It’s been nearly 2 months since I hiked Little Bigelow with Max (currently conquering THE Appalachian Trail)and a ragtag group of Appalachian Mountain Club members (including the dean of UMaine’s College of Engineering). Little Bigelow was my first big snowshoe trek, and was a great hike even though we were socked in with clouds at the top.

So now it’s almost March May (thanks mom). Snow has been mostly gone for a couple weeks, temperatures are reaching the 60′s, and I’m itching for a nice spring hike.

In trying to choose a hike, I grabbed the AllTrails iOS app, which uses google maps to show all sorts of different hiking trails in an area. AllTrails lets users rate, comment on, and add pictures of various hikes; altogether a well done app with a pretty decent user base.

I settled on the White Mountains National Forest, mainly due to it’s strategic location between myself and the other people I hike with. Oh, and the fact that it’s a huge region of mountains with tons of 4000-footers. I pointed the AllTrails app at the White Mountains, and settled on the Champney Falls Trail. 7.6 miles round trip to the bald-topped Mount Chocorua, including a waterfall along the way.

After a cold winter which saw me sunrise-summiting Sugarloaf and snowshoeing up Little Bigelow, I’m looking forward to shedding the layers for some beautiful spring hiking. I love being able to hang out atop a summit, enjoying the accomplishment, rather than making a quick turnaround to spare frozen fingers.

As usual, the end of the semester is very busy, but once school is over (May 7th), I’ll be trying to separate some people from their busy schedules for an excursion into the woods of Northeastern New Hampshire.