_Spruce Peak and Sterling Pond_
Spruce Peak is the mountain on the east side of Smugglers Notch. It may
be reached by several trails or the ski lift. An excellent view of
Smugglers Notch and the surrounding country is obtained from the summit.
Near the summit along the access road to the ski lift, unweathered
mica-albite-quartz schist is exposed and the folding can be clearly
seen.
Sterling Pond lies to the northeast of Spruce Peak in a shallow
depression along the divide of the mountain. This location is anomalous
for a pond because the amount of higher land around it is so small that
only a limited amount of drainage area is available for the accumulation
of rain and snow. Yet, the outflow of water is almost continuous during
the summer. The basin occupied by the pond was probably scoured out by
the glacier.
The Sterling Pond area contains talc deposits which probably would be
commercial if they were not so inaccessible for mining. These deposits
have been studied by A. H. Chidester of the United States Geological
Survey and a report is obtainable from the U. S. Government. The
occurrence of the talc, as mapped by Chidester, is shown in the sketch
of Figure 8.
Talc has the composition of Mg₃Si₄O₁₀(OH)₂ and is a soft flaky white
mineral. The talc-bearing rocks in this area are white, light gray, or
light green and usually are irregularly stained yellow-brown by the
weathering of an iron-bearing mineral that occurs with the talc. Because
of its extremely soft nature, the talc does not form prominent rock
exposures. As shown by the figure, the talc can be most easily observed
along the shore of Sterling Pond, south of the Green Mountain Club
cabin, or along the trail to Smugglers Notch near the top of the first
rise from the pond. Here the talc is exposed in the trail as low,
rounded, slippery knobs of “messy looking” yellow-brown rock.
As part of the pond is underlain by talc, it is probable that the
softness of the talc was a factor in the differential erosion of the
basin by the continental glacier.
The talc is believed to have originated by the alteration of a body of
_ultramafic_ igneous rock, which is characterized by having a low silica
content and a high magnesium content. Sometime during the
mountain-building period, the ultramafic igneous rock invaded the
pre-existing rocks from an unknown source within the earth’s crust. It
is believed that at a later date the original minerals in the igneous
rock were altered to talc and other minerals by the action of hot
ascending solutions composed principally of water.
[Illustration: Figure 8. Sketchmap showing the location of the
talc-bearing rocks at Sterling Pond.]
MAP OF THE STERLING POND AREA
FOREST BOUNDARY
Green Mountain Club cabin
STERLING POND
To Smugglers Notch
EXPLANATION
Talc-bearing rock
Solid areas are positions of exposures
Postulated boundary of talc body beneath pond
Trail
To Spruce Peak
From report by A. H. Chidester
The Long Trail passes by Sterling Pond, where the Green Mountain Club
has erected a small cabin overlooking the pond. Figure 9 is the
picturesque view of Mount Mansfield taken from the cabin.
_Smugglers Notch_
All of the rocks exposed at Smugglers Notch (Figure 10) are the
mica-albite-quartz schist which locally contains garnet. The large rock
boulders in the Notch were derived from the cliffs forming the walls of
the Notch. The gradual processes of weathering and breaking up by
freezing cause large slabs of the rock to become loose and eventually
break off the cliff faces to careen down the mountainside to the valley
below, just as King Rock did within historical time. At the north end of
the Notch, the large accumulations of such boulders form a _talus
slope_, the name for rock accumulations at the base of a cliff. The
irregular stacking of these rocks have formed Smugglers Cave. Smaller
openings extend further back under the “rock pile” to where the ground
is considerably colder and where the heavier cold air has sunk. Drafts
of this air escaping at the foot of the talus is noticeably cool.
The Smuggler’s Face, Elephants Head, the Singing Bird, and the Hunter
and His Dog are freaks of nature and a product of man’s imagination.
Their existence is due to the haphazard nature in which the rocks on the
cliff faces have broken along joint surfaces.
The origin of the Notch is not completely known. The steep walls and the
narrowness of the Notch suggest that it could not have been formed by
the headward erosion of two streams or by glacial action. It seems most
likely that it was formed by the erosive action of an ancient river that
once flowed through the area. Because of the high elevation, the only
time when such a river could have existed is when the Champlain Valley
was filled with ice on the west side of Mount Mansfield, so that the
normal drainage of water to the west was blocked by the ice. It is
possible that the conditions were such that the water supplied by the
melting glacier could only drain to the south through the Notch. After
the ice retreated the drainage system was abandoned in favor of lower
outlets and eventually the drainage was developed to Lake Champlain in
the west. The Notch was modified by the headward erosion of the present
small streams. Except for the shape of the Notch, the only evidence for
this hypothesis is the occurrence of a weakly-bedded, well-sorted
deposit of sand at the north end of the Notch at an elevation of 2050
feet. Such a deposit of sand is characteristic of standing water, which
occurring at this elevation indicates that some vastly different
drainage system must have existed in the past.
