Cascade, Porter and Blueberry thru-hike February 2022

 Josh and I met through the fan art community on Facebook, both of us collection pins and posters for the Grateful Dead and Phish. We ended up spending countless hours with other like-minded folks (shout out to Les, Patsy, Dre, Megan, Cecily and everybody else) bonding over music, sharing our lives. Josh is a Plattsburgh dude though and if there's one thing more loved than jambands in the 'Burgh scene it's the Adirondacks. Josh had been getting serious about completing the 46 so our conversations shifted to hiking, gear and trip planning. The scene was set for a hike. (2024 edit: Josh has long since completed the 46 and keeps going, finding much joy and beauty in the Adirondack Mountains)

In mid December of 2021, our dog Koda passed away peacefully at the age of 11. We're still reeling from it and not a day goes by where I don't notice the void that his electric presence occupied. When Koda came into our lives in 2012, he was 2 and an absolute lunatic. Super high energy, super high play/ prey drive and I just didn't know what it would take to help him (and us by proxy) find peace. So I did the thing I knew brought me peace: run in the woods until we were joyous exhausted puddles of goo. So Koda and I went to the Albany Pine Bush or Thacher Park, going on longer and harder hikes until I thought he was ready for the high peaks.

Koda's first high peak hike: Porter and Cascade from Marcy Field

In November of 2012 we climbed Porter and Cascade from Marcy field and had a wonderful day in the woods. When we got home Koda was tired and at peace. A peace that lasted for days after. We had found what he needed. I felt very fortunate. It was what I needed as well so we could share it. We climbed Giant from the Hopkins Mountain trail next then steadily began working on his 46 until we completed it on Algonquin in 2014. Our deepest bond was formed and shared in the woods so I wanted to celebrate his life by going on a hike. What better a place to go for closure than our first big climb together?

Rest easy sweet pup. You've earned it. 

Things seemed to be lining up nicely. I wanted to do a high peak for my 40th birthday. I hadn't climbed one since 2017, opting to dedicate my time to my incredible family. And maintaining this frickin 115 year old house that seems to crumble in a new place as soon as I finished the repair on the previous place. Josh was able to carve out a day as well and invited his friend Sydney along for the ride. I wanted to hike as an out and back from Marcy field, which is the route Koda and I took. Josh suggested we do a thru-hike, starting at the Cascade trail head and finishing at Marcy field. Which was great idea and was likely the deciding factor in us actually making it through this hike. More on that later.

So we started our morning a bit after 5 in -14 degree temps. While on paper it was brutally cold, we all felt pretty good getting started. We had a great motivation for our ascent: reaching Cascade for Sunrise. The early morning sky was crystal clear and I spent a good amount of the climb with my headlamp off soaking up the stars and moonlight. When we stopped to catch our breathe, the silence was complete and enveloping. As we got higher, the edges of the sky started to glow. Our first views were of sherbet orange skies draped over the peaks like a vibrant pashmina. Our spirits rose with the sun and each step we took towards the summit.

We got to the edge of the tree-line and geared up for the exposure. Josh was super stoked for the sunrise so motored ahead a bit while Sydney and I ambled along and took about a million pictures haha. It was just so good. Maybe one of the most beautiful sunrises I've gotten to enjoy in the Adirondacks. 

Sunrise over the turquoise Mountains

I loved how this cairn glowed

Daybreak on the land

Despite the cold we lingered. It was just so beautiful. Not too windy either which is a blessing on Cascade where the wind can really rip. While the trail up Cascade was its usual well-defined and broken out self, Porter had only seen one set of visitors since the last storm. Josh was trying out his new snowshoes for the first time and really enjoyed the feel on the loose snow. On the way to Porter we saw the tracks diverge at one point and explored both options. I noticed I couldn't see any blazes along the trail. Even when I backtracked towards Cascade. It was a bit unsettling. Was the trail from Cascade to Porter really this poorly blazed? We realized that the last storm was very wet and icy so the weight of the frozen snow had pulled down all the branches and likely obscured a number of blazes.

We had another nice hang on Porter aided by some delicious snacks from Sydney. While it looked like someone had ventured down the trail to Marcy field, the tracks quickly petered out and we were breaking trail through about a foot of loose powder. I'd willing to wager there are many winters where no one hikes this trail at all, Almost immediately it was really hard to tell if we were on the trail or not. We couldn't find blazes anywhere. Again, likely because of the droopy branches but also because its such an infrequently visited trail, I doubt its a high priority for the DEC to thoroughly blaze it.  So out came the map and compass. Sydney had Alltrails on her phone and while I've been very apprehensive about the popularity of this app, it was really helpful when combined with the map and compass. We worked together as a team, looking for signs of the trail and trying to stay on bearing even when we were pretty sure we were off trail. When we did find a blaze, it was always a moment to rejoice. 

Blaze On

I feel very fortunate for my hiking partners on this trip. They were super upbeat and I thought we worked together really well. We lost and found the trail countless times along the Porter ridge. My biggest concern was not drifting too far south off of the ridge towards Little Meadows and Railroad Notch. That's a vast and isolated chunk of wilderness that would be very hard to get out of. Sure enough, after one of our longest stretches of not finding the trail we found a blaze. An orange one meaning we were on the the now closed trail to the Garden. Thankfully, we were able to follow it just a few hundred feet back up to the yellow trail. That was probably our longest bought of trail finding and from then on it got incrementally easier, though we did have to remain constantly vigilant and still had to constantly check our bearing and squint to see the path ahead of us. 

We followed countless snowshoe rabbit tracks through the forest.

The drop off of the Porter Ridge down to Blueberry was likely the most fun part of the trip. It was unbelievably steep so we were so grateful to be going down. I mentioned at the beginning of this post how glad I was that Josh suggested this route. If we had attempted to climb Porter from Marcy field there is NO way we would've made it up this. Deep powder, no track and an incredibly steep trail. Climbing down it?  Or rather sliding down it? Pure bliss. Even though a spruce trap nearly ate me. Once we were out of the tightly woven pine forest on the ridge of Porter, the trail was much easier to follow and the real battle was putting one snowshoe in front of the other.

We took a nice long break on Blueberry and had significant snacks for the final push. The sky was so incredibly blue and the sun so bright, it felt far warmer than it really was. 

hunkered down on Blueberry 

It felt a bit like the end of the hike at this point but we still had quite a ways to go and an awful lot of elevation to lose. Which isn't exactly a walk in the park after pushing through loose snow for several hours. My knees were shot and Sydney had a knee injury from a previous hike that became aggravated. Josh was fine though apparently. What a G. There was a lot to see though to keep spirits up. Plenty of open views across to Hurricane, Giant and the Keene valley below us. Far below us. 

Here I sit, before the world has woken up, in my sunroom in Albany, several years later. Reflecting on Koda's life, the meaning of friendship and the beauty of these mountains. The peace and joy the mountains can bring reverberates with great force through this quiet house. Memories swirling tumultuously like snow on the ridge.