News
What We've Been Up To!
6/15: 14′ Bridge for Shaker Museum, Enfield NH
The Shaker community at Enfield NH powered their mills by collecting water from ponds and brooks high on the mountain via an aqueduct they dug in the 1840s. This ended at a reservoir about 20 yards across. It fed water into a brook that turned the water wheel of a two-story stone mill. The Shakers…
Read More5/12/24: Old Acquaintances on West Ridge Trail
Mother’s Day on Mount Cardigan was cool (50s) and a little breezy above 1900′, and I spent 5 hours re-digging 25 drains that are downhill of the jeep road and below the junction with South Ridge Trail. The state DOT opened the gate on the road to them last Thursday after closing it for six…
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Season Opener: Winslow Trail 5/4/24
Snow and ice has melted off most trails, the gate to this one is open, and five of us turned out to patrol it. After greeting old friends, and signing the waiver, we took tools and set off uphill in 40s temps and a shower of rain. Three hiked to the summit and worked down.…
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Season Starts Soon…
Hello Trail Crew, We seem to have made it through this would-be winter with not much snow but five mud seasons. Snow’s about melted, we can start patrolling trails. This note is just to say that we’ll start soon, but conditions are not quite ready. Gates are still across roads at Cardigan and at Kearsarge.…
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Anatomy of a Spring Patrol
By Wes Tucker Anybody who has spent time in New Hampshire knows that there are more seasons than just the basic four. The spring thaw is followed by mud season. Then fast on it’s heels comes black fly season. But wedged in between them is a brief window of time that Cardigan Highlanders call spring…
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New Trail Map!
Cardigan Highlanders is proud to present our new Cole Pond Trail Map. This often overlooked hiking trail has been in need of an accurate trail map for a long time. Using the latest USGS topo map as a base, we incorporated USGS data, GPS tracks, and on-the-ground observations to get the trail as accurate as…
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CHVTC Annual Meeting 2024
The crew held their annual meeting on Saturday March 9 2024. All seven Directors attended, strengthened by three interested volunteers. They approved the 2023 minutes and heard the President report. The treasury is healthy thanks to appealing to large donors by the President and the Trailmaster. Convincing them to unlimber their checkbooks is greatly helped…
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Winter Solitude
Under the guise of scouting trail condions on Mount Sunapee, but really just wanting to take a hike, Team Leader Josh sent us this image from White Ledge above Lake Solitude. He noted a few blowdowns to be cleared in the Spring, but the trail is orherwise in pretty good shape. Looking at this picture…
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2023: 39th Worklog Summary for CHVTC
Seventeen volunteers turned out: 13 had and 1 earned their tartan. The 532 hours on trails is 111% of the average of the last 5 years pre-covid: 476 hrs. Our admin hrs = 168, outreach not trailwork = 54 hr, Total hrs = 754. DNCR values our work at $31.80/hr, so that is $23,977.20. We…
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