Episode 20 - So You Wanna - Pine Mountain and Imp Face

[00:00:08] Here is the latest Higher Summits forecast brought to you by our friends at the Mount Washington Observatory. Weather above treeline in the White Mountains is often wildly different than at our trailheads. Before you hike, check the Higher Summits forecast at mountwashington.org.

[00:00:31] Weather observers working at the non-profit Mount Washington Observatory write this elevation-based forecast every morning and afternoon. Search and Rescue teams, avalanche experts, and backcountry guides all rely on the Higher Summits forecast to anticipate weather conditions above treeline.

[00:00:51] You should too. Go to mountwashington.org or text FORECAST to 603-356-2137. Hello listeners! Nick here with your forecast for the weekend of October 3rd, 2026.

[00:01:16] Friday, mostly in the clouds, trending towards mostly in the clear late under mostly cloudy skies. Rain and isolated thunderstorms early becoming a chance of rain showers in the afternoon. High in the lower 50s early then decreasing to the mid 40s. Wind west at 45-60 mph early decreasing to 30-45 mph with gusts up to 55 mph. Windchill falling to 30-40 above. Friday night, mostly in the clear under decreasingly cloudy skies, slight chance of rain showers in the evening.

[00:01:44] High in the lower 30s. Wind northwest at 30-45 mph with gusts up to 55 mph. Windchill falling to 15-25 above. And Saturday, in the clear under sunny skies. High in the lower 30s. Wind northwest at 30-45 mph with gusts up to 55 mph. Windchill falling to 10-20 above. So there you have it. Looking quite nice, albeit a bit chilly this weekend up on the rock pile. Hope you can get out there and crush some peaks. Happy hiking and safe hiking.

[00:02:14] Casting from the Woodpecker Studio in the great state of New Hampshire.

[00:02:49] Welcome to the Sounds Like a Search and Rescue Podcast. So You Want. A video series where we share post-hype reflections, challenges, lessons learned, and essential insights to prepare you for your next adventure in the White Mountains.

[00:04:04] All right, Nick. So you want a Pine Mountain Inface. So are you ready to get going? Sure, Mike. Let's go. Let's go. I call these my Friday night hikes. I would say. Yeah, it's Friday evening. So both of these, Pine Mountain and Imphace that we're going to talk about. They're good. They're 52 of the view hikes, and they were always good. Like, all right, I'm heading up north for the weekend.

[00:04:31] I'll leave work a little early, get up to New Hampshire by like five o'clock, and then that gives you plenty of time in the summer, three hours to just get up and down, see a nice sunset, and then get rolling. So both of these are pretty good for that. Yeah, 100%. And they are geographically close to each other. So even if you look in the 52 of the guide, technically, like I think they have Imphace is like Eastern White Mountains and Pine Mountain is in the Northern White Mountains.

[00:04:58] But they're like, geographically, I don't think they're much more than like five or 10 miles apart. Right. Future Align from one to the other. So that's kind of why we're including them in the same ballpark. They're also really close drive to each other. And you can see each of them from each other too, which I thought was cool. Actually, the best view of Imphace is from Pine on those ledges there. So, which we'll talk about. So, yep. All right. So why don't we start with a high level summary Nick of Pine Mountain and you're fresh off a recent hike there.

[00:05:27] So, and you're going to talk about coming in from the Gorham section, which I've never done. So why don't you do the intro on Pine Mountain? Cool. Yeah. It's up there like literally a week and a half ago. So it's fresh. It's fresh in the memory too. I was up both of these a week and a half ago. So we got good details. Um, so Pine Mountain stands at 2,404 feet. As Mike mentioned, it's a 52th view peak. It's located in Gorham, New Hampshire between the Mahoosic range to the north and the Northern Presidentials to the south.

[00:05:55] Um, and to the east you kind of have, I guess the whole Cardamaria range. Um, Pinkham ledge on the south side of the mountain is the main feature of the 52th view peak. Um, it offers a fantastic look into Pinkham notch with mountain ranges on either side. Um, there are other views from multiple ledges looking east as well. Um, and there's also a similar view, um, to Pinkham ledge from chapel rock. So the true summit is wooded and it hosted a series of fire towers from 1910 to 1967.

