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Greylock Traverse 11-19-06
I hate to say this, I really do... But this hike was very very boring. It was a peak bagging excursion/traverse. 5 of the top 10 named peaks in MA are on this ridge. In order from north to south: Prospect, Williams, Fitch, Greylock, Saddle Ball. Prospect requires a spur trail! The best part for me was at the very beginning, and end. The beginning had a nice consistent grind with nice views through the trees. The end was along an old road filled with waterfalls and other curiosities. Everything else was pretty much blah. The north flank between Williams and the thunderbolt trail is extremely repetitive and more or less flat. It gets boring fast unfortunately. The slope to the east however was cool but again.. repetitive.. The top 200 feet had a nice caking of rime and ground snow. I encountered a few other hikers here which was a welcomed change. I hiked down south to the Cheshire harbor trail intersection with one of the other hikers when he branched off down said path. I continued south to Saddle Ball which was much more exciting than the north flank at first, but then it flattened out and became tedious like its brother to the north. Interesting things cropped up on the descent to Old Adams road, such as giant boulders. Old Adams road itself had lots of cool waterfalls and old stone bridges. I encountered another hiker when I merged with Cheshire Harbor trail who grew up at the farm at the trailhead and he told me all sorts of stories about the old roads! Fascinating! So the hike was over.. Or was it? When I reached the trailhead I was not greeted by a car as one might hope, but instead my bicycle which I deposited earlier that day. This is where the REAL adventure of the day began -- the 8.5 mile bike ride from hell. I coasted down West Mountain road where my poor fingers got a pretty mean chill. I opted to take notch road instead of take rte 8 north.. It cuts off 2 miles, a ride along a divided highway, and a nasty final ascent hill, the trade off being notch road had a big ass hill which required an 800 foot climb in the middle but a fun filled coast to my car for the last 2 miles. now I did a little research on Notch road and noticed its shockingly close proximity to the giant lime strip mine (It is NOT A QUARRY!!!!) owned by specialty minerals. Big deal right? Wrong. The company had taken over a quarter mile of the road and built a mammoth slag pile on it. I followed an ATV trail around the pile but it was a non fun muddy nightmare. Once I got back on the road it began climbing moderately. Problem was it was completely washed out and chock full of nice round rocks which made traction impossible. I ended up walking my poor bike up practically every stupid hill because of this. The good part was when I finally crested the hill (next to the old Hoosac Tunnel alignment tower ruins) it was pretty much all smooth sailing back to my car! Its too bad my bike & I were completely caked in mud and exhausted when I got my car. Notch Road is NOT my friend. At least it gave me a funny story to tell.. The road that was swallowed by a strip mine! Click Here for the Hike Map
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