...Lake Placid New York Adorandak Mountains... Algonquin Mountain In January of 1999, we were able to go to upstate New York and do some backpacking in the Adorandak Mountains. The picture here, is of Algonquin Mountain. It's a technical climb, and unfortunately we ran out of time and were unable to climb it. It was beautiful!! This picture was taken from where we stopped to have lunch on the lake. It was pretty strange sitting on a lake to have lunch I will admit. Even more strange knowing that we had hiked across it, pitch black, high winds and ice pellets coming in vertical at us the night before as we headed back for camp several miles away. This particular day the temperature got up to about 32... mild for what we're use to. Mount Marcy is the highest peak here.... at 5344 feet. We could have made it to the top, but with 6 feet of snow underneath us and weather getting bad, we only made it to about 1/2 a mile from the top. I would go back there in a heartbeat if I had the chance. Btw... the ice was 17 inches thick on the lake... believe me, we asked the ranger the previous night ...after we crossed it. ...Virginia Grayson Highlands... Massie Gap Ah....The favorite. Jimmy and Al soaking in the view atop Massie Gap. Believe it or not, this is the first uphill from the parking lot, and it's a booger, but well worth the 10 minute climb to get up on the ridge line to see the valley below. Incredible view! Mount Rogers at 5729 feet is the highest peak here. It's most unfortunate too, that there are no views from the top... it's all covered in forest. The roads are always accessable up here and if there is snow in the forcast... it's gonna come here first. (did someone say the "s" word). The mountains in the back that you see are the Great Smokey Mountains in North Carolina. Jimmy's pack looks huge! Click on picture for larger image ...Lake Placid New York Adorandak Mountains... Colden Mountain Wow!! Talk about perspective (right). Jimmy and I were dayhiking on Avalanche Lake and he took this picture of me. I was still about 100 feet from the base of the rock if that gives you any idea of how big it is. It looked like it would be a great climb though....hmmm...I would get mega messed up if I fell off that, especially with crampons and ice axes flailing about me . Believe it or not, the back side of this monster is all pines, all the way down it (below). Lake Placid New York Adorandak Mountains Avalanche Lake OK... Probably one of my favorite pictures I have ever taken. This is breathtaking in the most literal sense. The sun was so bright off the snow, it was almost blinding. You can see why I love the winter backpacking... the landscape changes right before your eyes. This is the view I had of Jimmy from where I was (see picture above). This particular picture is like the postcard that you can buy of the Adorandaks at Avalanche Lake. You can see the sharp contrast of the rocks from the picture above, even though they are only a few hundred feet apart. ...Roan Mountain North Carolina... Even in the nighttime, we find things that are beautiful. Al took this shot on top of Roan Mountain at dusk. We did watch the sunset (left), but as I remember... it was extremely cold so it was short lived that night. Roan Mountain is on the North Carolina / Tennessee border. It's quite a drive to get there, but it's well worth it. The coldest trip we ever did up here was several years ago. We found out that the temperature got down to -3 in the parking lot and we were on the top of Grassy Bald with no trees, high winds, and testing a new tent (below). The snow was about 3 feet deep and we did not have snow shoes or ice cleets at the time. The day we packed up to leave the mountain, we had two climbs to do. The ice layer was about 1/2 an inch and it was extremely hard to climb without busting through the ice layer (below ). We ended up crawling on our hands and knees (with our packs on) to spread our weight over the ice so we would quit punching through it, just so we could get to the top. Whew! It was tough. Experience says a lot for trials such as these. We learned a hard and valuable lesson... We got "THE STUFF"! PS...The tent FAILED! It ripped a huge hole in the floor just as we set it up.... I was not a happy camper!!!! Click on above pictures for larger image