Last weekend, our good friend Sarah came for a visit.  With her new love of hiking, we finally convinced her to make the trek up to the White Mountains and go for a walk with us.  Lindsay insisted that we only do a shortish hike to a waterfall and suggested we hike to Giant Fall in Shelburne, NH.

We parked on the North Road where the Peabody Brook Trail starts between two houses.  Check out the house on the left, they have goats and chickens!  The trail begins on a logging road and is marked well at all junctions.

Peabody Brook Trail

The Peabody Brook Trail follows the Peabody Brook.  Depending on the flow of the brook downstream you can guess how well the waterfall will be flowing up above. You can also get a preview from Rte. 2 if you know where to look and see the water gushing steeply from the mountainside.

The Peabody Brook trail follows the Peabody Brook up to Giant Fall.

It was a cool, crisp December morning and we easily made our way up the trail.

Andrew hiking on the Peabody Brook Trail.

Sarah hiking on the Peabody Brook Trail.

Eventually the Peabody Brook Trail turns off the logging road and begins a steady climb, and before you realize it, just over a mile from the trailhead, you come to the Giant Falls Trail  junction.

The junction down to view Giant Fall.

The trail traverses a steep ravine, descends down to the brook edge, and follows the brook to the foot of Giant Fall.  Don’t be fooled by the small falls along the way.  You’re looking for the “Giant” one!

Giant Fall through the woods.

Snow and ice melting on Giant Fall.

We stopped for a break to take in the view and take a couple of photos.  We’ve been to this spot in all seasons, but our favorite time of year has to be in early spring.  The water is flowing good from the snow melt and the spray from the falls can be felt on your face from this spot that we stopped at in this story.  The woods are still bare with a few patches of snow in early spring, but the ephemeral flowers are amazing.  We highly recommend this short hike then, however any time of year the falls are fun to view.

Andrew and Lindsay pose in front of Giant Fall.

Lindsay and the snow covered waterfall.

Sarah enjoying the waterfall view.

All three of us.

Andrew waiting for the snow blobs to fall.

Since Giant Fall faces south, the sun melts the snow and ice regularly and even in the short time that we were there, we watched several snow blobs avalanche into the water below.

Sarah and Lindsay in front of Giant Fall.

We contemplated continuing on up to Dream Lake, one of Andrew’s favorite places (read about our hike to Dreamy Lake), or just going another mile up the trail, but decided to just turn around and head back down.  Today was just going to be a short hike.

Sarah upset and Andrew wishing we would continue up to Dream Lake.

Round trip was just over 3 miles and just perfect to get out stretch our legs, and take in the clean mountain air.