[00:06:22] The final one was demolished in 1975, but the concrete footing still remain on the summit. You can see them there today. Um, it was added to the 52th view list in 2020, making it a relatively new addition to the list. And the summit is located on property that is owned by the Horton center. Um, the Horton center is a faith based camp operated by New Hampshire. The New Hampshire conference of the United church of church of Christ. They own a hundred acre tract on the mountain, mostly on the Northern plateau and hiker access

[00:06:49] to the Horton center grounds outside of the trails that cross on the property is prohibited as is visiting chapel rock outlook specifically from the months of June to August. So from June to August, even if it's not roped off, um, they do not want hikers going up there. So that's one kind of thing to note with here, as far as trespassing and property rights. Um, so the peak was once known as camel's hump or camel's rump, which I thought was kind of funny. Um, the current name is, uh, for the fine stands of pine trees, which once lined its slopes

[00:07:17] before most were destroyed by wildfires. And we'll talk about those wildfires a little bit later. Um, there's also another pine mountain in Alton, New Hampshire, um, around the lakes region. And apparently there's something like a dozen things named pine hill geographically in New Hampshire. So I thought that was kind of interesting. All right. And then, um, Nick, a little bit about inface. I want me to take this one. I can do the intro. Sure. Why don't you take inface? So inface is a 52 with a view summit. It is, um, a little over 3,100 feet in elevation.

[00:07:47] It's located in the township of beans purchase, New Hampshire on the Western slope of North Carter mountain near pink, um, notch between, um, 16 and Carter Mariah range. Uh, inface is separate from imp mountain is actually a feature rather than a peak. It's a high cliff on route to the junction with the North Carter trail without standing views of the presidential range. So inface, basically the view of this is of a, like a, um, sort of a creature looking

[00:08:15] straight up into the sky. Uh, so it's not like you think of a face would be like actually looking towards you, but that's not the case. It's basically as if, um, you were laying on top of a summit and looking straight up to the sky is the view of inface. So we'll try to put a picture in the show notes of it, Nick. Yeah. I never really got that until we were up on pine like last June. And I finally, I don't know if you saw or someone we were with like notice it. And I'm like, Oh, I see it now. Cause up until then, every time I've seen, I'm like, I don't, I don't get why it's a face. Yeah. Right.

[00:08:43] I just thought it was just like a weird, maybe there was something or something like that. But yeah, I think it was Peter that, that pointed it out to us when we were on there. So, uh, but yeah, the cliff's name comes from a rocky profile, uh, best seen from the Dolly Cop campground or, uh, from Pine mountain, um, apparently, and we'll talk about Dolly Cop a little bit, um, shortly, but, um, she was the one that apparently named it when, um, she could see it from her farm below.

[00:09:11] There was an 1887 guidebook reference that refers to the profiles human like in a grotesque colossus spink formed by the upper crags of Mount imp imp mountain itself lies, um, off trail north of North Carter. So, um, both of these summits are, have, uh, good views. They're good for, uh, I guess sunset. I would say Nick, it'd be pine mountain, probably for sunrise as well, but for sunset for sure. Yeah. Um, depending the time of year, I don't know if sunset might be blocked by their presidential

[00:09:41] range. If you're on in face, I know like this time of year in the fall, I think you'd be good. It would kind of be to the side of Mount Madison. Um, but pine mountain for sure has much more of an open view West. Um, but either way, you're going to get really nice color from sunset and kind of, as Mike mentioned too, they're both relatively, um, imps, definitely a pretty good climb pines a little bit more moderate, but they are very good. Like if you want to take off an hour before sunset or whatever, like, and you want to haul it up there, like they're really good hikes for sunset. Yeah. You can get up there in pretty good, pretty quick time if you're moving. Yeah.

[00:10:11] I mean, if you come in from, and we'll talk about like the trails here, but like, if you come in from, from pine link and pine mountain road, I mean, you're, you're climbing, it's like about 600 feet or elevation. So it's really not a big climb at all from that side. And then imp face is a little bit more of a, a project I would say, Nick. Yeah. Um, one funny thing, I know I've done too many of these now because, um, I almost automatically typed Moses Sweetser's name after the 1887 guidebook.

[00:10:40] Cause I'm assuming it was probably his guidebook. I didn't want to get, I didn't want to jump to conclusions on this. It was probably safe to assume it was his guidebook. Yeah, exactly. So why don't we talk a little bit about the views? Uh, we touched on it a little bit here, Nick, but a lot of good views from pine mountain. So what do you, uh, what can you describe about these? Sure. So pine mountain, I broke into three separate components, um, based on sort of what you're seeing. Um, so the first one and the most impressive Vista on the mountain is Pinkham ledge. So this is that ledge that's on the Southern stretch of the mountain.

[00:11:11] Um, and from here it's more or less 180 degree view. Um, kind of looking from left to right, I kind of map this out. So stretching first, you have the Card Mariah range. Um, and then eventually it comes around to Pinkham notch and the presidentials. Um, Mount Madison is the most impressive thing probably in the entire view. It's directly in front of you in the foreground. You can see all the way like Osgood Ridge, um, going up to sort of the craggy summit. Um, and just kind of shows how big like that mountain is.

[00:11:40] Um, and then as you move East, you can sort of see the pilot Pliny range, um, eventually crescent and sort of the Randolph ranges over there. And you can actually see kind of a inter route to sort of coming into Gorham as you move fully right over there. Um, and one thing that's really cool here that I don't think I noticed it when I went with you guys up there last time, but there is a stone bench, uh, carved into the rock in one spot. I did. I remember that a couple of times. So on those ledges there, there is the stone bench.

