A lovely little winter hike with fantastic views.

Rainbow and I met at the trailhead at 9AM, since this was going to be a relatively short hike. We’d be hiking Mount Cube via the Cross Rivendell Trail (we didn’t see any elves!). We didn’t see any cars either, we were the first two there.

There weren’t any recent trail reports, so I wasn’t sure what condition the trail would be in. Happy to see a snowshoe trail at the start. It was still mushy enough that we went ahead and put on our snowshoes to further pack down the trail.

The trail, weather, and woods were just gorgeous. It was a pleasant snowshoe on not too steep a trail. We saw four people the entire day, mostly brief encounters, with the exception of one annoying dog owner with a rambunctious puppy off leash and owner no where to be found. Anyway…

After a nice summit lunch, we headed back down. I swapped between microspikes and snowshoes. The spikes felt a little too mushy for me, but the snowshoes are difficult on a descent (much easier to deal with the size of them going up, than stepping down).

Back at the trailhead and Rainbow gave me this amazing gift! She made it herself, and it’s three mountains that stand together, with her trailname, mine, and Right Turn. So awesome!

Hike stats:

• Distance: 4.2 miles
• Elevation gain: 1,460 feet
• Total time: 5 hours, 9 minutes
• Moving time: 3 hours, 55 minutes