In the clouds and wind for New Year's Day Hike

I continued my tradition of hiking on New Year's Day this year with my daughter, heading back to Mt. Greylock in MA.  The weather was warm, in the low 40's, and windy when we arrived at the Cheshire Harbor trailhead.  We started hiking at 10am and made good time up the familiar trail reaching the summit just before noon.  We were able to bare boot about 3/4 of the way up before putting on the microspikes and continuing.

It was gusty winds and icy at the top and we were in the clouds, so there was no views.  We walked around the beacon and then made our way back to the trees and out of the wind.  Luckily, it was not very cold and the wind didn't bite us. 

We decided to take the Gould trail down and then cut over on a side trail back to the Cheshire Harbor trail to finish.  The Gould trail had snow and ice down to the trail junction so we kept the spikes on until then.  As we made our way back toward Cheshire Harbor we descended in to a deep ravine with a stream to cross.  The sides were steep and we had a few switch backs along the way.  The snow was still thick in spots on the trail and made a tricky descent.  The stream was running high and we had to search a little for a good place to cross, but soon found a spot and were climbing out of the ravine.  Soon we were back on our way out and to the car. 

It was a fun hike and I found the conditions at the top, fun and exhilarating to experience.  We hiked a total of 7 miles in about 4 hours.  We only saw a few other hikers, though the parking lot had a number of cars when we returned.  It felt good to get out and hike as it's been a while.  I'm looking forward to hiking more in 2019 as last year I didn't get out as much as I would have liked.