BROWN MOUNTAIN

Our main activity for today, following a filling pancake breakfast from Café This Way, was a hike from Parkman Mountain to Norumbega Mountain. Near the summit of Norumbega, we recovered the tri-station BROWN MOUNTAIN—named, as many of the triangulation stations here are, after the former name of the mountain.

The station is not a disk but rather a copper bolt about one inch in diameter, which made it challenging to spot because it’s small and blends in well with the rock and pine debris in the immediate area. Fortunately, the bolt was surrounded by some small rocks, not necessarily conspicuous enough to draw anyone’s attention to the bolt who didn’t already know about it, but enough to be of assistance to us.

Both reference mark disks were similarly ringed with small rocks. They are standard disks that stood out quite easily given their larger size and blue color. Like the bolt, they are both in very good condition.

This was a peaceful and beautiful hike that I can highly recommend. The Norumbega Mountain trail follows a steep knife-edge at one point that adds some more excitement to an already thrilling hike. We had a bit of trouble near the bottom of the mountain; in the swampy area near Hadlock Brook (in the area between the two ponds), we must have missed a turn, and we were unable to locate the connector trail that should have taken us back to our car through the woods, so we ended up walking back north on Route 3. We did find a USGS mark along the way, so it wasn’t all bad!