Fire tower mini blitz: 7/4/2014

Mileage: 7.4
Elevation gain: 1785'
Trails used:  none.  road walks and bushwhacks


We decided to enjoy our fourth of July with another fire tower blitz (of sorts).  We had quite a few targets left on the list to do in southern New Hampshire so we decided to try and knock 5-6 of them out of the way.  I drove down and met Brian for the start of our first hike.

Joe English Hill is in New Boston, New Hampshire (it is also the highest point in New Boston, elevation 1285') was our first fire tower peak of the day.   For more interesting information on Joe English Hill http://www.newbostonhistoricalsociety.com/joe.html.  

 A beaver pond at the cul-de-sac at the end of Summit Drive.

We walked an unnamed road to the summit of Joe English Hill.  It is a mixture of old woods road and logging roads, possibly ATV and snowmobile as well.

Greg covered up due to horrible swarms of horse and deer flies heading up to the old fire tower remains on the summit of Joe English Hill.

Blueberry patches galore!  Most were ripe but a few needed a couple extra days.  Brian still enjoyed a few handfuls worth of them.

A few rock cairns on the way to the summit area of Joe English Hill.

A nice place to relax and enjoy the raptor migrations.  

Our 2nd fire tower peak was a peak that Brian had done already but Greg still needed.  It was a bit out of the way but since it was like a five minute round trip hike, we made the jaunt over to Derry to do Warner Hill.  Warner Hill sits in the middle of a residential area with antenna's surrounding it.  

Where we parked the car to make the short trip up to the fire tower.

The fire tower in all its glory.

The only views really.  It looks like you need to go into the cab itself to get any kind of decent views since the tree's were pretty tall.

Our third fire tower peak was Jeremy Hill in Pelham, New Hampshire and is also the high point for Pelham.   This one was a bit confusing to find the starting point at first, and we had to actually drive to it twice.  A quick smartphone google search gave us the answer.

We parked at a cul-de-sac and walked down a overgrown old road to this sign, which we read is okay to step over and proceed onwards.

Walking down the first part of the road was not fun.  It was almost all pricker bush and blowdowns, which made the going slow.

It turned nice right after that pricker nightmare.  We walked up right to the summit of Pelham Hill.

The old fire tower remains on Jeremy Hill (elevation 575' ).

Three hikes down, a few to go.  Next up was Beech Hill in Keene, New Hampshire.   Beech Hill is located in Beech Hill Preserve.

We parked on Chapman Road across from this gate for the access road up to the old tower location.  Rain was falling so we had to wear our rain gear but left our backpacks behind since this was going to be a fairly short, straight-forward hike.

The access road leads to the cable television towers on the summit (elevation 1053').  The old wooden tower is definitely long gone from here.

Small view of the Keene area from the southern ridge of Beech Hill.

Brian took a picture of this interesting flower at the gate up the access road.

Our last hike was up to the remains of the fire tower on Sam's Hill in Charlestown, New Hampshire.  Sam's Hill is also the highest point in Charlestown (elevation 1683').  We actually lucked out on this one as access is a bit shoddy with houses and no trespassing signs around in most of the obvious access points.  This hike was rough due to the pouring rain, humidity and bugs galore.

We found this old logging road that was obviously used by ATV's recently. 

We followed the road around to just below the summit and bushwhacked straight up to the summit, which was very steep and slippery from the rain.  We think it possibly could have wrapped around to the northern ridge to the summit.

Brian on the summit with the old fire tower remains.

Nice few peaks with a decent amount of driving involved.  Sometimes it seems like we drive more than we hike but that's the way it goes sometimes.  Five more tower's down with a handful to go.  The miles also keep coming slow but steady so we can't complain.

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