Lower Wolf Jaws

Trip Report:  A Stubborn hike up Lower Wolf Jaw

Dates:          September 30, 2000

Team:          Mike, Teena, & Rick Allen

Location:     Adirondack High Peaks

Destination: Lower Wolf Jaw (4,175') & Upper Wolf Jaw (4,185')

Approach:    Ausable Club parking to trailhead

Author:         Mike

Summary:

This was our second hiking trip in the High Peaks with Rick. He joined us for a trip up Cascade Mountain last year, and then hiked Giant Mountain (solo) the following day. This year, Rick joined us for another 2-day excursion. The hike to Lower Wolf Jaws was a stubborn one with flare-ups of Mike's knee, Teena's foot, and Rick's hamstring hobbling our efforts. As a result, it took over five hours to hike to the crowded summit. At the junction point between Upper and Lower Wolf Jaws, it was decided to hike Lower Wolf Jaw first. We made this decision more for strategic reasons than we did for any other. Strategically, we felt that if we didn't have time to hike both, Lower Wolf Jaw was the better choice to hike NOW since it was slightly more out of the way to hike in the future. Upper Wolf Jaw could more easily be combined with a second mountain hike in the future without having to traverse old ground, or so Mike's 46'er wannabe reasoning went.

Details:

It was a good day for hiking as the skies were mostly clear and the temperatures reached as high as 70 degrees Fahrenheit. We parked at the Ausable club entrance around 8:00am, and proceeded to hike from the trailhead behind the Ausable club immediately.

Within a half hour, Mike's knee (patellar tendonitis) started to act up. So we increased the number of rest stops. This was good since Rick was nursing a poor hamstring acquired at one of our softball games earlier in the summer. After two hours at a leisurely pace, Teena's foot flared up as well. Our hiking was quite the merry event after that since we each had an ailment, and our pace was so slow.

We finally reached the junction point between Upper & Lower Wolf Jaws after nearly five hours of hiking. No one complained. Why should we? It was a nice pace and it was a beautiful day. The team decided to hike Lower Wolf Jaw based on Mike's strategic rationale… Sounds of rebellion were in the air however as the rag-tag beat up team reached a summit that was crowded by both trees and other hikers. Through the trees, there was only one clear view from the summit, but like the city streets we sought refuge from, it was clogged by people.  We took a number and waited our turn in line to take pictures from the open ledge. Then we found the only piece of open real estate - a most uncomfortable boulder slanting down into the trees on the north face - and sat down to eat our lunch and nurse our wounds. Amazingly, our trip down was much easier. Was there something in the food?  We bought sandwiches at a little Deli in Keane Valley with such delicacies as vegetable bread.  Was there an added benefit - a special ingredient or elixir baked into that wonderful bread? Or maybe the calls from a couple of pub burgers and mugs of micro-brewed beer motivated our pace!  Regardless… We finished our descent in about 3.5 hours, and the ailments that slowed our initial ascent all but disappeared. We drove back to Lake Placid where we gulped down the latest nut brown beers and fed on burgers at the Lake Placid Brew Pub

What will we remember?  Awesome weather, beat up bodies, and great conversation will get you to the summit, but slowly.  The Lower Wolf Jaw summit views were a bit of a let down - after all, a good part of the reason we hike is for the views.  However, that's what happens when we "wing it" since we prefer to experience the views without reading about them first!  J

Pictures:

TBD - Converting all the old trip reports into this blog 

Table Top & Phelps - Aborted

Trip Report:  An Electrifying Hike to Table Top and Phelps

Dates:          September 2, 2000

Team:          Mike & Teena

Location:     Adirondack High Peaks

Destination: Table Top (4,427') & Phelps (4,161')

Approach:    Adirondack Loj trailhead

Author:         Mike

Summary:

We set up our campsite on Friday night at Whispering Pines campground after the obligatory 5-hour ride from Rochester. On Saturday (Sept. 2), we attempted to hike Tabletop (4,427') & Phelps (4,161') mountains, but were turned away by some very nasty thunderstorms and torrential rainfall once we made it to Indian Falls. We visited our home away from home, Lake Placid, again on the rainy Sunday that followed, and departed to go home on Monday morning.

Details:

I've been told that you learn something every time you hike in the Adirondacks. On this trip, we learned that there is an insidious nature to mountain storms… Somewhere around 3,500' we hiked into a dense, wet fog. In reality, it was a cloud. And, as we soon learned with a blinding flash, static crackle, and deafening roar… It was a thundercloud!

There we were…  Standing just shy of Indian Falls, ready to begin the last leg of the ascent up Tabletop Mountain. Our intentions were to reach the summit of Tabletop, and then visit the top of Phelps on the way back to the Loj parking lot. In an instant, our dreams for the day would be all wet. While hiking to the Indian Falls landmark, we entered a cloud - not uncommon for hiking in these parts. There wasn't anything particularly special or menacing about this cloud - or perhaps we need to attend an outdoors clinic ("How to identify thunderstorms while hiking"). Not even a rumble was heard to announce what was to come…

Suddenly, our hair stood on the well-defined goose bumps coating our skin as an electrostatic charge filled the air around us. Then… The instantaneous blinding flash and deafening roar of an uncomfortably close lightening strike turned our nerves to jelly! The air became liquefied as torrential rain fell upon us, and the trail began to disappear under newly formed streams of water. With more haste than precaution, we scampered down the hill like gazelle! Again & again, crackling zaps of static electricity with brilliant flashes and deafening rumbles accompanied us in our rain-soaked scramble to Marcy Dam. Our wonderful weekend excursion of high peaks hiking became a desperate race to safety. Ironically, as soon as we arrived at the Marcy Dam campsite, the thunder subsided into distant rumbling echoes. The rain still fell in torrents however, and we sloshed our way through the rest of our hike back to our car at the Loj parking lot. Once back, Mike took great pleasure in drawing cartoonish images in the trail register of lightening bolts "zooting" merry hikers! Despite the rain, we still cooked our steaks and drank Merlot at the campsite under the handy tarp we erected the night before.  We comfortably slept that night atop our queen-sized air mattress in our family-sized tent under the pitter-patter of constant heavy rainfall.  It doesn't get much better than that.  Since Sunday was also very wet, we decided to head into Lake Placid where we purchased winter boots for Teena, and "antique" snowshoes for our sports wall back home.  We departed on Monday morning after breaking camp and packing away our thoroughly soaked tent & supplies.

Overall, the trip was a roaring blast!

After all, how many times in life do you get to experience events that are so awesome that you are accused of exaggerating their stories even though you've toned down the truth somewhat?

Pictures:

TBD - Converting all the old trip reports into this blog