Zealand-Bonds Traverse January 2010

Bondcliff-Bond-West Bond-Zealand

TRAILS: Wilderness, Bondcliff, Twinway, Zealand trails

January 20, 2010

Today was a biggy! A traverse of the Bonds and Zealand peaks from Lincoln Woods to Rte 302 in Twin Mountain. 22.8 miles wiht 4 summits along the way. Meb, Jeremy, and I met at 6 AM in Twin Mountain and then drove down to Lincoln Woods. We were on the trail at 6:45 AM for our all day adventure.

The Wilderness trail had a few inches of fresh snow, but we made it to the Bondcliff trail in 1:45. After a quick break we headed up towards Bondcliff through 6 inches to a foot of fresh snow. As we approached the summit we encountered light winds with blowing snow. The summit area was a mixture of frozen snow and small drifts.

We quickly set out for Bond where we found deeper snow - up to 2 feet of powder in sections, but all rocks were covered and filled in with snow, making the going easier, although still a steep climb. From Bond we headed down to the spur trail for West Bond, getting a nice view of it along the way. We left our packs at the junction to make the short hike out to the summit. Meb was asked to go first as this was the finish of her January Grid peaks - only 12 more to go for her to become the 11th person to complete the grid!

As we approached Guyot we found hard packed snow conditions that allowed us to shave the corner over to the Twinway. A bit further along we finally saw our first hikers of the day - a group from UNH that were camping out. Nice to know that the rest of the trail would be broken out!

The Twinway had numerous blowdowns and trees that were bent over blocking the trail slowing us down and at one point snagging my camera - luckily I realized it was missing before we had gone too far and was able to recover it.

Eventually we made it to Zealand hut where we met Ryan, a member of VFTT. We took a 20 minute break here for food and water before starting our last push of @ 7 miles to the cars. A little over 2 hours later were were at Rte 302 having completed the almost 23 miles in exactly 12 hours!

After the hike Jeremy and I stopped at the Common Man in Lincoln where a steak dinner in front of the fireplace was a perfect ending to the day. A huge thanks to Meb and Jeremy for letting me join them today. Great hike, fun company.

Directions to Trailhead
From Lincoln head East on the Kanc until you arrive at the Lincoln Woods parking lot on the left in @ 5 miles.

Length of Hike:
12:00 hours
22.8 miles