Sugarbush Ridge (Ellen, Lincoln, Cutts, Abraham, Stark etc..) VT Round Trip

[MarcHowes]

Date(s) Hiked: 8-26-2006

Trails(s) Hiked: Battell Trail to Long trail and back

Total Distance: 24 miles

Total Vertical Gain: 7280'

Total Time 12 hours

Difficulty: Grueling

Conditions: Perfect

Special Required Equipment: Boots are always useful!

Trip Report: This was a nice long trip. I started off at 4:30 AM from Battell parking lot. I proceeded to the summit of Abraham in the dark just in time to catch the sunrise. The entire valley east of the ridge was undercast and to the west it was clear. http://hoosac.franklinsites.com/nonhoosac/VT/Sugarbush060826

I proceeded smoothly to Lincoln and Ellen taking pictures of the slowly rising undercast along the way. When I got to Stark the Undercast had lifted and was now overcast!! I reached my halfway point (appalachian gap) after exactly 6 hours where I filled my water bottle with water I left there the night before. I proceeded back the way I came with great ambition to get back to my car. Views were less amazing on the return trip. Air was hazy and kinda blah. Temperatures were a perfect 45-60 the entire day. I became somewhat foot sore at lincoln peak after about 20 miles but I pressed on to the car and returned at 4:25 so the whole thing took me 11:55

Views were top notch and I am very glad I got up early to see them. Met some interesting people along the way (Isn't that how it always is on AT or LT?) I would reccomend doing this with a friend and park one car at Battell or Lincoln gap and go one way to the Appalachian gap!

 

[Greg]

Wow! Those undercast pics are amazing! Thanks for sharing. ~~Thumbs Up~~

 

[ChileMass]

Marc - great pictures - that's a long day. Glad you had fun!

 

[Jonni]

Excellent Pictures! 24 Miles seems like quite a hoof for one day, though I've never hiked that series of trails/mtns before.

 

[noski]

Outstanding! Congratulations! We really have a treasure here with this ridgeline hike. It was referenced recently in NatGeo Explorer. Great pictures.

 

[thetrailboss]

I would reccomend doing this with a friend and park one car at Battell or Lincoln gap and go one way to the Appalachian gap!

You're the second person I've seen this month do this route on by going out and back. :blink: That seems odd since myself and many others who have done it have gone from gap-to-gap by spotting a car. Honestly, this is the only real way to do it rather than out and back, which doubles distance, difficulty, etc. I take it you are trying to do the LT and were solo on this day?

 

[MarcHowes]

For me making it a 24 mile round trip made it more fun. I kinda did it for a peakbagging challenge so I could finish my VT top 10 and ended up getting some real great views For that kinda mileage ideally I would have liked to do something more like lincoln gap to winooski with 2 cars but I dont know if I would be a very happy person going up camel's hump after 16 miles :-x I can still dream can't I