woodland wanderings: What can I say about Magalloway?

Magalloway Cabin from the fire tower

It’s a long, long drive from Massachusetts.

If I'm going to drive that far, I'm going to stay in the Watchman’s cabin. https://www.nhdfl.org/Natural-Heritage/Fire-Towers/Watchman-Cabin-Rental Originally I was going to hike this mountain last; I would finish with an easy mountain and my daughter would come with me to celebrate.

When I brought this up to remind her, she told me (in a sassy, melodramatic way that can only come from the mouth of a 16 year old girl), “Oh God! I can’t think of anything else in the world I would rather do less than hiking a mountain and staying overnight in a cabin, in the woods!”

Telling her that there was no electricity, no cell phone coverage and I would be cooking dinner on a wood stove did not help my case.

Okay, change of plans, I would save Stairs and Resolution for my last 52WAV hike. I needed a less challenging hike after Shelburne Moriah, so I decided to hike Magalloway and combine it with Sugarloaf the next day.

The trailhead is located on Magalloway Road. Turn right at the Magalloway Tower sign and follow the road until it ends.

The Coot Trail is short and not too steep for anyone who is reasonably fit. It’s eroded in places and a muddy mess at the beginning of the trail, but I was on the summit in under 30 minutes. I watched a number of people visit the summit during the afternoon. The comments ranged from, “OMG that was tough” to “Nice easy trail”, to “I can’t believe I made it.”

Coot Trail

There are three viewing areas. Most people only know about the tower views. You are missing out if you don’t check out the other two. The Overlook Trail is a short walk to some unexpected ledgy views.

The other viewpoint is right outside the cabin. Walk past the fire pit and there is a beautiful place to sit and watch a sunrise come up over the mountains.

There are a few things you should know about the cabin if you plan to stay there. The cabin is advertised as having a working woodstove and a screened-in porch. If you go with visions of sitting and reading your favorite book in the screened porch, or being warmed by the blazing fire in the wood stove, you will, 1) be staring at woodpile in the dark storage area (AKA screened-in porch), and 2) freeze half to death because they have closed off all but the top cooking portion of the stove.

guilty pleasure

The wood storage AKA screened-in porch

Thinking I would have hours of warmth with the wood stove, I did not bring my sleeping bag. I thought my multi-layering of cloths (wool tank, wicking tee, long sleeve Smartwool shirt, heavy duty Smartwool jacket with hood, Northface raincoat, extra wool socks and gloves, etc.) would be enough.

The temps dropped into the 30’s – I was not warm. Then, I had what I thought was a great idea!

Note to self: An emergency bivy sac does not double as a sleeping bag.

If you do this, you will fall asleep toasty warm thinking you had a great idea. Then you will wake up soaking wet, chilled to the bone from your bodyheat being turned into water droplets trapped on the inside of the sac.

Deciding I was too tired to do much about it, I turned the sac inside out. I looked at the ERD, he looked at me, he walked across the bed, walked into the sac, curled up into a ball and went to sleep on my lap. Warm enough to get another 40 minutes of sleep.

Got up at 4:20AM, packed my gear, and went to watch the sunrise over the mountains. By 5:20 I was walking down the mountain and off to my next adventure.

I would stay there again…with a sleepbag next time. It was a beautiful place to spend a night.

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And then there were three.