![]() ![]() 302 and into the woodlands alongside the Saco River. After backtracking to the Ethan Pond Trail/Appalachian Trail junction, you’ll take the AT down to Rt. Together, these neighboring cascades make for a diesel double-bill of falling waters.įrom Ripley Falls, the return journey to the Willey House is mostly level and easier on the quads. At 100 feet tall, spilling over wide rock slabs, Ripley Falls is the polar opposite of Kedron Flume. Upon reaching a junction for the Arethusa-Ripley Falls Trail, I took a right turn and climbed through the woods by Avalanche Brook for 10 minutes to re-visit this classic beast of a cascade. At the junction, I turned left and descended the Ethan Pond Trail-part of the Appalachian Trail!-at a moderate grade. Or…you can turn your Kedron Flume outing into a less grueling but still formidable loop hike and visit another nearby waterfall. You can turn right and climb for another punishing 1.2 miles to the top of Mount Willey. But instead, I kept on climbing as the Kedron Flume Trail made an even steeper, scramble-y ascent, gaining another 423 vertical feet before leveling out and concluding at the Ethan Pond Trail. (Since the climb is only 0.8 mile long, you could strap the chair to your pack and not get too annoyed as it slaps against the back of your legs.) Once you’ve had your fill of the flume, you could simply backtrack down the steep trail for an efficient 1.6 mile out-and-back hike. I could have gladly spent an hour hanging out at Kedron Flume if I had the foresight to pack a folding beach chair up the trail with me. The Kedron Flume Trail climbs 646 vertical feet in 0.8 miles just to reach the flume itself, so by the time the leafy deciduous trees begin transitioning to dark green boreal conifers, you’ll likely be ready to plop down and empty an entire water bottles over your head. In other words, the Kedron Flume Trail is a grim New England classic.Īs you wheeze and drip and wonder why you didn’t opt for the more conventionally pleasant summit trail up nearby Mount Willard, you’ll catch occasional glimpses of the distant base of Crawford Notch from which you started your hike. Stones bulge from the earth like swollen organs, with sinewy roots draped over them and occasionally serving as handholds. Once you’ve crossed over the tracks, you’ll notice that the Kedron Flume Trail becomes raggedy and steeper on the other side. This is part of the route for the Conway Scenic Railroad, which offers daily trips from North Conway through the notch. A set of switchbacks delivers you to a clearing where railroad tracks run alongside the “wall” of Crawford Notch. The Kedron Flume Trail is far more rugged and desolate, but in that nice way which will make your dinner taste extra savory come sundown. Some of you probably know this place as The Flume, one of the most popular New Hampshire state parks, where you can easily pass through the misty, watery chasm on a series of twisting boardwalks.Ĭrawford Notch is home to some popular waterfalls hikes such as Ripley Falls and Arethusa Falls, where the trails are spacious and well-worn. The gorge had been covered by a glacier during the Ice Age, but once thawed, it became the channel through which a mountain brook made its way into the deciduous woodlands below. (Talk about nonagenarian goals.) But instead of stumbling across a decent trout pool, Aunt Jess found something way cooler: an 800-foot granite gorge festooned with waterfalls and moss. One day in 1808, the 93 year-old New Hampshire resident went poking around the woods near Franconia Notch, searching for a good place to fish. Many of the 19th Century flumes that were used for transporting timber were man-made, but naturally-occurring flumes predate mankind by many eons. So what is a flume, exactly? Technically, it’s a narrow channel or ravine through which water passes. You’ve got your logs, you’ve got water, and you’ve a tight and stony flume through which the water shoots and sloshes. ![]() But the baseline joy of a good log flume ride is how it feels like a roller coaster slapped together with elements of the natural world. Part of what I still love about log flumes is the atmospheric touches that are lacking on most amusement park rides: the way the loading station often resembles a sawmill, the Western-style fiddle and banjo music echoing from speakers posted around the ride, and the tunnels through which the flume will often run. Sure, roller coasters and spinning rides were fun, but there was a unique magic to stepping into a hollowed-out “log” boat and riding it through a narrow, winding waterway to a series of conveyor belt lifts and plunges. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I was a log flume kid. ![]()
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