Pyramid, Gothics, Armstrong, UWJ, LWJ

[Gray Ghost]

My dad, bro, TT (46er 2018 if I'm not mistaken), and I started out from St. Huberts and ascended the Weld trail. My dad and TT headed over to Sawteeth since dad hadn't done it yet, and TT needed it for his second round, and my brother and I went to chill on Pyramid for a while, since we already had the Saw, and wanted to spend some extra time on Pyramid and Gothics. The views from both summits were great, though it was just a tad hazy. We zipped down to Armstrong, then UWJ. I thought the descent from Armstrong was pretty rugged....tougher than I expected. When we reached Wolf Jaw Notch, we had to decide whether to zip up LWJ too. My dad said hell no; it was his first hike of the year and he was completely bushed, even it was only another mile round trip. I gave him the keys to my truck and he headed down the Wedge trail, while my bro, TT, and I zipped up LWJ. I was pretty exhausted at this point, but knew I would regret it later had I skipped this short, easy climb. My brother blitzed down ahead of TT and I to catch my dad, which he did about halfway down the Wedge trail. He is one fast hiker. I felt much better after descending LWJ and gulping more gatorade. I really liked the Wedge trail, and felt is was one of the easier trails I have descended in the HPs. TT and I cut over the West River Trail, where my brother had scratched some messages for us in the dirt...arrows, initials and such. It made us chuckle. We cut across the East Branch and picked up the road....boy I hate walking on that thing...and swiftly made it back to the truck. My dad and brother had already ripped open the cooler when we got there. A bottle of Saranac Adirondack Amber along with some sharp cheese, crackers and pepperoni (thanks to TT) topped off what was a challenging, but completely awesome day of hiking. Fifteen down, thirty-one to go.

[eddie]

The youngsters need to go easy on the Dads.

Sounds like another great ADK high peak experience.