Dennis Dixon is heading North!: NE 100 Highest

Thursday, Oct. 19, 2017 - The New England "100 Highest" - East Sleeper, New Hampshire:

There is always "another list". Having finished with the New England 4000 Footers (67 peaks), the "next list" is the New England Highest 100 - it consists of the "next highest" 33 peaks in New England. If you have been following my blog, you know that it is a "list I will not complete" - there was NO TRAIL to Fort Mountain (it is the far-upper-right black X). A new black X addition to the map (in the middle) is the Peak Above the Nubble - all its hiking descriptions include the word BUSHWACK!

The other 6 I have done (South Brother, Mount Coe, Mount Bigelow-South Horn, The Cannon Balls-NE Peak, Jay Peak, and Big Jay) are marked with red X's, and today's peak East Sleeper is in the purple circle. Today I hiked 13.31 miles in 5 hours 15 minutes:

The Google Earth view, looking up Downes Brook Trsil

The red in the upper-left is a hike I did in 2014 to Mount Whiteface. Here is a Google-Earth-screenshot of today's East Sleeper hike among other hikes I have done along the Kancamagus Highway (State Route 112) in New Hampshire:

After breakfast-in-Boston, I returned some cds in Winchester, then continued up 93 North. Stopped for coffee and gas in Tilton, New Hampshire, and to mail a postcard in Lincoln, New Hampshire. The Kanc has new blacktop, and is a BEAUTIFUL ROAD. Its a BEAUTIFUL day in New England! Parked at the trailhead, and started my hike at 12:25. Downes Brrok Trail is the "nicest trail I have ever been on":

(not "the BEST", or "the Most Rewarding", but just really really "NICE".)

The trail is generally an old logging road, running straight and true, and crosses over Downes Brook 9 TIMES:

and there are usually easy cairns to mark the brook-crossings:

Downes Brook Trail is 5.2 miles long, and for much of that goes right alongside Downes Brook. It ends at the Kate Sleeper Trail, which runs along the top of the ridge from Whiteface to the Pyramids:

There are some "blow-down" areas:

and one moss-covered, rock-climbing area

0.8 miles west, and you come to an unmarked path leading up to the right, to the summit (3:30 PM):

nice forest up there:

OK views from the blow-down areas:

But the hike was really about Downes Brook: looking upstream

and downstream

around 4 o'clock.

I made GREAT TIME heading down, and I finished the hike at 5:40. The sun was going down, and I was heading home!

Until I got 30 minutes down the road - my 2015 Honda Fit STOPPED WORKING as I was going up the hill next to Chocorua Lake:

It was like I "dropped the transmission" on the old BMW 2002tii (which I did coming out of Boston one Thursday morning on Route 1 North). The "engine" worked, but nothing was going to the wheels, either in Drive or in Reverse. I coasted back down the hill, with my red flashers on, and got to the side of the road. There was NO CELL PHONE SERVICE, so I just waited for 1 hour 30 minutes until a super-nice guy in a truck stopped and asked if I was ok. He let me use his phone (SURE, HE GETS RECEPTION!!), and I spoke with AAA. A tow guy was there 15 minutes later, and he towed me south to Tice's Automotive Services in Tamworth. It turns out that it is RIGHT NEXT DOOR to the Day's Inn I stayed at in August 2015!! So that's where I spent the night.

I'm certainly wondering how "car breaks down" fits into God's plans, but I still have to say "THANK YOU GOD for all these wonderful hiking adventures!!!"

Today, it was a morning for jazz:

Chick Corea Akoustic Band - Alive 1991 live album