Zoom

17 miles of hiking • 4500' elevation gain •

Sunday we decided to go wander around the Table Rock Wilderness. I had found a gps track we were going to go by and include Table Rock and Pechuck Lookout in the days activities. The morning was cloudy and drizzly like yesterday. We started off at the Table Rock TH and headed out into the clouds. We got the the Table Rock summit junction fairly quickly but decided to do that on the way out in hopes that the clouds would burn off so we had a view. We took off towards the "saddle" and I have to say if this is a saddle then the horses back is broke. This was more like a steep ravine. We had a steep descent down to a short semi flat stroll through massive anthills. Biggest I have ever seen! Then we had yet another semi steep descent down under Rooster Rock where we were greeted with a crazy steep incline up the hill and ended up in the meadow by Rooster Rock. From there we still had no visibility and we headed out to Pechuck Lookout. We made decent time there and was surprised to find it empty. Took a relaxing lunch break all the while wishing we had a view. up until now we had seen no one all day long. Started getting chilly so we geared back up and headed out. Ran into our first people as we were heading down from Pechuck and then shortly afterwards ran into a second set of people heading up to the lookout. We soon learned on the way back the track i was going by had off trail sections. I don't have an issue with off trailing but would rather do it in an area I am comfortable in so we took the "long" way back and retraced out steps back to the meadow which I am kind of glad we did because the clouds finally started opening up and we got to see Rooster Rock. Back down through the gully and up to the "ravine from hell" and we finally made it back to the Table Rock summit TH. Coming back through that saddle slowed us way down and I have to admit I had to talk myself into making the final Table Rock summit climb lol but I had yet to do that summit so i trudge my way up, and oddly it was probably the nicest of the climbs of the day, very mild really. I'm glad we save the Table Rock summit for the last because we had great views by then. When it was all said and done my 13.5 mile expected trip was nearly 17 miles and a tad over 4500 ft of elevation gained under our belts. It was a great hike but very grueling at times.

Comments

Mountainkat
May 26, 2015

This one has been on my list for a long time. I didn't know there was an interesting looking lookout in that area, either - some extra motivation to go! Were you able to go inside the lookout?

Rhonda
May 26, 2015

Yes you can go inside the lookout, even stay there if you like.

Mountainkat
May 26, 2015

Great, thank you!

Rhonda
May 26, 2015

You are very welcome :)