You Are Here: Klem-Mack Loop

Today was perfect. Which is an amazing statement to make. But it was. I told my boys I wanted to hike. No one argued or tried to negotiate their way out of it. They both just got ready and said "where are we going?".. They are 11 and 9. That just doesn't happen! We made our way to Camp Bell, which was a new trailhead for me. Found it easily and parked the car. We geared up and after some map exploring headed up in what we hoped was the right direction, which was a relatively steep section of jeep road from the main camp area. I knew it was a road hike for a mile before the trail actually started, but the road went in a couple directions, so I hoped my map reading skills were spot on. We found the Round Pond Trailhead marker after passing some gorgeous views of Piper and Swett Mountains.. and started our little trek. The trail was relatively moderate in ascending, just a bit slippery with dry leaves and pine needles. There were 2 ladies ahead of us, and since I am not a fast hiker at all, the goal was to keep them there. I didn't want to be flip-flopping the entire hike. So we had lots of breather breaks, water breaks, picture breaks. Worked out perfectly. We made it to the intersection with the Klem-Mack Loop trail, the ladies in front headed anti-clockwise, and we went clockwise, which was my intent anyway. I have read and heard a lot about Round Pond, but to see it on a day like this was great. Such a beautiful spot. There was a small campfire area set up with logs as seats, so we took our lunch break and just enjoyed the views. Continuing on with the Klem-Mack Loop, we started to climb a little more, still nothing really crazy. I loved this trail. There was some residual snow from the crazy snowfall this week, but it didn't hinder our progress in any way. I had read there were some pretty views from Mt Klem's northwest slopes (having been to Mt Klem and Mack before, I knew they were viewless summits) but had no idea it was as gorgeous as it was. We were so lucky with the day. Even the boys were blown away and just stood and admired for several moments. Mt Klem's actual summit was a letdown after that, when we arrived Cameron proclaimed "this can't be the summit, it's not supposed to look like this"! We crossed paths with a nice lady who was down from North Conway and doing the Eastern Belknap loop I have done in the past. The stretch between Klem and Mack is great too. Quite a few beautiful outlooks and places to stop and rest. We had a snack on some rock ledges along this portion of the trail. Mt Mack was buggy, so after a quick picture we moved right along. The boys gained 2 more peaks towards their Belknap Range Summit patch! The Klem-Mack Loop after Mt Mack is basically an old jeep road that would have been used for some communications towers we passed, that I don't believe are in use any longer. It's quite shredded from ATV or snowmobile use at the moment, but thankfully only about 0.5 miles of that stretch is in this condition. We completed the loop, and rather than take the Round Pond Trail back we opted to take the jeep road. With tired legs, it was easier to not really have to think about where we were going or what we were stepping on. Yes, there was loose gravel at times, but large stretches were just grassy too. Considering it was a 2 mile trek back to the car, this worked out perfectly for us. So that was our amazing day. 2 more trail completions for me too. You know it's a great network of trails when you're already planning the next hike before you even finish the one you are on!

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