Flume and Liberty, Flags on the 48, 9/8/12
I'll spare you a long trip report on this one, and just say that if anyone is looking for a nice foliage hike this fall, Osseo Trail up to Flume would be a great one to take on. The Osseo trail is great, if you've overlooked it in the past. Nice easy grades through the harwoods, beech and birch, and some cool ladders towards the top with a little rock scrambling to top it off. Overall it was a great hike! We continued on to Liberty and down Liberty Springs, but if you wanted to just do an out and back to Flume without going up the slide, this would be a great way to do it. I would not at all have minded heading back out that way, but with Liberty added it was too long to back track. There were hardly as many rocks on Osseo as there are on Liberty Springs as well. And you only have to trudge down 1.4 miles of Lincoln Woods (which is very nice at the beginning of a hike during the day and not in the dark!) which I suspect would also be very pleasant on a foliage hike in early October. We had a great day and discovered a new great trail. I highly recommend it if you're looking for something different (as we were after a long miserable Hight, Carter Dome, Wildcat trip topped off with a Bonds Transverse). Very Nice.