[00:12:08] I think there was like a couple of people that were, um, sitting on it when we were coming up. And then, uh, when we came back down, I think I, I was over there. Yeah. It's a, it's, it's really neat. There's also some like, um, there's a number of like names and dates and stuff carved into the, uh, into that ledge summit over there. So some that go back into the 1800s. Cool. Um, so that's the main view. I mean, going up from that South side, like, I guess we could talk about the trail section too, but there's a lot of just ledges.

[00:12:37] If you poke around, um, kind of where you can get slightly different views, but that's the main one from the South. Um, now as you're moving North, um, over the formal summit, um, there's a couple different views that are on the way from there to where chapel rock and sort of the Horton camp are. Um, so the first one you pass, these are all East facing views. So if you're heading North, they're going to be on your right. Um, the first one you hit is angel view. Um, the second one you hit is Gorm View. And the third one is called chapel view.

[00:13:06] They're all pretty similar. Um, as I mentioned, they're all sort of that Eastern side of pine mountain. So you end up with pretty much a view of the Mahusig's Gorm and the Carter Mariah range, um, based on where you're looking. Um, there's also a couple options for camping over there. There's actually a lean to, I believe at angel view. That's kind of neat. Um, and chapel view is a little bit different than the other two, just in terms of that, you can actually see across to chapel rock. And then the final viewpoint that we have, that's impressive is chapel rock.

[00:13:33] So this is similar to pinkham ledge, but it's further North on the Ridge. You have pine mountains, actual summit blocking some of the view to Madison. Um, but I would say this view is arguably as beautiful as pinkham ledge. It's a little bit more of a steep drop off. Um, so you're kind of really looking a little bit more clearly, I think the pinkham notch, and it just might be a little bit more impressive, just aesthetically. Um, but a really good sunset spot. There's sort of where you poke out there. There's sort of a cross, a wooden cross that looks out directly into pinkham notch when you're looking South.

[00:14:02] And then to your right, you have this taller rock and sort of ledge that you actually couldn't climb up on, um, and poke up where you can see sunset and over to Mount Madison and stuff. Um, so really good stuff. And I'm sure there's probably more ledges and open areas to the East that aren't even like marked viewpoints. If you just want to do some exploring up there, um, there's probably a lot of other little nooks and crannies that have interesting views that you could find. Right. Yeah.

[00:14:28] And then, yeah, there's, there's a bunch of huge, and like, it's not a lot of effort for awesome views. Um, and then on the imp side, um, you've got, um, a lot of good, a lot of really nice views. I think my recollection of, and I've been, it's been a while since I've been up there, but my recollection was I spent a lot of time focusing on sort of, um, looking down towards the Southern notch down into Gorham and across to, uh, Madison and, um, and Pine Mountain.

[00:14:55] But you can also get views of the, uh, the Carter range as well, um, off to your left. And then there's a ravine over to the, uh, sort of imp brook side. So you can see the, the Carters and Wildcat and Pinkham notch, um, and a little bit of Bootspur and Washington to Madison. But again, my, my recollection on this was that the, the best views were sort of out to Pine Mountain itself into Madison. Yeah, for sure.

[00:15:22] Um, one thing the guide called this out too, and I just noted in pictures that I took, but the angle that you're looking up the great Gulf from where imp faces, you're almost at a straight diagonal, like a straight shot looking at where there's sort of this interesting head wall that comes up between, um, Jefferson and Mount clay. You can't really see around the corner to the, the great Gulf head wall as much, but it's kind of impressive seeing like, I think it's like Jefferson's knee. They call that feature.

[00:15:48] And some of the steep sort of ridges that rise up out of that part of the ravine, you get like, you get kind of a feel for how deep the great Gulf actually goes into the presidential range and how remote it is. Um, which is really interesting. Right. Yeah. And I would say too, the other thing about amp and we'll talk about this when we talk about the trail approaches is that, um, it is like, it, it gets steep at the end. Like there's a good, um, probably 600 foot climb of a push or actually about 800 foot

[00:16:15] climb of a push that is, um, pretty sneaky. I mean, there's a little bit of a, like a switch back there, but we'll talk about it, but it's, um, it's definitely a tougher climb than pine for sure. Yeah. Pine. Um, I mean, if you're coming from the Dolly Cop side, it's pretty easy and even the Gorm side, it's longer, but it's pretty gradual, but in faces a little bit more of a standard, like kind of kick your butt right out of the car type of white mountain hike. Exactly. So, um, all right.

[00:16:44] So then why don't we talk about parking here, Nick? So this is like, and I think pine mountain is one of those mountains. It's definitely, if you're, even if you're researching it, I think if you do your research on the 52 with a view site or you do on the Facebook page, or if you just use the 52 with a view book, that's got a little bit more up to date information that Ken McRae has put together. But the white mountain guide also has some parking information, but it's confusing. It was always confusing to me, Nick, until I got there. Yeah.

