Participants: Chris Tracy, Jeff, Brent (of Presi-Traverse fame), Eric & Matthew Gilbertson, Mike Kokko
On the approximate summit
Feb 18, 2006
Peaks Bagged: Field, Willey, Avalon & Tom (well, close enough)
Starting Temp: 0° F with snow
Lowest Documented Temp: -18.7° F (see Eric’s pics)
Estimated Sustained Windspeed: 20 mph
Distance Traveled 10.0 miles
Elevation Gain: I have no idea; but it was steep and therefore warm
Author: Mike Kokko
The objective was Washington. Mount Washington. All 6,288 feet of it.
Turns out that we picked a bad weekend. It was 54° F in Boston during the week, but fate changed quickly thanks to a cold front that blew its way through on Friday and sent the entire Northeast into a deep freeze. The avalanche report on Thursday warned of the weekend weather turning losing a mitten from merely an epic event into a full-blown tragedy. On Friday there was further discourse that began:
NOW FOR THE “WHY YOU SHOULDN’T DO A PRESI-TRAVERSE THIS WEEKEND” DISCUSSION
Even Dan Walker and Steve Block called-off their Superverse, so in the name of safety we set our sights a little bit lower and picked a route with less exposure.
Chris, Jeff, and Brent left Boston around 6pm on Friday and spent the night in the AMC bunkhouse at Crawford Notch. The Gilbertsons rode with Mike up to Intervale and slept in a tent (and Mike in the yurt). Intervale’s thermometer read somewhere between 4° and 5° on Saturday morning, and there was snow falling/blowing at a good clip in Crawford Notch when we all met-up around 7am.
We spent about an hour repacking bags warming-up in AMC land before hitting the A-Z trail. Within five minutes nearly half the group was sprawled-out on the ice, so we stopped to strap-on our crampons. Armed with super-human traction skills we proceeded up the trail towards Mt. Tom. Although mighty cold, the steep terrain kept us pumping heat and made the conditions quite bearable.
We reached Mt. Tom at around 9:30am, but were later informed by an avid VFTTer that we missed the official summit by 200 feet (we should have paid him off not to tell anyone). The clouds started to clear-out and the wind increased as we finished our snack on top of Tom. The whole heat-transfer thing stated to catch-up with us too, and we strapped-on our facemasks on the descent/ascent towards Field.
The views from the (actual) summit of Field were better than any of us expected, and we got a glimpse of the madness that was Mt. Washington’s weekend weather. Although we never saw the summit, Jefferson did poke out of the clouds for a while revealing strong winds and an amazing amount of blowing snow. The temperature, you ask? -13.2° F. And yes, there was wind too.
The saddle between Field and Willey was significantly windier than the A-Z trail and several small trees were blown across our path. We stopped for lunch in a sheltered clearing then pushed through the rest of the distance to Willey. Just east of the summit we got some great views down the notch towards Bartlett. At this point we could have continued down the infamous Willey ladders to the base of the Kendron Flume trail, but we would have then had to hitchhike back to Crawford and we feared for our collective personal safety. (Well, ok, we really weren’t too excited about the prospect of hanging around without a car in a windy notch either).
Hiking back to Field we encountered our coldest temperature (-18.7°F) of the day and then descended towards Avalon sporting fashionable frozen eyelashes. The trail dropped very quickly through the snowy forest, but thanks to our MITOC Winterschool training we knew to resist the urge of glissading with crampons. Avalon itself yielded some nice views of the Southern Presies and we shared the summit with a few other hikers. The trail back to Crawford was also well-traveled and we made good time. Arriving back in the notch around 2:15pm, we warmed-up and parted-ways to return home. It was definitely a fun trip, and I don’t think anyone was too disappointed that Washington didn’t work-out this weekend.
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