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Date: October 2-5, 2001
Difficulty: Day 1: Pretty hard; Day 2: Strenuous but not as bad as day 1; Day 3: Not too bad!
Conditions: Trails all in great shape; Weather: delicious!

Trip Report: First off, I want to thank all of you who provided all the good advice on gear, trails, etc. before I took off for my short week of dayhiking in the White Mountains. Your advice was good and sound and definitely helped make for a seriously good trip! I was probably over-prepared but, considering the reputation the Whites have for changeable weather, it was probably better than being under-prepared.

In a nutshell, the trip ended up as three full-day dayhikes: Mount Washington, Mt. Adams, and Franconia Ridge. I burned up some frequent flier miles on Monday, October 1, and flew to Portland, Maine, whereupon I rented a car and drove the 90 miles or so to the AMC's Pinkham Notch Lodge. I dayhiked on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday and had planned to do a half-day hike on the Caps Ridge Trail Friday morning but after the first three days my old knees started to get pretty sore and I opted to "play tourist" that day instead (more on that later). I had to leave the Pinkham Notch area by 4:00 or so Friday to catch a 7:20 flight back to Washington DC. Now … why have I waited so long to send in this trip report? Two basic reasons: 1) lots of backed-up work at the office and undone chores at home, and 2) I'm not a writer by nature so I don't often express myself very well with words and those mountains are, well, some seriously BIG MOUNTAINS compared to what we have here in Virginia! I could probably ramble on endlessly about those three-and-a-half days but thought it best to first think about what I wanted to say.

Mt. Washington - Tuesday, October 2 (4.3 miles up - 4.2 miles back, 4,256 feet of elevation gain): Those of you who were advising me earlier about these hikes might recall that I had made up my mind to do this one via the Ammonoosuc Ravine Trail going up and returning via the Jewell Trail. After talking with several of the more experienced hikers my first evening there they suggested that if I wanted maximum "visual impact" on my first trip to the Whites that I should really consider going up via the Tuckerman Ravine Trail. I was a little put off at the possibility that I'd have way too much company but was assured that, considering my early planned departure time (7:00am), I'd probably have the trail mostly to myself. So … it was settled, or so I thought. By the time I hit the sack at 9:00 I'd been convinced that going up via the Huntington Ravine Trail and coming back via the Tuckerman Ravine Trail would not only provide maximum visual impact but would also provide maximum challenge (something I specifically seek out in the mountains where I live).

The AMC guidebook, in fact, lists the Huntington Ravine Trail as the most difficult hike in the WMNF! So, at 7:00 Tuesday morning I was headed off to Huntington Ravine. First, a word about "trails" in the WNMF. These aren't the kinds of trails I'm used to in the Shenandoah National Park … there don't appear to be many plain, old dirt paths to be found up there! Instead the "trails" are more like clearings through the rocks, and the rocks in many places are more like small boulders! This is the case both for going up and coming down - those of you who said to count on about a one-mile-per-hour pace were just about exactly right! Really tough on the knees, too (particularly the coming down parts). To add to the challenge I found out I was carrying about 25 pounds around with me, what with all the extra gear and water and stuff - compared to about 15 pounds I normally dayhike with around home! So here I was, setting off on my first hike on this long-planned trip not sure whether or not I could make it up a trail that strenuous with that much weight on my back!

As it turned out I made it okay but, good golly Miss Molly, what a hike! The headwall of the ravine was steeper than anything I'd ever gone up. The AMC guidebook says that, at the steepest part, there's an elevation gain of 650 feet in 0.3 mile - that's a 41% grade - pretty  tough, particularly for an old geezer like me. When I finally reached the top of the headwall, Mt. Washington's peak was in the clouds - really dense clouds. The hike continued a little further up the Huntington Ravine Trail to the Nelson Crag Trail which would take me the final mile or so south to the summit. I was disappointed that I wouldn't be able to see "anything" from the summit but I wouldn't have given up the hike in the clouds along the Nelson Crag Trail for anything! Visibility was such that you could only see 100-150 feet ahead - thank God for the cairns! Add to this the 50+ MPH crosswinds that day and the experience was surreal (with an ambient temperature in the high 30s this made for a wind-chill of about 18 degrees, as I recall). It was as though the winds were ripping and tearing the clouds into shreds and blowing them across the ridge I was on - an unforgettable experience. I spent little time at the summit/observatory/visitor center since I wasn't sure what my downhill pace would be … couldn't see anything anyway. The return trip down the Tuckerman Ravine Trail was uneventful except for the four times I wrenched my ankle! But I could see why Tuckerman is such a popular hike - easy accessibility, not nearly as challenging as Huntington Ravine (but still a grind), all wrapped up with beautiful views! Those "trails" though …

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Submitted by Peter Harris
Warrenton, VA
Thu, 18 Oct 2001