[00:17:11] Um, I had done it before some of the issues happen, but we'll start with the easy trail. If you're, if you kind of don't want a headache, like Mike said, or get confused, this one's really hard to miss, but if you're doing pine mountain from the Southern approach, um, which is starting on pine mountain road, um, and that pine mountain road, more or less branches, um, East off of pink and pink and B road or Dolly cop road. I'm not sure exactly what the deal with that is. I'm assuming pink and B road turns into Dolly cop road at some point.

[00:17:41] Maybe it's like a town line kind of deal. Right. Um, but it's more or less a connector road that runs from route to, um, shortly before it's like right after Appalachia, it branches off and then it runs to route 16. Um, which I think it's probably a little North of like the great Gulf trailhead, um, sort of around there where it branches off 16. Um, but in any event, uh, if you want to do that shorter, um, less confusing approach, which parking is available at the trailhead for pine link trail, which is on the Western side of the road.

[00:18:09] And then you have pine mountain road, which is basically, um, the main road for the Horton center is directly across the road. Um, and you can, uh, get to the trailhead from there. Exactly. So you just basically, when you park here, this is a built in road walk. Essentially what you're doing is you're signing up for, uh, uh, I don't know, three quarters of a mile road walk just to get to the, uh, the actual trail to get to the mountain. So it's sort of like, it's a road walk as part of the hike. Yep. Yeah. And this is, this is the standard approach.

[00:18:38] So I know, like I mentioned a little bit about the Horton center property and kind of being careful where you're trekking, but like using that road to get up and down the trails is, um, perfectly appropriate. They kind of just don't want you like further up on that land that they own. Right. But I think where people get confused is they'll drive down that road and look for parking close to the pine mountain trail, which there is no, I think there's a couple of like turnoffs. I've definitely seen cars like park there where they're, I don't think they're supposed to be. Uh, but your parking is at the pine link trailhead and then walk down the road.

[00:19:09] Yeah. And, um, that as Mike mentioned, um, to like, not only are you not supposed to park there, but it's actually explicitly prohibited. Like you're not supposed to park on that pine mountain road. So don't do it. Just park at pine link trail. Right. Um, so where things get confusing is if you're coming from the North side in Gorham, there used to be a trailhead in a quarry off promenade street. So you had to kind of go down promenade street, pass the cemetery on your right. And then you would go down a dirt road and there was a very small trailhead, um, for the start of the pine mountain trail.

[00:19:39] Um, so this is actually in, I want to call it to you at the time of this recording, this is the most current information. So like Mike said, make sure you refresh the 52 of the view page. That's where Ken McCray from Ken McCray's mouth. This is where this guidance is from as far as parking. Um, but definitely keep tabs on this cause it could change in coming years. And I'm assuming it probably will. Um, the old trailhead that was off promenade street from the quarry is completely gone. I just checked this out literally like a week and a half ago. It is gone. It's not there. You're not supposed to approach from there anymore.

[00:20:09] Um, so if you do want to approach from the pine mountain trail and it by no means, it's not like it's not being used anymore. I was on it. Clearly people are going up that way. Um, you want to basically park at a municipal parking area, um, which is located at the corner of church and railroad streets. So there is a big parking lot over there. It's pretty clear to see, um, parking anywhere else near the trailhead is prohibited. Um, so make sure you park there if you want to approach from this side and from that

[00:20:38] municipal parking lot, you're going to walk up church street and eventually you're going to hit this building, um, which is the Gorham Depot. And then from the Gorham Depot, you want to go right and follow utility path. And eventually you will hit the corridor for the pine mountain trail. And that will branch off left. Now, the one thing I will mention with this is if you look on like Garmin or other things or all trails, it seems like a lot of people are using a network of mountain bike trails that are also located behind the Gorham Depot.

[00:21:07] And that eventually, if you pay attention to where you're going, we'll connect you to the pine mountain trail. Um, so like Mike mentioned, it's a little bit more confusing going that way. I think you got to watch your parking. I will say that that trail is really, it's some nice woods up through there. Um, it's really pretty. It's a nice moderate approach. Um, so definitely don't sleep on it, but if you do want a simpler, no brainer scenario, uh, just go on Dolly Cop road and call it a day. Right.

