Little hike up to Giant Mountain

Wed, June 19th


Me and the dogs took off on an adventure to Upstate New York today. Weather forecast was calling for sunny skies and upper 60- low 70s.

When we got to the parking lot there were several cars parked alongside the road. I think i counted around 11 groups of people in the register book. I was eager to start the hike, over 4:30 hours of driving was enough to get you going. 

Trail started with couple water crossings and muddy spots, but everything was easily avoidable/crossable. There were many, very interesting sections at the beginning, we were very happy to be able to hike during the week with less people around. Trail took off steep pretty quickly and we were panting heavily right away. I was glad there was plenty of running water for the dogs to drink along the hike. 
Whole approach to Giant was pretty steep and involved a lot of rock climbing and boulder crossing. There was wonderful section of the ridge walk. Something i like the most!!

 Couple view spots were occupied by some people so we did not spend much time around there. When we got up to Giant there were 5 people there. I took couple pictures and we headed off for Rocky Peak. 
Kappa slowly started to get tired and i started worrying if he could make it through. The decent of Giant was a little tricky with several big rocky slabs that you could slide down on, a lot of roots sticking out and rocks allover. I started thinking how i was going to get the dogs back up all of that after ascending Rocky peak. 
After we got to the flatter section we could catch some breath. Ascend to the Rocky Peak was fairly easy and we had the whole summit to ourselves. We spend probably around 30 min up there. It was beautiful. Amazing views and weather. 

We decided to get going when first couple of people came to the summit. The whole way back from Rocky was very tough on Kappa and i had to help him out in several places. While MIsha was flying by he was struggling. I tried to help him as much as i could, but we had to slow down a lot.
 I stopped and talked to several people who were on their way to Rocky. It was so nice out and i was so happy to be out there. 

It was amazing hike and worth repeating. Its going to be Kappas official last hike up the mountains. He has to stick to the low land from now on. Its sad that i wont be able to take him with me on any more adventures, but hopefully he can still join me on my morning runs.