snow – Page 3 – David Kotz

Wildlife camera – February

New cameras and exciting footage!

As you may recall from my prior blog post, I purchased and deployed two more wildlife cameras, allowing me to explore several interesting locations simultaneously. I quickly captured some exciting video of a fisher, a small but fearsome predator I’ve never truly seen in the wild. The new cameras were blurry, and flaky; after numerous iterations with tech support they sent me two new cameras. So I have lots of video to share this month! Check out this new video of the fisher, nice and clear. Later, watch the deer sniff my camera.
Read on, though, for the most exciting video!

Moosilauke rime

A beautiful day on a favorite peak.

Moosilauke is my favorite mountain, and I visit often. Nonetheless, it had been nearly a year since my last visit – far longer than my usual time away – and I was itching to get back up there. Today’s weather forecast promised moderate temperatures and clear skies – and I knew from recent weather that these popular trails should be well packed from the storms two and three weeks ago. Although I got a late start (hitting the trail at 11am), it turned out to be a fantastic day to be in the mountains. Read on!

David at the summit sign for Mount Moosilauke.

Sunday Cube

Mount Cube with a dusting of snow.

It has been a warm week, complete with rain, sleet, and drizzle. Bleah – much of the beautiful snow we had last week has compacted, and the frozen ponds and rivers are looking rather soft. Nonetheless I was eager to get out on the trail, so I headed for an old standby, Mount Cube. The sky was cloudy but I was rewarded with views both close and distant. Read on!

Wright’s Mountain

A gem of the upper valley.

After another week of snow and cold weather – that allowed the snow to remain soft and powdery – it was time to get out on the trail again. Some friends suggested Wright’s Mountain, outside Bradford VT. It has a lovely network of trails, maintained by local volunteers. It’s not a tall mountain, nor are its trails long, but on a single-digit kind of day it makes for a nice morning outing.

View from summit of Wright Mountain, Vermont.

Ski season

It has finally snowed – two or three good dumps of snow, over the past two weeks. Although it rained on the snow last week, it stayed cold all this week, so last week’s snow was compressed and hardened by the rain, and this week’s snow formed a wonderfully fluffy powder on top of that base. Today I had a chance to get out skiing, for the first time this season. A friend here in Lyme provides an incredible community service – he grooms several kilometers of trails for nordic skiing, classic style. These trails are a short drive from my house, and they wander through the farm fields and timber forests of central Lyme. I made a quick couple of loops in the lower fields this afternoon… just me and the breeze and a light falling snow. Deer tracks criss-crossed the field, and a barred owl soared silently over the meadow.

Skiing the groomed trails in the hayfields behind the farms of Lyme.

Sunday Mountain Sunday

I hadn’t been out hiking for a month, so I was itching to get back out in the woods. It snowed (a lot!) last weekend, but this week’s rain compacted and froze most of that snow into a hardpack. Nonetheless, Tim and I headed out this morning for a quick hike. An overnight snow squall had dusted the forest with a fresh, thin layer of snow, which made for pretty scenery. We chose Sunday Mountain, a forested bump of about 1800′ elevation up in Orford, NH, along the Rivendell Trail.

Black Mountain in the clouds

A day for “inner views.”

It had been two weeks since I had a chance to get out hiking. The weather forecast was not promising – morning fog, clouds all day – but it’s always nice to get outside. I picked Black Mountain, a place I’ve been many times because it has a great view of Mount Moosilauke. Not today!

Black Mountain is in the clouds today. Don’t expect any views of anything!

Potash mountain

A beautiful late-fall day for a hike.

As I drove north in the early twilight, the few clouds slowly became tinged pink, then bright orange. I turned onto NH Route 25A and headed due east, the road ahead was illuminated in a brilliant orange display as the sun rose into the clouds. A broad smile spread on my face as I realized I had made the right choice; the forecast had indicated a slight chance of snow or (later) rain, but things were looking awfully darn good for an early-morning late-fall hike. Did it hold? read on.

Sunrise over Kancamagus valley from 118 over Moosilauke.

First snowfall

Winter is here?

At daybreak today we woke to our first proper snowfall – with an inch of fresh snow on the ground by 7am. We’d seen snow flurries once or twice in the past week, but now we can confidently say that fall has ended and we’re entering stick season. It appears raspberry season has ended, as well!

Winter’s last gasp

It’s not over until it’s over.

You and I both know that the spring equinox arrived last Monday, but the New Hampshire weather seemed not to notice. It snowed yesterday, just a bit, and drizzled this morning. But as I looked out at the morning drizzle and 33º temperatures, I just knew it would be an all-snow event a bit higher up. So I drove to the other corner of Lyme, to those ski trails-that-shall-not-be-named, and stepped out into fresh powder.