This was indeed a great summit. There are excellent views over the Lakes of the Clouds area directly below, of Mount Washington beyond, of the much of the Northern and Southern Presidentials, in fact. We now had beautiful late-day sun, adding to the scenic effect.
So, this was it - number 48. All of the 4000-footers in New Hampshire now completed; another milestone along the way to the real goal, that of the Northeast 111. It was now time to turn my attention to the nine remaining 4000-footers in Maine I had yet to do.
courtesy JInnes
Towards the Crawford Path
Rather than head back down to the Lakes of the Clouds area via the way we came up, we decided to continue over the top of Monroe and join up with the Appalachian Trail down on the Crawford Path just west of the peak. This would allow us to make a little but very scenic loop back underneath the southeast face of Monroe. Usually Asmir is the one to nix ideas regarding extra distance, but in this case he was up for it. So, we did just that. After an extra twenty minutes of so of walking through sublimely beautiful alpine meadows, we arrived back at the Lakes of the Clouds hut, and stopped in for a break.
Approaching Lakes of the Clouds Hut
Interior, Lakes of the Clouds
After availing ourselves of the cold water and the 1-dollar cookies available in the hut, we headed back out, cognizant of the fact our late start meant that we had to be careful not to run out of light. The next (and last) leg of our hike took us down the Ammonoosuc Ravine Trail - a direct but fairly steep way to connect from the alpine terrain up here at the hut down to trailhead access below.
We had speculated that recent rains combined with the fact that the Ammonoosuc Ravine trail seemed to run parallel to the bottom of the ravine's drainage might mean especially good natural water features, and we were quite right. Very soon after a stretch of steep open slabs, the Ammonoosuc Ravine trail started crossing and re-crossing the narrow trickle of water in the bottom of the ravine. Combined with the soft spongy moss that was plentiful up here, we were treated to a nearly continuous display of scenic little flumes, cascades, and waterfalls. Asmir is very appreciative of water features (so much so that he has coined the term 'waterage'), and so he was highly impressed with all of this.
The 'waterage' situation only got better, owing the ever-increasing flow of water in the bottom of the drainage as we descended. There really is an impressive variety of beautiful cascades and waterfalls along this trail!
After well over a thousand feet of descending past various cascades, flumes, and falls, the trail finally veered away from the bottom of the ravine. We came to an impressive area of tree blowdown, which on closer inspection seemed to be the result of a large and recent avalanche that had come down through this section of the ravine - possibly even from the previous winter. The blowdown from the avalanche continued for a considerable distance down-valley, and at times reached far enough over to impinge slightly on the trail (any such sections had already been cleared out, but you could still see where these areas were).
