This was perhaps our grandest hiking adventure – a circuit hike of Mt. Washington that featured about 4 miles of above tree-line hiking with magnificent views on a clear day. The camera cannot even begin to capture the panorama we saw.
We climbed up the very steep Ammonoosuc Ravine Trail to Lake of the Clouds Hut and then took the historic Crawford Path to the summit. I took a frightening spill on a wet ledge on the Ammonoosuc but my out-of-control fall was fortunately braked by the sidewall of the ledge. Moral- stay off wet ledges on steep trails.
As the highest peak in the Northeast, Mt. Washington attracts its share of hikers who can't go the distance. The kids observed without judgment the many couldn't make it. It is not only the physical conditioning but importantly the psychological conditioning that comes from previous hiking challenges that gets you to the summit. Without that conditioning and knowing that you can put one foot in front of the other and endure, your ego may scream at you that you can't make it. The kids today saw how far they have come – not only was the physical challenge fairly easy for them but they were essentially not even challenged on the psychological side.
The summit is of course crowded with folks who arrived by auto-road or cog railroad. At 3pm it was 48 degrees at the summit with 21 miles an hour winds and 88 degrees and calm in the valley below.
After the summit we hiked down the other side on the Gulfside trail. For almost 2 hours we had spectacular views of the Great Gulf and Mts. Clay, Jefferson, Adams and Madison. Then down the Jewell trail and out (because the bridge was out on the new trail) at the old trailhead at the Cog railroad. We exited the trail, shortly after 8pm, just as the sun was setting.
Distance 10 miles; Climb 3900 ft; Elevation 6288 ft.
