Christmas Eve Along Smarts Brook

After two days of snow, freezing rain, and all sorts of other wintry precipitation dumped on the state I was itching to get up into the Whites to get in my first snowshoe trek of the year. With only one wintry hike under my belt so far this month, I decided to keep it relatively flat and try out a loop around Smarts Brook in Waterville Valley.

I got to the parking area for Smarts Brook off of NH-49 around 10:30 a.m to find it plowed (but very slick asphalt nonetheless) with two cars there before me. After getting out of my car and strapping on my bright green snowshoes, I headed straight into the forest next to the kiosk at the parking area and took an immediate left onto the Pine Flat XC (cross-country) Ski Trail. It started out nice and flat and mostly well-tracked, not leaving much for me to pack down with my snowshoes. However, the shoes did come in handy as I ventured off trail in many spots all around the loop to get an up close look at winter slowly taking hold of Smarts Brook.

A beautiful scene of marshmallow boulders along Smarts Brook

I came to the first major blow-down on the Pine Flat Trail just past its junction with the Old Waterville Rd. Trail. It was about a 6" diameter tree laying across the trail that was easy to step over. From this point on to the junction with the Yellow Jacket XC Trail, the weight of the prior days' snow made more and more trees sag into the trail, including one more major blow-down with most of its branches left waiting to snag a down jacket and one section of so many trees sagging in such low succession that the best way to tackle them was to plow straight through.

Some previous hikes had given one of the evergreens along the trail some Christmas spirit

At the sign for the Yellow Jacket XC Trail I took a right to head southeast down towards the junction with the Smarts Brook Trail. It was clear that this trail had gotten much less use compared to Pine Flat, as my snowshoes came in handy most of the way along the route, packing down a set or two of footprints that hadn't done much to break out this stretch of trail. However, the snow, with its crusty, crunchy top coat of ice from yesterday's rains, was not deep enough to make the task of packing down the trail too arduous.

Walking along the Yellow Jacket XC Trail

After shooting off trail along the way a couple times to take in some views of the brook, I finally came to and crossed the large wooden bridge that brought me to the Smarts Brook Trail for the final leg of my loop. To my surprise, this was the least tracked out of all the trails I took! It shocked me that the only primary hiking trail I was using had the least amount of usage upon my arrival. Therefore, I was extremely happy to have my snowshoes here as I flattened the path of sunken footsteps along the way.

Up until the final junction of my hike, all the prior intersections had been clearly marked with large signage to point me the right way. As I neared the final half-mile stretch of my hike, I came to a split in the Smarts Brook Trail, with the wider trail most closely resembling what I had been on going to my left and a narrower, but still well-tracked trail delving deeper into the woods to my right. I took the trail to my left first and got a little ways down before I checked my AllTrails app to see that I was walking down Smarts Brook Road at this point instead of Smarts Brook Trail. It was a quick backtrack to the junction I chose wrongly at the first time and then I ducked into the narrower trail in the woods which led me on a nice downhill stroll where I emerged out of the woods a short distance from the parking area, with a nice view of Welch and Dickey Mountains in the distance.

Welch and Dickey in the distance as I completed my hike

In all this was a wonderful hike to get back into the swing of snowshoeing. The few ascents I had were never steep, with most of the hike being nothing more than a nice stroll in the woods, breaking trail along the way. This loop is probably one I'll visiting again one spring when the snow has thawed and the brook is roaring, a several cascades along the way looked like they would be quite wonderful to see that time of year.