We met at the Richmond Park & Ride at 9, piled into one car, and headed to the trailhead in Huntington. We started up the Forest City Trail at 9:30, with a temperature right around freezing and low clouds.

Given sparsity of recent snow, we left snowshoes in the car, but donned microspikes. All trails were packed, although there was fresh snow over the tracks on the Long Trail section, and even off trail, the snow wasn’t very deep. We had a little wet blowing snow on the way up Forest City Trail, but otherwise encountered no precipitation.

We made good time up, with the trip “leader” at the back keeping the pace from getting too fast, and we reached the Long Trail around 10:20. There were a few glimpses of blue sky and sun on the way up the Long Trail, but no real views, and we spent most of the time in the clouds. We reached the summit around noon, but there was a pretty stiff wind, so we waited until we reached the hut clearing to have a snack. We’d seen no one until we reached the summit, but from that point on we saw several groups, though still not many for Camels Hump on a weekend.

The “leader” who had been lagging behind to this point proved he’s faster on downhills, and led the group down to the car, which we reached around 1:20.

Participants: Gary Kupperblatt, Lisa Hardy, David Hathaway (leader).

Photos: David and Lisa.