Trail Report: Avalon Tr, A-Z Tr, Mt. Tom, Crawford Notch

The starting point of the first trail is at the Crawford Deport in Crawford Notch. When we arrived at the parking it was full. During this time of year, this is a very popular place to hike so parking is limited. You can park on the edge of the road which we did. The great park though of coming later is the train that arrives at the station from North Conway bringing visitors.

I was on the trail side when taking this picture of the train when it stopped at the station. We headed up the trail which is called Avalon Trail. My stepson and I had hiked this trail to Mt. Avalon in the early spring. Great views from Avalon. As you travel up the path you will come across a sign that says Beecher and Pearl Cascades. You can take that trail around and it will lead you back to the main trail. There you will see two cascades.

After hiking up Avalon trial for 1.3 miles, we connected onto A-Z trail which brought us up to Mt. Tom Spur Trail. We had traveled 1.0 up on A-Z trail before connecting onto Mt. Tom Spur. At that point my stepson wanted a break, so we had a snack. That spot was a great resting stop, had a few logs to sit on and it was shady. Then we hiked up Mt. Tom Spur to see the view. There are two places to view the mountains around. Here are a few pictures I took:

There were some short trees to have to take pictures over, but I stood on the highest point. I have to say that it wasn't the best views but I still got some nice pictures. The hike all together was 5.6 miles. We hiked for about five hours, stopping a few times. Mt. Tom is 4051 feet, making it a 4000 footer!
Happy Hiking!

Trail Report: Nancy Pond Trail, Nancy Cascades and a wonderful surprise

This adventure takes us to Nancy Pond Trail, which leads to Nancy Cascades and Nancy Pond. Sadly we never ended up going all the way up to Nancy Pond for dark clouds rolled in when we were at Nancy Cascades.
I have always wanted to hike this trail ever since I heard the story about Nancy. The girl's name was Nancy and she went searching for her love. The man she was going to marry left to fight in a war and she went after him. She traveled through the woods in the middle of winter back in the 1800's. When word got out that she went after him, people went looking for her and they found her near Nancy Brook (which was named after her) and she was sitting on a rock, frozen to death. It is such a sad story. I wanted to hike the path where this girl is buried near by along side the river she was following.
The Trail starts on route 302, there is a small parking area, for its not a busy trail to hike. The trail is wide at the start and easy to follow. You cross two brooks, Halfway and Nancy on the way up to Nancy Cascades.

The sign at the start of the trail

The first brook we stopped for Stitch to drink at, he loved the water.

This sign was when we got to Nancy Brook Scenic Area. It is large and you can read it easy. The Red area is the Nancy Area where you will find the Cascades and Pond of Nancy. But we also got a fun surprise...we came upon a very old maple sugaring house. You could tell that it was old and hasn't been used in many many years.

 We weren't sure what this was but we knew it was old and must have been hanging in the trees. The nails in the front were hand made for the ends were squares. The other end had hooks so we knew it must have been used for collecting the sugar from the trees.

These two pictures is of the sugaring house. It has trees growing around and inside of the house but you can see some old rusted cans around the house which they used to keep the sugar syrup in. I love seeing old places like this one, it makes you think back to when they used it. The sugaring house is about two miles from the road...
 After seeing the sugaring house we soon crossed Nancy Brook and came upon Nancy Cascade. It was so beautiful and made lunch while sitting on the boulders. We headed back due to rain clouds which did decide to burst on us while we were still a mile from the car. Nothing like hiking in the rain:)

Nancy Cascades

Our hiking trip was 4.8 miles in all. Easy hike. Happy Hiking!