You Are Here: Cardigan Mountain - Cathedral Forest/Vistamont Trails

I've not been out in a month due to family commitments.. and while I cherish each and every one of those moments, I've missed the trails, so it felt good to get back out and continue exploring. I haven't been up an actual mountain in a really long time, and have mostly trails in the Cardigan and Monadnock areas left to hike on my quest for the AMC South Redline patch. I decided to head to Cardigan and grab a few sections there. It had been raining the past couple of days and was misty and sprinkly on my drive up. I managed to avoid any actual rain, but had some wet trails to contend with. Nothing impossible, just some extra care taken on those rocks and roots. I never seem to have good luck with parking at the AMC Cardigan Lodge, and this weekend was no different. Even though I arrived just after 8am, the lot was completely full and cars were even parking down the road despite the very obvious NO PARKING signs. Turns out there was a large group of Boy Scouts from CT who had been camping. I saw several cars parked just outside the AMC Cardigan Reservation sign, where there aren't any signs against parking, and hesitantly turned around to find myself a spot there. This would only had about a half mile dirt road walk each way. I geared up including bug spray as it was rather mosquitoey and headed out. Just as I got a few hundred yards from the car, several of those campers passed by leaving. I hightailed it back to my car and headed for the parking area to grab one of those empty spots. Feeling better about this, I headed back out again down the Manning Trail, and onto Holt Trail. The section to Grand Junction is just under a mile and is really quite pleasant. A very gentle ascent initially, then across Bailey Brook on a bridge before hitting the more technical area with quite a few rock steps. The trail follows along Bailey Brook and there are some lovely cascades. At Grand Junction I turned onto Holt-Clark Cutoff/Cathedral Forest Trail which was about 0.7 miles. The grade was a little steeper now, but not as bad as I had anticipated. I was going really slow though, cognizant of the fact I need to rebuild mountain fitness, but I felt pretty good overall. At Clark Trail, I turned right. Very easy grades at first, the trail takes a right hand turn alongside a big rock cliff covered in moss and starts the climb in earnest. Made just a bit trickier today with the wet rock, overall it still wasn't as bad as I had expected. I was pleasantly surprised. At the Hurricane Gap intersection there is a lovely little bench at an overlook. Unfortunately today it was socked in with cloud, but that's OK, I have been here before and seen the gorgeous view. I continued up Hurricane Gap Trail which was fairly eroded in places. The AMC High Cabin is along this trail, and was a flurry of activity this morning as some campers were cleaning up preparing to head out. The view is cleared in front of the cabin which must be gorgeous at sunrise/sunset when the skies are clear! At the end of Hurricane Gap Trail, which was technically as far as I needed for redlining, I did take a left turn and head up the short tenth to the South Peak summit, despite knowing there would be no views. My second time on this summit and I had the same conditions both times! It was moody though as the clouds cleared ever so slightly and I could occasionally see the Cardigan summit as I had my snack. Descending the clouds cleared even more and back at the cabin and also the bench, I had more of a view, which was lovely to see. Back on Clark Trail, I continued past Cathedral Forest down to Vistamont Trail. The trail beyond Cathedral Forest definitely seemed less traveled, but was still well maintained and easy to follow. At the Vistamont intersection, the trail heading off towards Skyland Trail was completely obstructed with a huge blowdown, but as I wasn't heading in that direction today it caused me no issue. I took Vistamont back to Cathedral Forest and Holt back towards the car. Instead of a complete retracing of my steps, at the newly opened All Person Trail, I decided to follow that as the last time I had taken this trail it was still under construction. Unfortunately this was the buggiest portion of my day, so I didn't stop to read any of the story pages along the route. Back at the car, I was feeling pretty good and as I had parked right at the Woodland Trail entrance, I decided to head in and do the Nature Trail. I knew nothing of this trail other than it existed and I had passed it when I had done this section of Woodland Trail a couple years ago. After crossing a wooden bridge that is in need of a little repair on the ramp, but still able to be crossed, the first entrance to Nature Trail came up soon after. I decided to start here. The trail sign says 0.5 mile loop, and it did end up being just about that. The first part was low and wet and muddy with lots of bog bridges. All day, I had been very conscious crossing any wooden bridge, knowing the wood would be slick in the wet and had done alright up until now. Stepping from one bridge to another, I went down hard. Annoyed with myself, I got up and continued, now just ready to be done. The lower portion of the trail was a little more rustic, but still easy enough to follow. It basically meanders alongside the brook which travels alongside the road to the Lodge. In fact, you could see the road for almost all the length of the trail. I saw 2 little placards along the way, I had thought there may be more of those as is often the case on a "Nature Trail". Once reaching the lowest point along the trail right at the road, the trail turns in and surprisingly had a short, steep little climb, though good footing made it no issue. From here on back to Woodland Trail, it was a very pleasant walk through the woods. Once back at Woodland Trail, I returned to the car for a successful day bringing me to 94.3% on my redlining spreadsheet!

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