Mt Toby

Mt Toby is a great location to hike during hunting season which on upon us!

By the way telephone trail is not the easiest way up in my opinion. The fireroad is. Telephone is quite eroded and steep in sections.




Lots of history here. Like many of the valley peaks it had a hotel on the top at one time.  Here is the blurb from Wikipedia:

Mount Toby is named for Captain Elnathan Toby, a settler from colonial Springfield, said^[who?] to be the first Caucasian to summit the mountain. Like other peaks in the Connecticut River Valley in the 18th century, a resort hotel was built on the summit of Mount Toby, but it burned down a year after it was constructed, and was not rebuilt. The land was subsequently acquired by the Massachusetts Agricultural College (now the University of Massachusetts Amherst), and is currently part of the Mount Toby State Demonstration Forest owned and managed by the University.^[3]

We frequent the area and have covered lots of trails. Trail maps are not available at the trailhead.  The best one out there is this PDF version:

The best route in this season is up the fire road to the top. It is a nice walk up along the river, forming basically a safety corridor during hunting season. Give hunters lots of room to work and hikers a nice path to the top. 

Winter was making itself known early this year depositing a layer of frost in the higher elevations.

At the top you can always climb the fire tower for  good view of Monadnock region to the north and Sunderland to the south. Greylock is visible on a clear day. 

We were pressed for time so we headed on down.  Toby is a nice hike that will take you 2- 21/2 hours round trip using this route.  Check it out if your in the area.