My parents’ car was still there in the lot so they hadn’t even made it back form the first waterfalls yet. We left a note on their windshield just in case we missed them along the trail, got our hiking gear all set, grabbed my Dunkin waffle sandwich and headed out to find some waterfalls on what was probably the clearest day of our whole vacation. As we were loading up my pack, we spotted one of the old couples we’d seen going up the Greeley Ponds trail the day before, we recognized them because the dude was awfully creepy and my parents were joking that he was an evil doctor who stole fresh body parts to replace his failing ones. Strangely, his arm that was in a sling yesterday seemed perfectly fine today, hmm. Right at the start of the trail we encountered a chipmunk who I conveniently dropped a piece of my waffle for, and then another piece. He sat at our feet gobbling it up, probably wondering what kind of deliciousness he was eating, and then my parents came around the corner.
The four of us went back to see the waterfalls they had just come from which amazingly did have a significant amount of water. The short cascade loop brought us to a couple falls but none of them were the ones I’d remembered. I distinctly remembered the stream passing through a narrow gorge with a waterfall at the head of it and although the ones along the trail were similar, they weren’t quite it. Oddly enough I couldn’t recall seeing those ones before but I knew the one I was thinking of actually did exist because I have a picture of it, dark and fuzzy because it was taken with a disposable camera twenty years ago, but I knew I wasn’t imagining it.
We got to the spot my parents had turned around at but I decided to keep going, just in case it was right around the corner. I gave them one of the walkie talkies and bushwhacked my way up the river. There were more waterfalls right above the one we were at, which makes me question why they stopped the trail when there were more falls just fifty feet away. I found some really nice waterslide cascades that would be impressive during high water but still no narrow gorge. Then up ahead, through the trees, I could make out a line of white squiggling down a cliff, I knew I was coming up to something good. Up and over a couple more smaller drops and there it was, the waterfall through the gorge I’d remembered. After taking a couple pictures and wondering how we’d gotten so far off the trail so long ago, I noticed a faint path on the other side of the gorge. Sure enough, it lead back to the trail, no sign for it like the others had. I informed Jaime and my parents to keep coming up the trail and I’d meet them halfway.
A couple of older women were coming up the trail looking a little lost, which they most certainly were, they were going up the wrong mountain. So I directed them the way they wanted to go, they’d missed their turn at the very beginning of the trail. So I chatted with them until reaching my family. My parents noted the place they’d turned around because it was at the beginning of the steep part of the trail, so we slowly made our way up, luckily the falls weren’t too far up.
My dad recognized the falls right away, they were the ones he’d been searching for for years but couldn’t remember what trail they were on, he just had a mental image. How the lower ones got names and a trail to them yet this one gets nothing is beyond me, it really is a breathtaking cascade and much larger than I’d remembered. Jaime got some amazing pictures of me standing on the edge of the gorge with sun beams shining down on me through the trees. What’s weird is I remember being on the far side of the gorge, not the side with the trail on it, and back then there was a tree hanging over the falls, obstructing the view, which luckily is gone now. I’ll have to try to find my old picture of it and compare. I’d been wanting to go back there for years but figured the waterfall couldn’t be anything too spectacular since there’s no mention of it anywhere so I kept putting it off. Content with our rediscovery, we made our way back down.
My parents were hungry so we stopped at the Willey House for a picnic where I got an ice cream cone, S’mores ice cream, omg. My parents got jealous and each got some ice cream as well, Jaime got jealous and finished mine, which is good because I wasn’t all that hungry after just having breakfast but for some reason Willey House ice cream is the best, I think it has more to do with location than flavor though. We examined Dad’s maps and my notes and decided to do the Bemis Brook off shoot of the Arethusa Falls path. They’d been there long ago and remembered it to be something special but I had never been.
Just after hitting the trail, Jaime waited in the car for this one happily reading magazines on her tablet as it charged, the train passed by so we got to see it up close and personal. The falls along Bemis Brook were incredible, like nothing I’d ever seen before. The rock formations here are different, they break away in brick like patterns so the water falls down staircases of stone that look chiseled out. It’s really quite unique and there was just the right amount of water flowing so you could really make out the distinct landscaping. I explored each fall, getting up close shots and side views, getting a little wet in the process but it was worth it. The trail was a bit tough and steep in parts but I feel like it traveled too high up on the ravine wall and might have missed some falls lower down, I’ll have to check it out some time, I could hear falling water below us. Arethusa Falls was still almost a mile away so we went back the way we came, Mom wasn’t too keen on doing the damn near vertical climb up to the main trail so I’ll have to go back someday to see the main attraction which I believe is considered to be the tallest waterfall in the state.
