15 miles - difficult
This
hike is really two separate hikes which we were crazy enough to do in
one day. We left at 9:15 and walked the first 2 miles to Marcy Dam
with energy. The next two miles were also very easy. We followed a
fast river to a bridge. After about a mile of forest walk, we arrived
in Avalanche Pass. It looked like a big dump of broken trees. The
cliffs on each side (Colden Mountain to the East and Avalanche
Mountain to the west were very impressive. We arrived at Avalanche
Lake a little before noon and decided to keep going to Colden Lake
before having lunch. The hike along Avalanche Lake was difficult, but
fun. We had to climb latters and rocks. Before arriving at Colden
Lake, the path split in two and we had to decide whether or not we
wanted to hike Algonquin Peak and loop back to the camp ground or
not. We met another hiker and she told us it was very snowy so we
kept on going to Colden Lake. We had lunch at one and with all the
energy we decided that we could go the 9 or so more miles to loop
around Colden Mountain instead of simply looping around Colden Lake
and going back the same way we came. The walk around was not only
longer than what we’d done so far, it was much more difficult. The
first three miles were uphill, but the worst was still to come. With
about six miles left, at 3:30, we arrived in a marshy area that was
completely flooded. To make it across, we had to balance on floating
logs that were not very well placed. For a few minutes we feared we
would have to walk back the other way or wade through the marsh, but
Guillaume was able to replace the logs so it was solid enough for us
to get across. More surprises were on the way. The trail starting
heading up and the higher we got, the snowier the trail got. We ended
up having to go for a good 3 miles through snow, ice and rocks. When
we finally arrived back where the path joined back our original root,
I could not believe I still had more than four miles to walk. We did
it, and we got back before dark at 6:45.
