarted by the weather, the steep back side of Slide really would have capped off an epic day!