[00:21:34] I always joke, Nick, that like people say, I always say like the hardest part of like these 52 with a view in the 4,000 foot of the list. Sometimes it's just finding the trailhead and pine mountain in particular is probably one of the most confusing mountains around as far as like, how do you get to the trailhead? What are the rules around like where I should park versus where I can walk and, uh, sorting it out. So hopefully we made it a little bit clear for people so they understand. Yeah. And I mean, the, I think one of the only reasons I was able to find it the first time

[00:22:04] is when I, in back in 22, when I first did it, I was checking in to do trail means that the next day actually did success and then checked in. And I was mentioned, I was going hiking and the front desk clerk mentioned, Oh, you should check out pine mountain. And I had planned on pine anyways. And I was asking, I'm like, what's the deal with the trailhead over there? Cause it's confusing. And she gave me directions to get there. She's like, it doesn't look like you should be able to get here, but it is a public road through this quarry. You can go here and do that, but you can't do that anymore. Um, but otherwise I probably never would have found that trailhead, even though it was like

[00:22:34] half a mile from where I was staying and you could literally see it on the map marker. But, um, but that's, that's the deal. So a little confusing and, um, much more straightforward. Do you want to, do you want to highlight the parking situation for him face, Mike? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's pretty straightforward. It's just, um, it's on, um, 16 and it is like, so if you go, if you're going south on 16 heading towards, um, heading towards Gorham, then you have a series of trailheads that you'll run into.

[00:23:02] You've got 19 mile and then, um, you've got some pull-offs where Camp Dodge is. And then you've got the great Gulf wilderness trailhead. And then if you head down, um, a little bit farther, maybe, I don't even know, like not even a half a mile, um, you'll see, you'll have two pull-offs that are within like a quarter mile of each other. Uh, the first one is basically, and the, but imp trail is a loop with the, the, the trailheads actually start in two different locations, about a quarter mile apart from each other.

[00:23:30] Um, so the Southern, the Southern, um, section of the imp trail is a little bit longer. Um, it sort of makes its way back over towards Camp Dodge and then heads up, um, as a loop. And basically you would take that if you're going to, if you're going to wait to go, um, towards Carter Mariah and that's the more direct approach, uh, to getting to the Carter Mariah trail. But then I think most people, Nick, I don't know, I don't know.

[00:23:57] My opinion is I, I typically will park on the, on the section that's a little bit farther north. That's right across from Daniel Webster trailhead parking. And, uh, from there, you know, you just go up the imp trail and, uh, it's a little bit more of a direct approach to the imp ledges, which is where you want to go and in face. Yep. Yeah. Agreed. Um, I, I meant to call it out earlier too, when we were doing the high level summaries, but with the 52 of the views, there are a couple that I think like maybe Mount resolution

[00:24:26] is one technically where there is some peaks where there's really a destination and not that isn't the actual summit. So this is kind of the, one of those cases. Um, it mountain itself is located. It is a peak, but it's located north of North Carter. Um, in face, isn't really close to where the summit is of it. I actually thought it was closer when I was looking on a map. There is like a high point past in face where I think it's just marked on a map. That's not the ledges, but in mountains actually a little bit further. It's like a 3,500 foot peak. Right. Um, that's kind of off the Carter Mariah trail. Yeah.

[00:24:55] I think table mountains is, is another one. That's like a, um, is yeah. Yeah. It's like that. Like the true summit is not, um, not on technically on the 52 with a view list, but yeah, it's pretty straightforward. It's just parking. And I've never really run into any issues with, um, being able to just park on the side of route 16. So it's not a problem. Nope. Yeah. Other than the normal, I guess, sketchiness that is just comes with like parking on a road where the speed limit's like 50 or whatever it is that can feel a little weird sometimes when you're getting in the area of your car. Right.

[00:25:24] And then a little history on these. Uh, so anything interesting, Nick, that we should know about, um, Pine Mountain? So Pine, um, nothing terribly interesting other than it has a pretty, uh, I guess verbose wildfire history. Um, so it's had repeated wildfires, um, going back to 1897. Um, remember we're mentioning that Pine was named for pines on it. And if you go up there nowadays, you'll notice there aren't really a ton of pine trees and this is why.

[00:25:54] Um, so in 1903, we had approximately 1890 acres burned. Um, so the Gorham Mountaineer reported at the time that fire on Pine Mountain working rapidly toward the Peabody River. Um, the fires destroyed trees and burned away soil. A 1930 account described exposed rock and visible glacial markings on the summit. Um, which kind of gives you a little bit of context when you're up there today and you see sort of all these open granite slabs.

[00:26:20] Um, despite the fact that you're not an Alpine zone, you're like well below that. Um, there was also another case where there was severe trout and leftover logging debris fueled fires throughout the whites in 1903. Um, and there, there was another fire during this time, but it wasn't exactly clear what caused this. Um, with all these wildfires breaking out, it's probably not terribly surprising that a lookout tower was built on Pine Mountain in 1910, um, to try to control these wildfires.

