West Cilley - Grandview - Cilley - Sunday Mountain: 9/6/2014

Mileage: 11.7

Elevation gain: 2831'

Trails used: snowmobile trail, bushwhacks. Cross-Rivendell Trail

We decided a few days ago that we would do one or two more fire towers to slowly get towards finishing off the few ones we had left.  Grandview Mountain would be our first (and only as it turns out) fire tower peak of the day, and not for lack of effort (The heat and humidity tapped us out on our first hike).  Along the way, we would tack on West Cilley and Cilley.  Why you ask?  Well, because we could and they are right there.

West Cilley, Cilley and Grandview are located in Woodstock, New Hampshire.  All three peaks are trail-less but it is very easy to navigate in the mainly open woods we found, plus you get to use old forest roads and snowmobile trails to access them.  Grandview Mountain had an observation tower on it's lower eastern summit and even had an old ski tow area on one of its slopes back in the 1950's.

Grandview is on the New Hampshire Fire Tower List.  West Cilley and Cilley are not on any official hiking lists.

We took the forest road in towards Elbow Pond and parked right at the junction for the pond and a snowmobile trail.  We decided to do West Cilley on the way up, then hit Grandview and finally, Cilley.  

The open woods heading up to West Cilley (elevation 2030').  

There are even some bridges along the snowmobile trail over water crossings.

We took several snowmobile trails to get to Grandview.  

Once we jumped into the woods to bushwhack to the summit of Grandview Mountain, Greg stumbled on this moose antler.  We have no clue what number this made for this year, we have found so many.  We left this one because it was in poor shape.

The nice fern covered main summit of Grandview Mountain (elevation 2012').

The old observation tower remains on the eastern summit of Grandview Mountain.

Greg exploring among the tower remains.

The open woods heading in between Grandview and Cilley.

We came across several of these rock piles stacked up in one location.

Greg decides to go for a ride! TIMBEEEEER!  This was on or near the summit of Mount Cilley (elevation 2227').

We ended up coming out on the forest road near Elbow pond not far from the car.

Camping at it's finest.  Just pull your trailer in and put a tarp over it.

Back at the car, and with the air conditioner in full effect, we decided to do another hike.  We wanted to do something with a trail so I mentioned Sunday Mountain in Orford, New Hampshire and it's choice of two trails.  We would be taking the Cross-Rivendell Trail roughly 2 miles one way to the summit.

The Cross-Rivendell Trail is a 36 mile trail that starts at Flagpole Hill in Vermont and ends on Mount Cube in New Hampshire. 
http://www.crossrivendelltrail.org/

Sunday Mountain is not on any official hiking list.

The trail head kiosk (complete with trail map) right off of Dame Hill Road and 25A.  The directions to get to the actual trail are on the blue sign to the left.

We did a road walk to get to here and had to cross into the woods along the edge of a farm.

There was this old piece of farm equipment along the trail.

Greg walking through a muddy section complete with bog bridges.

One of the several switchbacks we would navigate on our way to the summit of Sunday Mountain.  We would follow this old woods road up for a bit.

Another switchback with nice grades and good blazing which made this easy to follow.

Sadly, this was about the only view we would get for this hike.  Looking towards Mount Cube.

 The Cross-Rivendell trail continues at this junction but we would take the summit spur.  From here it is .2 miles to the viewless summit.

Sunday Mountain (elevation 1823').  A summit/hike only a peakbagger would love.

The summit cairn and summit area of Sunday Mountain.

We turned around and headed down the switchbacks and made good time to this farm area we passed on the way in.  It had started to rain just before we got here.

We were hit by the heat and humidity bug most of the day and Brian suffered the most on the trip down from Sunday Mountain.  With Summer's day's slowly numbered, hopefully the nice crisp fall weather we love will show itself soon.  We still managed to get 11 tough miles to add to the totals and got another fire tower peak done.  3 more to go!  

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