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Ascent of Cannon Mountain on 2017-07-02

Climber: Maggie Zarlengo

Others in Party:	Raymond Zarlengo
Date:	Sunday, July 2, 2017
Ascent Type:	Successful Summit Attained
Peak:	Cannon Mountain
Location:	USA-New Hampshire
Elevation:	4080 ft / 1243 m
Ascent Trip Report Our original plan was to go up the Kinsmans via the Lonesome Lake Trail, but the AMC trail crew closed Lonesome Lake trail from Lafayette Campground to the hut, so we decided to bag Cannon instead via Hi-Cannon trail, since this was the detour to the hut anyway. We hiked the day after severe thunderstorms in the area, so trails were extremely wet with rivers running through them and were washed out at times. Hi-Cannon was a difficult trail because it was wet. The summit was nice, but strange to see buildings up there (very Washington-esque). We went down Kinsman Ridge trail thinking we would walk the ridge to bag the Kinsmans on the same day, but it was just impossible. That trail down was extremely steep, even steeper than Airline down Mt Madison, and I was on all fours scrambling down slippery granite boulders for the quarter mile of that steepest part. It was absolutely miserable. After an ankle and knee injury from that trek down on my part and a fall on my dad's part, we decided to scrap the Kinsmans and take the Lonesome Lake cutoff and get off the mountain. We rested at Lonesome Lake with blueberry cobbler in hand and I talked to Carter and Abby, since Emily was on day off and we just missed her by a couple of hours. We returned to Lafayette Campground via the Dodge Cutoff and Hi-Cannon trails, determined to return with a different route to bag the Kinsmans. There was simply too much water on the trails and going down that quarter mile Kinsman Ridge trail was extremely dangerous due to trail configuration and conditions. Kinsman Ridge between the Lonesome Lake cutoff and Cannon is an up trail only.