Nippletop and Surrounds
Adirondack Park, NY, USA ● 22 Jun 2024
After almost 3 month without a decent walk under my belt, I was excited to head to the Adirondacks for a Hike-a-palooza with the Ottawa section of the Alpine Club of Canada (although it did feel like a bit of a waste not to be taking climbing gear). There were no overnight trips on the menu, so I settled for the longest day walk on offer - bagging four of the 46ers: Dial, Nippletop, Calvin, and Blake. GPX file here.
Anticipating a 12 hour day and rainy weather we set off walking from the Ausable Club Parking Area at 5:45. The walk started along a road, through a golf course, and past a fancy resort building. We signed in at the trail register, including a brief interaction with a classic park ranger. When the path headed uphill off the road I was immediately sweating. As we gained altitude we entered more confierous forest which I enjoy much more than the deciduous forest.
Climbing up towards Dial
Reaching Dial we were treated with lovely views of mist. Although it did briefly clear a bit to reveal atmospheric views of the ridge ahead. Continuing on, we next stopped at Nippletop, which disappointingly didn’t feel particularly nipple shaped. The view was almost identical.
Looking along the ridge towards Nippletop, from Dial
Getting close
The gang on Nippletop
Heading downhill was interesting – not as steep as I was expecting, but some interesting slabby granite to navigate. It really goes to show how much use these trails get, because they are so worn away. As we reached the bottom and refilled water at the camping lakes the proper rain set in.
Moody ponds at Elk pass
We marched on uphill, and it felt like we made good time to Calvin. Near the top were some cool slabs, and a really neat section with a small ladder over a gap. In my head we were then just going to pop along the ridge to Blake, but I should have looked closer at the topo because there was a 200m descent and ascent between them, which I realised as we dropped down and down and down. Blake is the most underwhelming “peak” I have ever seen – a boulder in some relatively flat woods – but the route to it was fun, with some decent slabs to clamber up, and a couple of ladders to go down. After a very brief break we backtracked back over Calvin and rejoned our loop.
Mud and granite
Fun slabs to negotiate
Ladders if you want to cheat (we did)
The others decided to head directy back to the road, but I ran off to visit the lookouts over the lake – managing to time it well to get some really moody views with the cloud lifting. I got in my head I wanted a swim, and after a brief side trip to Rainbow Falls, found a good spot by the damn at the end of the lake. The water was so warm, and while I couldn’t quite relax due to being in a new setting, the swim did so much good for me.
A glimpse of Lower Ausable Lake
Looks perfect for a swim!
I met back with the others where their trail met the road 1km down, and we trodded back out to the car. All in all, slightly over 30km & 1600m elevation in 12.5 hours. It felt good.