Mt. Washington Expedition

Climbing Mt. Washington

The first trial run for our gear happened over the MLK weekend.  The OSU Mountaineers Club took their annual trip to Mt. Washington and we went with them.

The trip is always a frantic non-stop event; travel 13 hours in a van to New Hampshire, rent crampons and axes, climb up and down the mountain, then get in the vans for the 13 hour ride home.  This was the fourth year that the mountaineers club has done the trip, and they have summited every year in the past.  This year was a little different because there was a major weather front moving across the entire country that weekend.  As it happens, the front was moving east out of Ohio just as we were leaving Friday night.  So, the entire way there we were traveling in tandem with the storm.  When we finally got to North Conway in New Hampshire they were experiencing unseasonably warm weather (which is basically anything above freezing.)  This was pretty bad news for our group since hiking in thirty-three degree rain is about the most miserable conditions possible.  After waiting out the weather in the Pickman’s Notch lodge, our wise leaders changed the schedule and we camped at the bottom of the mountain rather than slog up to the traditional base camp and soak our clothes beyond recovery.

Fortune was finally on our side because that night the rain turned to snow and we woke with our tents covered in a comforting blanket.  Our original plan was to send one group up the normal winter route (Lions Head) and another more experienced group up a challenging route called Tuckerman’s Ravine.  Liz was going to go with the Tuckerman’s group since she’d done the climb three years before and get some valuable experience with roped-in climbing.  The weather raised the avalanche forecast to an unsafe level for anything except the Lions Head route though.  Winds on the summit when we left the lodge were 80+ mph so a summit attempt looked pretty dim, but then, no one climbs Mt. Washington in the winter for it’s tranquil conditions (check out the Mt. Washington Observatory for a taste.)  The hike up to tree line was pretty uneventful which was nice because I for one learned a couple things about winter hiking.  It was unnerving at first to realize that I only needed a thin base layer and shell to hike in temperatures that didn’t rise above twelve degrees, at least until you stop moving, then you throw on everything you own.  Figuring out crampons and an ice axe in a relatively safe situation was helpful also.  Above tree-line was a different story.  It was amazing how quickly the trees shrunk to your shoulders, they your waist and finally disappear.  The winds around us were gusting to about 60 mph, it was quite a rush for those that chose to push on.  Our group reached the limits of time and safety simultaneously as we made it to the rock outcropping known as Lions Head at 5218 ft.  The views were still pretty spectacular there, because from that height we were still above any other mountain in the area.  The land stretched out ahead of us like a lumpy carpet.  Moments like those are why people climb mountains, for the feeling of being a visitor to this planet (which is really the truth anyway.)

In all, the trip was a success.  We are definitely looking forward to the summits in South America even more now.