From there, Mom and Dad headed back to Lincoln while Jaime and I parked at a random gravel lot at the foot of Mt Willard. On our first day trip to NH in the spring we stopped here but it was raining, pretty hard at that, so I explored the area a little but would have to come back to really check it out. I was on what I believed to be the rock climber’s trail up to the Mt Willard cliffs where you could follow the train tracks to an obscure memorial site by the trestle. That day I just bushwhacked over to the river and got some pictures of the small cascades but it was way too wet to hop around on the rocks safely. Today I followed the rock climber’s trail which turned out not to be, it was the unofficial trail that leads to the Mt Willard Section House memorial, which is right by the trestle like I’d expected. Man is that trail steep, I mean damn, I see why it’s not a publicized path. The view from the memorial was amazing, the foundation of the house still remains, as well as some old artifacts, with a sweeping view over Crawford Notch and a close up look at the imposing cliffs of Mt Willard and the precarious trestle you can see from the road on the steep mountainside. I could hear some water under the bridge so knew I’d have to go back down and follow the stream up, there was just no safe way down to it from where I was.
After making the steep descent, I left the trail where I had a few months ago and cut across to the stream. Last time I could hear it through the trees a few hundred feet away, today, nothing. And with good reason, the brook was completely dry. I came out at the exact same spot I had the first time except the riverbed had absolutely no water in it, not even a puddle. I decided to follow it anyway, since last time there was too much water and it was too wet, this would at least afford me the opportunity to check for potential cascades. Although there were a few nice drops, there was nothing that looked like it’d be too spectacular, just some rocky rapids.
Then the trestle came into view, towering over me, and I understood why I couldn’t find a safe way down from above. What was weird was the fact that I could hear running water not too far away, just on the other side of a rock pile. So I climbed over the boulders, logs and debris from the bridge to find the stream disappearing into the ground. From there on up the stream would reappear for small sections before getting lost under a boulder. Standing beneath the trestle was wild, I can only imagine when the train goes overhead. This was originally my turnaround destination so I checked with Jaime to see if she minded if I went further up and being the awesome wife she is, she told me to keep going.
The terrain changed drastically here, as the smaller rocks that you can hop from one to another on gave way to boulders that I had to climb up and pick my way around. The walls of the ravine are insanely steep, so making this journey probably wouldn’t even be possible when there’s actually water in the brook. At times the tree cover opened up giving me a nice view across the valley to the ledges and slides on Mt Webster. Up ahead I could see what looked to be a rock wall with light shining down on it so I kept working my way towards it but the stream just seemed to keep going. I know for a fact it wasn’t that far in distance but the pace it takes to safely climb up giant boulders was really slowing me down. And the boulders just kept getting bigger, as did the fallen trees and logs blocking my path, which sometimes came in handy. I wanted to get to the split in the stream where the rocky ravine went off to the right at what I think will be an enormous waterfall but not today. It was getting late and just as I decided to stop and turn around, Jaime came over the walkie telling me she was starting to get hungry down there.
Figuring the way down would be more difficult and even slower going, I took to the trees on the inanely steep embankment and tried that. But the mountainside was so steep that I was just sliding down it, holding onto the trees for support. It was actually taking longer than if I just sat on my ass and plopped my way down from one boulder to the next. So back into the dry riverbed I went. The descent wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, and in a lot of cases I found myself on the exact same path I took going up. Under the trestle I scooped up the rocks I found on my way up, lately I’ve been putting them in obvious places so I’ll see them on my way by and remember to grab them. Sweating like crazy, legs a little sore, I returned to the car with my goodies and we headed off.
On the way back to the hotel I stopped at the Eisenhower Wayside Viewing Area which is just a little hill along the side of the road with a spectacular view of the Presidential range. Being such a clear evening and with the sun setting, I wanted to stop and get some pictures. The problem is that the little hill is really steep so you don’t usually see people utilizing it. After a long day hiking I didn’t know if I’d be able to walk up it, so I ran instead. Surprising even myself, I made it without any difficulty and got some great pictures from the top. Then I ran back down.
We stopped at the hotel to see if my parents were there to have supper together but their car was gone so we called. After a few rounds of phone tag, they had just left fifteen minutes ago to eat at the Chinese restaurant in town, as it turns out we were going to the restaurant directly beneath them in the plaza, Enzo’s. As we were looking over the menu they stopped in to say hi and see how my hike went, I told them to be glad they didn’t accompany me on this one. We ended up getting appetizers to go and then went to pick up Slouvakis from GH Pizza and brought it all back to the hotel. The appetizers were okay but the slouvakis were delicious, it was Jaime’s first time having one from there, now she understands why I always pick one up to take home with me when we leave. My sister arrived around 9:30 that night for her one day with us, she had class all week. We discussed our plans for tomorrow and called it an early night, I think we were asleep shortly after 10:00 which is just embarrassing.
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