[00:26:49] So, um, I know there's quite a few mountains in the whites, um, especially with these 52 of the views where they've had fires and that burned away all the soil. And that's why they have views today because there's no vegetation on them. There's no soil that can grow. There's nothing that can grow there. So they're open and they have nice views for us, which is kind of good. Yeah, Nick, and I will put this in the, um, the show notes, but there's an interesting

[00:27:12] post that was, um, put on the 52 of the view Facebook page in 2025 talking about the, uh, the fire lookout tower from a matter of fact, and you can still see the remnants of it. Um, it's sort of past the ledges, but towards Chapel Rock as you go through. Um, but the, there's a, um, a woman by the name of Barbara Mortensen that in 1943, she

[00:27:39] worked there as a, as a fire lookout and an airplane lookout. A matter of fact, they actually literally like the fire towers, part of what their, um, their, their duties were was to watch for enemy planes flying over and potential attacks. So they were, I mean, think about it. They had, they had Pearl Harbor, they were at war. So they were always expecting enemy airplanes to attack. Uh, so she was a lookout for aircraft as well as a fire and Barbara, her husband was, was in the war in the U S Navy. He was overseas.

[00:28:06] She lived in the tower around the clock returning to the Valley only, only occasionally to just get supplies. Um, she lived there with her great Dane dog named Brenda and, um, the U S Navy sent a, like a, um, office of war information photographer document her life on the home front. And basically what they did is they took a bunch of pictures of her, told, told her story about how she was helping out with the war.

[00:28:34] So a lot of what the office of war information did was focus on the home front and how the wives and the women of, uh, the combat, um, troops were, were handling it on the home front. So she was a feature on this and they took a ton of photos. Library of Congress has an extensive series of, uh, photos of Barbara Mortensen. And she actually, her husband did come home from the war. They lived in New Hampshire for the rest of their lives, had a kid and she died in 2000 at the age of 91.

[00:29:03] So it's pretty interesting story. So they had, um, the women were, um, manning the, the fire towers during world war two. Cool. Yeah. Definitely have to check that out. Um, while you're mentioning that too, that it jogged my memory on something I read today too, which I believe was in camera craze latest edition of the guide. And we went into this on a slasher episode a little bit, um, while back, but there's portions of the pine mountain trail that are actually were part of the old pine link trail that

[00:29:33] used to be the old appellation trail when it went into Gorham, um, which is kind of another cool little factoid there. So it's kind of funny to imagine how the route of the AT would have changed to be coming across like pine link all the way down. So it must've went up to Madison and then dumped down pine link all the way and then kind of went to Gorham and not gone back across to the card. Mariah is where it does today or up to the wild, I guess really South and then up to the wildcats. Right. Yeah. I don't know. We'd love to get our hands on a map or something someday of what it looked like, but I feel like we did, we did do part of it.

[00:30:03] I feel like somehow it did reroute back up to, um, Carter hut, but I can't remember the details. It might've just been a road walk that they had to do back up to 19 mile, but I can't remember the details. Um, but we will have to look into that. Yeah. Another cool part of that trail. Yes, exactly. Um, and then, uh, the history on, uh, imp. So you had pulled some notes on Dolly cop here, right? Yeah. Um, do you want to do it?

[00:30:33] Yeah, I can do it. So Dolly Emery cop, um, was a, was a pioneer from, um, Bartlett. She's born in 1807 and lived to 1891. So she lived a good long life. Um, she had married Hayes cop in 1831 and they farmed land near the Peabody river that later became the Dolly cop campground, which is right off of route 16. Um, she was a familiar face to visitors. So their farm became a stopping place for white mountain tourists in 1882.

[00:30:58] Account describes travelers detouring to the cop home specifically to see the imp's profile. And then, um, you know, she had named the, the imp face, um, from the lookout where she had lived. And, uh, you know, there's a claim actually that she named it. Uh, but it, it's, I guess there's no, no clear historical record on it, but it's a, it's a good story anyway to follow up with.

[00:31:25] And then, um, apparently Dolly and Hayes had a volatile marriage and separated after the 50th wedding anniversary. Dolly said that 50 years was long enough to live with one man, which, you know, you can relate to. Yeah. So, uh, but yeah, that's, that's interesting. So yeah, Dolly cop is a pretty well known, like anybody that's into hiking will run past that campground for sure. Um, and she's pretty well known. And then her husband, Hayes, we were speculating that maybe he's the guy that Mount Hayes is

[00:31:52] named after, which is also sort of on the other side of Gorham to the North a little bit, but we're not sure on that one either. Yeah. So listeners, if you want to dig in that one, let us know. I couldn't find definitive information on it. So. Yeah. And we'll include some links. There's a, a link to a story called in and about Gorham that, um, talks about Dolly cop and, uh, the hiking there. And then there's some stories about the in-face naming discussion, and then a little bit more history about Dolly cop at dolly cop.com. So a lot of good stuff there.

[00:32:21] If you're a history buff and you want to get into it. A hundred percent. Yep. And then, uh, Nick, let's talk about the trails and the, the recommended routes for Pine Mountain. Sure. So nothing too crazy with some of these, um, the recommended route is the route from Dolly cop road. So that will take you on Pine Mountain road, the ledge trail, the Pine Mountain trail, and then Pine Mountain loop. So this actually makes a nice little loop using the road, um, that'll run you about four miles and a thousand feet. And they do recommend going counterclockwise on that one.

