Last week, I talked to a couple hikers about the gorgeous vantage point at Mt Chase, perfection if they did not mind the two mile snowy road walk to the trailhead. It left me wanting to revisit the area. I had hiked to the Mt Chase summit and Eagle Rock spur last August. I still wanted to summit the adjacent Bald Mountain.
The Bald Mountain trail veers east off the Waterfall trail, Waterfall a scenic alternative to the main trail. I first heard of Mt Chase Bald when a hiker injured herself there in 2021. When the AMC released the second edition of the 100 Mile Wilderness map, I noticed the addition of the Bald Mountain trail. I suspected it would be added to the 12th edition of the Maine Mountain Guide.
I could have waited for directions from the 12th edition. My insatiable curiosity prompted me to attempt it in August. I followed sporadic pink and orange flagging tape along a contour, across a stream, and up an old woods road to a young beech stand. The route appeared flagged well-enough until .2 before the summit. I turned around there due to uncertainty.
I had hoped for better results today with the 12th edition description in hand and a self-made track based on public tracks. Parked at the winter space tucked inside Mountain Road from Rt 11. Barebooted on the compacted snow two miles to the trailhead.
Straight ahead, 100 eclipse viewers had compacted the main trail down to a tread way of consolidated snow. To the right, north of the picnic table, a few boot tracks headed towards my favorite ascent route, the Waterfall trail (caution: stream crossings and streamside route may not be appropriate for all or all seasons).
The million dollar question: did any eclipse viewers break out the Bald Mountain trail? Heck no. When I reached the Bald Mountain turn-off, I saw an adventure of unbroken snow. The snowshoes I carried soon became bound to my feet as I followed the now familiar route.
I soon arrived back in the young beech forest at the infamous last piece of flagging tape. I searched the leafless woods for pink or orange or any color tape. No luck. The path remained wide and clear in the direction of the summit cone, so I proceeded to the base.
Until this point, the MMG description can be followed even in winter conditions. It now instructed me to look for a mossy outcropping. It seemed like there were numerous, all covered in snow! Even worse, a cairn in a small opening! Funny thing about trying to find small cairns in snow-covered woods…challenging for sure.
Realizing the silliness, a sensible guidebook hiker may have turned around there. Not me. Was there a path to my left? Nope, that goose chase landed me to the north of an outcropping wall too steep to scramble up.
I retreated back to the last known piece of flagging tape and looked at the mossy outcropping contenders again. I spotted rocks that looked like I could “weave through”, as the description said. I headed there.
It felt path-like leading to the south side of an outcropping wall. Where would I scramble up? I could see a thick coating of ice exposed under the snow. I thought of the 2021 search and rescue. I pushed my way through dense branches in search of a hint of a trail.
411 feet from the summit, Gaia said. It was somewhere up on the ledges. If I wanted to tag another Bald, I could have pushed my way there. Yet that is not the game. This is the follow-the-blazes/flagging tape/cairn/directions-in-the-MMG game. Like it or not, I will have to come back in May to hike it to my satisfaction.
Maine: The Way Life Turned Out 