 The red track shows my route in 2013. The blue track is from a 2008 trip, when we were stopped at 12200' by 90 mph winds. The other 4 folks were on the red route most of the time, except for a short stretch down the purple route |
 A Google Earth (GE) view from the NE, for the upper part of the trip. GE doesn't have an exact digital elevation model and can't model the cliffs well, so the terrain is somewhat rounded. The other 4 folks followed the purple track (approximately) down a very scary chute. We had gone around the back of the peak, and to what we guessed was the top of a nice scree slope on the NW shoulder. Oops. |
 A close up of the GE view. I got down below the purple chute, and watched for an hour as they came through, ever so carefully, one by one. Laura did an excellent job getting people through, and I'm not sure my red route was really any better-- it worked for me because I can run across talus, but that doesn't work for a lot of folk. In a few places, my route skirted scary cliffs. |
 OK, back to the trip. Laura finds a heart-shaped rock. |
 Grouse. We saw deer and marmots as well. |
 Laura finds a tree with a heart-shaped scar. |
 I thought I was taking a surreptitious picture of Laura and Christine, and didn't understand why they were giggling. I didn't get it till I got home and looked at the photos! |
 View of University Peak across Bench Lake. |
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 View across the Matlock Lakes, where Andy Griffith fished after Opie went to University and started directing movies. |
 Lake 11360'. |
 Anita (in pink) and Luc (in green) met us at the lake. |
 Scree, talus, scree, talus, scree, scree. |
 OK, we hit the good stuff! |
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 Less and less scree as we get higher. View NW across Kearsarge Lakes. |
 Laura's pic of me. I don't think we had to go up here, but it was fun! |
 Laura gets ready to pop through the "Keyhole" on NE side of summit, at about 13450'. |
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 Laura and Christine ponder the West summit. |
 The group gathers on the middle (higher) summit. L to R: Christine, Laura, Luc, Anita. |
 View SW. |
 View N |
 View NE over (L to R) lake 11360, Bench Lake, and Matlock Lakes. |
 Who was here recently? |
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 Luc points out a UFO |
 Christine. |
 Now we are coming down the SW side. Picture of Anita's butt. |
 Almost back to Lake 11360! I didn't take too many pictures for much of the descent. I spent about an hour watching the folks come through the "purple" chute, and somehow thought I would jinx them if I took pictures. |
 Christine looks over Bench Lake. |
 View back at University. |