Mount Osceola (4,340'), named after an Indian war chief of the Seminole Indians in Florida (misappropriation of Native American names was not unusual in the 19th Century), was an excellent half-day hike. The Mount Osceola Trail branches off the Greely Ponds Trail and is accessible from the Greely Ponds trailhead.
The trail quickly started its ascent, becoming quite steep at times, with the East peak looming overhead. When I did finally reach the East peak at 4,156', the in-your-face panoramic view was both incredible and dizzying. The East peak view point is extremely steep; a huge jagged clump of rocks angled in such a way they seemed to shout "don't trip here, or it will be a painful slide down!". Upper Greely pond is also visible from here and having visited it only an hour earlier made me appreciate the distance that much more.
After another short burst of unforgiving, steep trail, I reached the summit-with-views. I call it that because the true summit, which can be seen from here and is a relatively short and easy hike, has very limited panoramic views.
I didn't stay at the summit long and decided to take a break at the summit-with-views instead. Amazingly, the Northwest side of Mount Washington, the highest peak in the American Northeast, can just barely be seen from here (center of picture, behind the foreground peak, just barely visible).
Also visible from here, and probably more incredible for me, is Mount Hancock, which I climbed the previous day. It has a distinguishable “V” rock slide, which can be seen in several of the pictures I took from Mount Osceola. The V can be seen in the center of this picture and here is a closeup of the rock slide I took the previous day.
Date of Hike
2007/09/03
Hiking Time
Parking Lot to East peak: 50 minutes
East peak to Summit: 30 minutes
Total Time: 2 hours 40 minutes
Book Time: 4 hours
Hiking Distance
Round Trip: 5.6 miles
Total Climb
2,250'
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