The day began with four of us meeting at the Richmond Park & Ride at 4:45 pm to head to the Camels Hump Huntington Road Trailhead in Huntington. We arrived at the trailhead at approximately 5:15 pm. The remaining four met us at the trailhead. Two of the hikers sent messages between 2 and 4 pm that were unable to make the hike so our total went from 10 to 8 abruptly. We did brief introductions as three new hikers (Welcome Nancy, David, and Philip), reviewed the important hiking rules, and we were off on our adventure at 5:30 pm as planned.

We parked at upper lot, took the short connector trail and headed up the Forest City Trail. The weather was perfect regarding temperatures being in the mid-50’s to 60°F, sunny/clear skies and low humidity. The group was clipping along at brisk pace, chatting and before we knew what happened we arrived at the Long Trail and Dean Trail intersection at 6:15 pm. We took a brief snack break, discussed our pace, and approximate arrival time at the summit based on our current pace. Goal was to arrive at summit between 8-8:15 pm since sunset was at 8:31 pm and moonrise at 8:32 pm. We dropped our pace down slightly so would not arrive at summit between 7:30 and 7:45 pm as temperatures were predicted to be feels like 27°F – 39°F between 8 and 11 pm. Another pause at approximately 6:45 pm at a clearing where had some great views of the Worcester Range to the east. Insert trail humor here “What would Julie rather be than a leader for GMC hikes?” Answer a gallon (rather than a Liter). That has dad joke written all over it! Onward and upward with the final push to where the Alpine Trail intersects the LT North Trail arriving there at 7:55 to 8 pm. Brief pause to get the group back together at this intersection and some began heading up to the summit when needed to start moving to maintain core temperature as getting cooler at this time. Susan and David arrived shortly after Bamby, Marcus, Julie, Philip, and Nancy began trek to summit while I waited until they arrived. Susan, David and I arrived at the summit at 8:10 -8:15 pm. We all layered up to settle in for the sunset and moonrise while preparing/enjoying the views, having some nourishment, and to get our headlamps out for the trek down. The sunset was beautiful and amazing glow as dropped below the Adirondacks over Lake Champlain. It is incredible how fast the sun drops at the very end.

We stayed up at the summit until approximately 9 pm with the hope the moonrise would have been high enough to see since clear skies allowed to see the sunset but to no avail thus headed down to the clearing area north of Camels Hump. Arrived and waited at clearing about 9:10 pm, whilst Marcus checked peak finder for moonrise tracking to see if potential viewing at the clearing area. Waited for 10 minutes and decided to begin our trek down Burrows Trail at 9:20 pm knowing our moon views would have to be on the way down and at the trailhead. Glimpses of the moon in its splendor were present half way down the Burrows Trail and again at the trailhead parking lot. Arrived back at the trailhead at ~ 10:30 pm. Hike Participants: Philip Mosenthal, David McColgin, Nancy Kahn, Susan Tobin, Bamby Pierpont-Bates, Marcus Keely, Julie Cimonetti, and Dale Schmit(Trip Leader). Photos: Dale, Marcus, Bamby and Susan.