Giant 4'th High Peak Ascent

Giant Mountain

12'th highest peak in NY State with an elevation of 4,627 ft. 

5-26-12 We planned this climb for several months hoping the weather would be nice when we made the camping reservations. We lucked out and the weather was perfect. A group of 10 of us drove up from Connecticut to the ADK Loj on Friday night for the weekend. The last time I camped at the Loj we stayed in a lean to. This time we decided to take it up a notch and rented a canvas tent for the weekend. We planned to "bag" two high peaks if possible by climbing both Giant Mountain and Rocky Peak Ridge in a day. My buddy Russell said he has done both and they are doable but it would be a long day strenuous day, he wasn't kidding. After a breakfast of pop tarts and bruised bananas we hopped in our cars and drove approximately a half hour back down 73 through Keene to the trail head for Giant. There are two trails you can take into Giant and we decided on the one at Roaring Brook Falls so we could see the falls. All ten of us signed in and set out from RBF at approximately 9 am.

After less than a half hour we were at the foot of the falls. They were not overly impressive but cool to stop for a minute and take a few pictures at the bottom. You can't really tell from this picture but the falls are pretty high up and steep. We then set out to climb to the top but had to go back to the trail to do so.

This is a picture of myself and our two sons at the top of the falls. I'm still smiling at this point because I have no idea what awaits me the rest of the day.

From after the falls it was a steady incline climb up to the summit of Giant. I say a steady incline because there was not very much time where we were not hiking on an incline. Some parts were more steep than others but always up. Other hikes that I have done, like Mount Marcy, there are sections that are relatively flat so you can get a breather, but not Giant Mountain. With the incline also came sections like this with boulders that had to be climbed over.

There were also many more sections of rock slides that were in various states of wetness that had to be scaled with care.

 

This one section was particularly steep and slick and I assume has been so for some time by the fact that a nice rustic wooden ladder had been fashioned to make the climb doable. I was getting pretty hungry at this point but determined not to each lunch until I had reached the summit of Giant. It was around noon and the peak was in sight but still a ways away.

At long last I reached the summit and touched the marker at approximately 1 pm. I then treated myself to some rest and a lunch of trail mix, the good stuff with chocolate, and a couple of Clif Bars.

After a short break and the enjoyment of the spectacular views we set out back down Giant approximately 0.1 miles to the trail split over to Rocky Peak Ridge. See the next posting for a description of the rest of the day.