Rock Cut

Two lots at Rock Cut, and the one you want is the north lot, on your right. The south lot, on your left, has no toilets, and no path joins the two. Park on the right, and turn right when you leave. From the north lot, the Tundra Communities Trail climbs six-tenths of a mile of asphalt, steep at the start, at twelve thousand feet. All hiking at Rock Cut stays on the pavement. Look down beside the path. Those low cushions could pass for moss. They live by sitting under the wind, which blows just a few inches above them, anchored on long taproots, and they get a growing season of a few short weeks. Look for Old Man of the Mountain, the alpine sunflower. It spends ten to twenty years growing nothing but roots and leaves, then it blooms and it dies. Every flower head faces east, away from the wind, so you could steer by it. Listen before you look for pikas, a high eek from the rock piles. They weigh just over six ounces, they don't hibernate, and they spend the summer making haystacks to eat under the snow. Cold is the greatest threat to them here, because less snow means less blanket. Lava Cliffs is the big lot on your right, just before the top of the road. That fenced square by the Rock Cut lot looks like a utility box. It's one of botanist Beatrice Willard's research plots, the first in the country on the National Register, and an old foot path runs through it. She spent forty years measuring how long that path took to heal. The builders took care here too. The surplus rock from this road was laid with the lichen side up. The Tundra Communities Trail ends at a mountain index on a rock at twelve thousand three hundred and ten feet, a memorial to Roger Toll, the superintendent who first proposed this road. The plaque says his love of the high country was shown by making it more accessible to you and your friends.