Reports of peak foliage in New Hampshire’s White Mountains have been filtering down to us via various blogs and message boards. Normally the mountain foliage is in its prime circa Columbus Day, a happy coincidence for the hundreds of innkeepers who eek out an inconsistent existence the rest of the year but can always count on Columbus Day to bring busloads of tourists coming to “visit the leaves,” as Mr. P says.
Us too. Every year, I am tormented by the idea that I will miss peak foliage, so with the weather forecast calling for sunny skies, we woke up at an unconscionable hour on Saturday and jumped into the Honda for a nice cruise up I-93 to the Flume Visitor’s Center, where we would take the Liberty Springs trail up to the Franconia Ridge. It’s the same route by which we first climbed Mount Liberty more than three years ago, and part of the Appalachian Trail to boot, although most of the thru-hikers have long since hiked thru.
From the Flume Visitor’s Center, it is a one-mile walk on a paved bicycle trail to the Liberty Springs trail. We could have parked at a parking lot right off the trailhead, but then we’d have to pay a $3 parking fee. Yes, that’s how cheap we are. Plus, we would be able to avail ourselves of the Visitor’s Center restrooms. The Visitor’s Center was filled with its characteristic tourists: busloads of senior citizens, youth groups, and a smattering of international visitors who come to visit the leaves.
That morning the Visitor’s Center was particularly intense because a large group of women from the Red Hat Society were waiting in line for the restrooms with me. One British woman also waiting in line was flabbergasted. “What is this, some sort of hen party? Why are you all wearing red hats and purple jackets?” she asked one elderly woman, who smiled sweetly and said “Because we’re Red Hatters!”
Indeed, autumn was peaking. The mountain air was crisp, the wind was dominating, and the leaves were warm gold and fiery orange, with smatterings of stalwart green, shocking red, and premature brown. But… I don’t want to call the weatherman a liar, so let’s just say he was optimistic about the bounty of sunlight that would crest the earth unimpeded by clouds. After hiking 2.8 miles on the Liberty Springs trail, we took the Franconia Ridge Trail 1.5 miles to Little Haystack, with the intention of getting a good look at Mount Lafayette, but all we saw was a low-lying cloud. So we had to turn around and head back 1.8 miles to Mount Liberty, where the sun was more visible, and we could clearly see that the foliage was not peaking. It’s better to be early than to be late, we decided, as we descended the trail back to the car and the sun gave its long sigh good night over the mountain horizon.
Cannon Mountain from Mount Liberty
Wind-induced Cowlick on Mount Liberty
Flume Visitor’s Center and I-93
Patchy Sunshine, Patchy Foliage
