Cardigan: Our Home Away From Home: Day 2

September 29 2016

Green Group D1B4

By Sara L.

Day 2- Movement: On Day 2 the plan was to hike Cardigan and Firescrew so we needed to eat a lot to be prepared to hike that much. After breakfast (muffins and fruit) and packing our lunch, we raced upstairs to get our gear. Our guide, Fern, explained to us that we would be taking 6 transects as we ascended the mountain. When we reached 1439 feet we took our first transect. She explained that we would use a rope and straighten it out on the forest ground. Then we would have someone "Walk the rope" as we liked to call it and call out the names of the trees that were close to the rope. This helped us to learn more about the native tree species. At one point she told us that in an area of the woods there are apple trees. Surprisingly, apple trees originated from Central Asia, Kazakhstan and were carried over to Europe and then England. When the English migrated to New England, they brought apples with them and that is why we have apples!

A few hours later, (and three transects to be exact), we reached a mossy spot with a pile of pine-cone bits at 2,353 feet in altitude. She explained that a pine cone has lots of proteins in the center of it that squirrels and chipmunks like to eat so they rip off the scales of the pinecone and nibble of the proteins. They then leave the scales and the center of the pine cone on the ground. Insects later come and eat the pieces to the bone until there is nothing left for the wildlife to eat. While we slipped on the rocks, trying to get our bearings, we chatted along with our team members and tried to gather enough strength to be able to hike to the top of Firescrew, where we could eat. Upon reaching the summit of Firescrew, we saw alpine bogs and a few scarce trees. From where we were, we could see for miles. While we were chewing on protein bars and sketching, we heard a very loud humming coming from the sky and as our heads hot up, we saw a helicopter! It tried to land on the rocky terrain of the mountain but couldn't so it flew up and away.

We raced over the saddle between Firescrew and Cardigan to see our friends from the other groups at the top. The view from the top was even better than on Firescrew. Carved in the rock, we saw a lot of signatures including one from 1812! There was a steel lookout and two geodetic markers in the rock. On the way down the mountain we saw the old lookout, a log cabin in a thicket of trees for the Warden to live in. I took multiple dirt samples on the way down to see the change in moisture and pigment with altitude. We reached the ski trail which was a very steep slope through the trees, covered in ferns and hobblebush. Halfway down the mountain I saw a log cabin style sled that was an Emergency sled! We finally arrived back at the lodge for a lasagna dinner and then it was time for our group to prepare the bonfire. We stacked the logs and started it until it was a blazing fire. We then performed a skit about our trip. Then, just as our heads started to droop, we went to bed!

Cardigan; Our Home Away From Home: Day 2 by Sara L. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.