Tell me again why I am doing this...

oh, that's right....because I want to be a 46er, duh!

Let me tell ya, this hike to Armstrong and Upper WolfJaw was a real knee-slapper....not! Actually, I think this one could be considered a sanity checker. And from what I hear, they get worse. Great. Well, at least the car ride was nice!

Ok, let's re-cap this beastly little hike. We signed in around 7:30am and headed up Lake Road. Brian wanted to take the Wedge Brook Trail thru the AMR and end up at the col between Upper and Lower WolfJaw. Well, we took a wrong turn, were slightly confused, and ultimately decided to get back on the road---taking the next right turn towards Gothics.

This was at a little foot bridge on the East River Trail.

Beaver Meadow Falls--not too far from the turn off from Lake Road. I would have been happy to drop my pack and stay here all day. It's a beautiful little spot. There's a little bridge in front of the falls--you can stand there and feel the cool spray hit your face.

There's the rainbow in the center.

Right after Beaver Meadow Falls, it started to get ugly...went up the first of many ladders. It didn't stay ugly for too long and seemed to level off a bit as we headed towards NYState property. I'd say within a half a mile of crossing over, it started to get rocky, rooty, and muddy all at once. There were several steep slabs (should have taken more pics of those) and ginormous boulders like this one below. No problem...just grab the nearest root and hoist yourself up.

And then we got to this erratic--it was teetering on the right side. Yikes! I wouldn't want to be near this bad boy in an earth quake.

This is a view of Pyramid (not a High Peak, in the center) and Gothics (to the right). The trail was tight in this section and we encountered a few more well-placed ladders. We got to the col and hung a right towards Armstrong--only half a mile to go!
Yay---#15 for me--on the summit of Armstrong. Gothics is behind me (on my right) and I think the upper section of the Great Range is over my left shoulder. We had a quick lunch, took some video and headed over to Upper Wolf Jaw.

My muddy buddies

Me and the man on Armstrong

This is a little snippet of video coming down the backside of Armstrong. I was a little nervous as I approached the top of the ladder---the footholds were not great and the upper part of the ladder was icy and snowy. There was probably a good two feet of snow covering the bottom of the ladder.

After this ladder, I had to excuse myself and use the "little girls room". Brian looked up and then yelled over to me "Holy Crap, do you see how steep that is? We just came down that! Incredible!" To which I replied "Um, I'm trying not to think about it right now--because I don't want to have nightmares, LOL!" It was kind of scary!

After that ordeal, we made it to the summit of Upper WolfJaw and made fast friens with this little junco. Did you know that Juncos like French Onion Sunchips?

Changing socks. The old Merrells aren't as waterproof as they used to be. That's Lower WolfJaw in the background. Been there, done that, not going back til Winter.

Not the most flattering picture, but after shimmy-ing and scooting down more huge boulders on the backside of UWJ, I'd say I looked pretty good....just kidding. What's that you say? Where's the trail? Follow the mud or follow the rock.

The middle of May and there are still icicles in the Adirondacks.

On the way down the Wedge Brook trail, Brian spotted White honeysuckle, tons of Trout Lilies, and a few patches of Trillium.

Wedge Brook--very pretty and very loud.

Back on the AMR property. Had we taken a right turn in the morning (when we were slighty disoriented), we would have crossed here at Canyon Bridge.

We weren't too far from the Lake Road at this point, maybe 3/4 of a mile...and another 3/4 of a mile after that to the car.

That was a gnarly little hike (or as I like to call it, 12 miles the hard way) and I'm glad it's over. It's been two days since that hike and my upper thighs and fanny muscles are less sore than they were on Wednesday. Anyhoo, a big thank you to my man-hiker for taking me out for some fresh air and getting me back to the car in one piece :-) !