[00:32:51] Um, so the, uh, little obscure confusing trailhead route, uh, just Pine Mountain trail and then ledge trail that'll run you 5.8 miles and 1870 feet. And if you do want to go past, um, to the, uh, the actual Southern ledges, just to make sure that that'll like add it's negligible mileage, but you do want to go past the summit from that side to hit those nice views on Pinkham ledge. Right. Yeah. And you'll have, um, there's a couple of, you know, you've got the, you've got the lower

[00:33:20] ledges to the South. Then you've got the main summit where you come across the, uh, the remnants of the fire tower. And then, yeah, there's like two or three outlooks on Pinkham ledge. I think, isn't there like a lean to as well up there? Yeah. There's a lean to, I believe at angel view, um, or one of those sort of viewpoints that look off to the East. Um, and yeah, the, the trail I'll say to like of those routes, um, the recommended one's going to be a little bit easier file follow Pine Mountain trail. Some of the blazes are a little bit faded.

[00:33:49] Um, you do have to pay attention a little bit to where you're going, especially if you're doing it for sunset, like I did, and you're coming down in the dark and you hadn't been on it in a while. Um, but it's, it's fairly easy. I'd say once you hit chapel rock, it's pretty well marked that you end up going on a board walk for a little bit and then sort of across the ridgeline. Um, and, uh, Mike, do you want to talk about the routes to in face, which is really kind of one route, but yeah, I mean, you can do the other one if you wanted to. Exactly. You can do a full loop, but generally, um, what we're recommending here and what you'll find with

[00:34:19] is, um, you'll park at the Northern, um, the Northern most trailhead. That's right across from, um, the Daniel Webster, uh, trailhead parking and, and Dolly Copp area and just go up M trail. I think you start your, your elevation around, um, probably 1300 feet and then you'll climb your way up to, uh, around 3000 feet. So it's a, it's a decent little climb for you.

[00:34:48] And, um, I think we've got it as a total of 4.4 miles out and back and about 1800 feet of elevation gain. Um, and then if you want to do the full trail, then it's about 6.6 miles and a little over 2000 feet of gain. Uh, we'd recommend a clockwise loop with a short road walk back to, uh, route 16. And then if you want to get adventurous, I mean, you can connect up to, um, the, the Carter Mariah range and hit the Carters and go out that way.

[00:35:16] If you want, if, if 19 mile was a little too, uh, crowded for parking, then this is an option. It's going to put a little bit more distance on you, but, uh, I would skip Carter dome. If you're going to do middle and South, maybe you can do that as an out and back as well. Yep. Agreed. And, um, just noting too, if you do that clockwise loop, it's not like there's like another viewpoint or something you're going to hit. I don't, I haven't gone past the imp ledges to the North Carter trail junction. I have gone down the other side in the winter, um, and come back through camp Dodge.

[00:35:46] But, uh, yeah, I'd say it kind of like your, your destination, your high point basically is the junction where like you hit that North Carter trail and then you just go back down. So it's not like you're missing anything by only going up to him face and back. Right. Yep. And like I said, I think that both of these are like good, um, second hikes of the day. If you want to, like Nick, you would mention, I think you had said you did a success and then imp. I also did the same thing. I did, um, I think I did them maybe, um, on the same day or like back to back, uh, one day and then another.

[00:36:15] So, uh, definitely they're the easier hikes, I would say on the list compared to, um, some of the longer, more challenging hikes in the 52 with a view. So, um, add them on, you know, you don't have to take, even if you're a slower hiker, I think pine in particular, it doesn't take that long. Yep. Agreed. Yeah. I would also say that from a foliage perspective, pine mountain really immerses you into, um, the lower sections of Madison. So it's a good foliage hike for sure. Yeah.

[00:36:45] It's, it's probably one of those, I'm sure it's like busy during foliage season, but it's not going to be like a Welch Dickey situation. Yeah. Um, and it's arguably probably more beautiful in terms of what you get for views. So, yeah. So that's it, Nick. We seem to be going after the 52 with the views at this point on our Soya 1 as lately. Yeah, we do. Um, I did have just a couple notes for winter. Sure. We wanted to run through those. So, um, so winter notes for pine mountain.

[00:37:12] Um, if you are looking to do from the Dolly Cop road side, um, Pinkham B road is only plowed about a half mile from NH route two. And it's only plowed about a half mile from New Hampshire 16. Um, McCray mentioned that there may or not be may or may not be spots plowed at the ends. Um, either way, um, you're looking at around three miles and 420 feet, um, addition to your hike to do it. Um, the pine mountain trailhead, um, from the Northern side in Gorham can be accessed by

[00:37:42] the same route we just described. Um, the church railroad street parking lot is usually plowed. It sounds like for snowmobiling partial reason why their, um, route finding could be difficult a little bit if you don't know where you're going. Um, but it does have fantastic grades for snowshoeing. Um, and then nothing really much new on, on imp face for the winter. Um, 16 is usually plowed and cleared enough so that you can get on the side for parking. People for sure are doing this hike in the winter because it's right off the road and it's an easy, beautiful hike.

