Whiteface Landing

With just a dusting of snow in the Champlain Valley for weeks, we had been pining for a day on our skis. Lisa checked the North Country Public Radio's ski conditions webpage and with the Lake Placid region listed as "outstanding," we threw the skis in the car and headed to the Connery Pond road.

The day could only be described as perfect. The powdery snow make the skiing absolutely sublime as we meandered through the woods. We stopped briefly to admire Connery Pond from the boat access while making mental notes for a future return with paddle boats when the pond would be a bit more liquid.

Our destination was Whiteface Landing at the belly of Barrel Bay on Lake Placid. We took a brief snapshot of the lake but then ate our lunch in a grove of trees to keep our fingers warm. In winter trips, the breaks are brief and we were soon back on the trail, gliding most of the way. We backtracked except for where we skied across Connery Pond.

With puffy snowflakes falling gently from the sky, we savored our last mile of the trail. We will be keeping this one high on the list for all seasons!

Lake Andrew Tract

On the last day of 2016, we packed the car and headed to the Newcomb cabin in search of snow on which to ski. We were happy to see that as we climbed in elevation from Port Henry to North Hudson and later to Newcomb we went from seeing a dusting on the ground to over a foot of snow. Upon arrival, we shoveled paths and got the wood stove cranking for our New Years Eve in the wilderness. We would be hard pressed to find an experience further from attending the Times Square celebration in New York City!

In the afternoon we headed to the Newcomb ski loop, which we assumed to be a pleasant trail for skiing since it was labeled as a ski trail. What we found was a mile of flat terrain followed by cliffs, river crossings, boulders and borderline impassable "trail." We scrambled up and down the rough terrain, taking off skis to walk in places while breaking trail. We made it back around sunset, exhausted and ready for supper.

We whiled away the evening eating chili cooked over the wood stove and playing Settlers of Catan by firelight. We didn't make it to midnight...not even close.

The next day we parted with Tom who elected to snowshoe around the Hudson River area behind the cabin while we skied the Lake Andrew Tract. We parked at the Bradley Pond trailhead and found that the trail had been tracked by skiers already. This made for a pleasant surprise and an opposite experience of the previous day. The wide road into the hunting camps made for easy skiing. We found ourselves looking directly up at the slides on Santanoni Mountain. It was a breathtaking view and we enjoyed the light snow falling as we admired it.

Our ski out was quick since most of the four miles was downhill! It was a perfect way to ring in the New Year with plenty of sleep and lots of fresh air.