[Illustration: Figure 9. The Chin and Bear Head on Mount Mansfield
viewed from Sterling Pond.]
[Illustration: Figure 10. View of Smugglers Notch and Spruce Peak
from ski slope on Mount Mansfield.]
_Big Spring_
On the south side of the Smugglers Notch road at an elevation of about
1800 feet is the Big Spring which furnishes a tremendous output of cold
spring water. The source of the water is not known although it is likely
that, like most springs, it is derived from an underground drainage
system. The spring probably originates by the seepage of water derived
from the winter snows and rainfall in Spruce Mountain through a joint
system within the mountain. No buried stream channels could be located
between the spring and the base of the massive overhead cliffs. The
belief that the spring is related to Sterling Pond is unfounded. It is
unlikely that surplus water could be drained from Sterling Pond because
it already maintains a delicate balance between the supply of water from
rain and snow and the output to the stream flowing to the north.
_Mount Mansfield_
The summit of Mount Mansfield when viewed from a distance has the
resemblance of a face with an exaggerated distance between the nose and
upper lips. Accordingly, these peaks are named, from south to north, the
Forehead, Nose, Upper Lip, Lower Lip, Chin, and Adam’s Apple. All these
points are readily accessible by the Long Trail and the area of the Nose
may be reached by the Toll Road or the Ski Lift. From all the points
along the crest an excellent view may be obtained. On clear days Lake
Champlain and the Adirondack Mountains in New York State may be seen to
the west, and Mount Washington in New Hampshire may be seen to the east.
Of the local structures, good exposures of the mica-albite-quartz schist
occur along the crest with magnetite and garnet locally abundant. The
rocks on Sunset Ridge, which extends west from the Chin, can be seen
clearly to be dipping at gentle angles to the west.
The Chin has an elevation of 4393 feet, which is the highest point in
Vermont. Most of the schist in this area is nearly horizontal or dipping
slightly to the west. However, minor folds are present everywhere and an
average reading is difficult to obtain. At the summit much of the schist
contains large black grains of magnetite. The summit is reached by the
Long Trail along the crest of the mountain from the Toll Road, by the
Long Trail from Barnes Camp via Taft Lodge, or from the west by the
trail up Sunset Ridge. An excellent view of the Lake of the Clouds and
the Adam’s Apple is obtained a short distance north of the summit of the
Chin.
[Illustration: Figure 11. “Subway” formed by separation of the rocks
along a joint on west slope of Mount Mansfield.]
Lake of the Clouds which lies north of the Adam’s Apple and Bear Pond
which lies north of Bear Head Mountain are both small shallow bodies of
water. The slight depressions in which they occur were probably scooped
out by the erosive action of the glacier.
[Illustration: Figure 12. Cave of the Winds. Mount Mansfield, as
seen from the east slope of the Chin. The Mount Mansfield Hotel and
the Nose are in the distance. The rocks in the foreground show the
beginning stages of downhill slippage of a large mass of rock away
from the joint.]
Between the Chin and Mount Mansfield Hotel are a number of interesting
trails. The Subway and Canyon trail on the west side of the mountain
follow, for part of the way, joints in the rock which have been enlarged
by the downhill slippage of the western block. Figure 11 shows the
nature of one of these passageways. On the east side of the mountain,
the Cliff trail passes through a similar joint called “Wall Street.” The
Cave of the Winds, reached by a trail just north of the Lower Lip, has
formed along another north-south joint. The block which has moved
downhill has tilted into the mountain and rubble has filled the gap at
the top to form the cave. Figure 12 shows the appearance of the cave as
seen from the eastern slope of the Chin. This photograph shows smaller
joints on the Chin which have just begun to be enlarged by slippage of
the downhill block. It is possible that some of these open joints date
back and partially owe their origin to glacial erosive action.
Drift Rock which is located along the Long Trail south of the Upper Lip
has already been described as an erratic boulder moved by the glacier.
The glacial striae may be seen in the bedrock northwest of the boulders.
Garnet crystals are very abundant in these boulders and specimens of the
small red garnets may be obtained here.
The Nose is easily reached along the trail from Mount Mansfield Hotel.
From the summit the view is excellent to the south towards Camels Hump,
which is one of the prominent peaks of the Green Mountain range. The
mica-albite-quartz schist on top of the Nose has many small folds and
crenulations.
South of the Forehead along the Long Trail, cliffs of an albite-rich
variety of the mica-albite-quartz schist form obstacles which have been
surmounted cleverly by the Green Mountain trail-markers.
In the southern part of Mount Mansfield State Forest the Long Trail
passes through Nebraska Notch in the vicinity of Taylor Lodge. This
notch also was formed by the erosive action of an ancient river that
flowed across the mountain at this point, but which has long since been
abandoned.
[Illustration: The cliffs at Smugglers Notch as seen looking south
from the west wall of the Notch.]