[00:38:10] Um, most of it's pretty good for snowshoes. Um, McCray called out in the guide that you may want crampons, um, above the cliffs and it's likely to be a little bit rougher. Um, again, probably not getting a ton of winter traffic for people bagging peaks, um, from that whole stretch from the North Carter trail to imp face. Most people are just going to go back down to the Valley, down the North Carter trail. They're not going to be going back out over in face. Um, um, yeah. And that's probably really about it from winter.

[00:38:39] So I didn't want to just throw those out there. Yeah. I didn't know. Um, and then Nick, we should have probably started with like your resume. So it looks like you've been on these more than I have. Like I, I'll just be full disclosure. Like I've been on Pine Mountain twice, both times I took the, um, I, I parked at Pine Link and then I took the, um, you know, I, I took basically the, um, Pine Mountain Horton

[00:39:04] Center road to the, uh, the Pine Mountain trail as a, I think I did an out and back once and I did a loop the other time. So fun time, we went with a group of guys, I think Nick, I think I went with you and Jake and some other folks after the Mount Washington road race, um, one day. And then I think I went solo the first time. So, um, and then I went in face was only an out and back one time to just get the 52 with a view list done. Yeah. So you've knocked them out and I really had only done them once until pretty recently.

[00:39:34] So I did Pine Mountain back in May of 22, um, and then did it in June of 25 after the Mount Washington road race show when we all did it with the gang. Um, those, so one was from the Pine, Pine Mountain trailhead in Gorham, then 25, I did it from the Dolly Cop roadside. And then I did it again, just, um, a couple, like a week and a half ago, uh, from the Gorham Depot side. And then, yeah, in face I had been up in 22. Um, and then I'd, uh, just done it in 26 again, like a week and a half ago.

[00:40:03] So both same approach. I have gone down the other side of the trail, at least from North Carter to the camp Dodge sort of logging road cutoff in the winter. I kind of made a big loop going over the Carters, um, one day, which I have to say, it was nice coming down the winter. It sounds like the footing kind of sucks based on what the guide said for most of it, but in the winter it was packed and it was fine. Yeah. So that's pretty good, Nick. We got five trips to pine between us and then three to imp between us. So that's a D that's a decent resume.

[00:40:30] I think we can talk, um, definitively about both of these mountains. Yeah. We can talk shop. Yes. I will. I will say in face after not having done that, that was quite a bit steeper than I remembered it. Like you said, there's that one stretch that probably goes up like a thousand feet and less than a mile at the back, but yeah, it's the footing is not bad. It's, it's quick to come down. And it's kind of like, by the time that's the thing that what that's nice with a lot of the 52 with the views is by the time you're just like in the thick of it where you're like, Oh man, this has been steep for a bit. It usually ends. It doesn't last. It's not like going up to the Northern president or something. Right.

[00:41:00] So, yeah. Cool. So that's it folks. So, um, enjoy these hikes. And like I said, these are 52 with the views, um, reminder, just Ken McCray, who we've mentioned a few times on this, he's got the, he wrote the guidebook for 52 with a view. I would definitely get that. Obviously referenced a white mountain guide as well. And then there is the 52 with a view Facebook page that usually will give a lot of up-to-date information to check out. Um, especially in relation to the rules around pine mountain, cause there are some restrictions

[00:41:26] like on chapel rock and then some nuances to the, uh, the trailhead parking on the North side and Gorham. So, um, but you know, we'll, um, we'll link all that stuff in the show notes for people to take a look at, but, uh, pine mountain rules do tend to get updated occasionally. Yep. Yep. And, um, another just pat on the back for Ken McCray too, is he actually is like the admin of the 52, the view Facebook page and he'll will like directly answer your questions. And he also doesn't put up with as many shenanigans on his pages. It's pretty, it's very, no nonsense.

[00:41:57] No, he has no, no nonsense on his page, which was actually kind of refreshing in today's social media climate. So, uh, he will give you straight information and give you the answers you need. Right. Excellent. All right, Nick, until next time, um, we will, uh, we'll look at the end of the podcast. Let the listeners enjoy this and then we'll be back soon. All right. Night, everybody.

[00:42:38] Thank you for listening. If you enjoyed the show, you can subscribe on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you want to learn more about the topics covered on today's show, please check out the show notes and safety information on slasserpodcast.com. That's S L A S R podcast.com. You can also follow the show on Facebook and Instagram.

[00:43:03] We hope you'll join us next week for another great show until next time on behalf of Mike and Tom, get out there and crush the peaks.