Mt. Washington Trip Report

“Flew to Boston, MA friday night and then took the subway to my brother, Russ' apartment in Brighton. Arrived around 1am. We prep'd our gear and hit the road for the Whites around 3am, only stopping briefly at Dunkin Donuts in Conway for some breakfast.

Original plan was to meet up with Skiracer, but my brother didn't finalize the plan and wouldn't let me in on the trip planning. I'm really sorry about that Ski.

We also were hoping to catch the sunrise on the summit. My plane had a serious delay and screwed that up. Additionally, we were going to ascend via the Tuckerman Ravine, but that path was closed for some reason, probably because of melting snow and ice hazzards. So instead we decided on the Lions Head trail.

Anyhow, we arrived around 6am at the trailhead at the Pinkham Notch visitor center. Geared up and hit the Tuckerman Ravine trail (tractor path). The tractor path is a long 2 mile trail with a steady uphill grade and not a lot of scenery. It passes through a lovely forest though and there is a nice waterfall and a series of cascades near the bottom. I enjoyed it none the less. It's the low point of the hike.

The Lions Head trail starts near the Hermits Lake shelter and is a right turn off of the Tuckerman Ravine trail. We made the turn and started up the trail. All of the sudden we're walking up a steep, rocky, slippery, small drainage stream with casecades. It doesn't look anything like a trail to me. I never hiked Washington before though and my brother has many times, including a few on the Lions Head. I trust he knows where he's going. We continue. Finally, I suggest we're off trail and ask him. He says "I know this is the trail." Ok, we continue up. It gets steeper and steeper and risker by the step. Finally the stream turns to the right and it becomes essentially a cliff climb and a rock scramble with lots of lose rock and steep drop offs. It is necessary to use the entire body to climb. Russ now admits we're no longer on the trail but it would be unsafe to go back down at this point. So we continue up. We had the Tuckerman not too far away from our right side and if we continue going up we should soon hit the trail.

We eventually reach a point where we're at a cliff wall and our only option is to pop into the stunted balsam forest for a bush wack up the steep face. The stunted Balsams were nearly unpentitrable, but we pushed our way through. Finally we found what appeared to be an over grown trail that was heading in the direction we needed to go, up. We took that and found our way back on the Lion Head trail right near the treeline.

From there we climbed up to the Lions Head, checked out the views of the valley below and got our first views of the Tuckerman Ravine Wall. It was awesome, complete with snow. I'm not sure why they closed the trail up it though. It was hardly snowed up.

The trail then paralells the south side of the ravine for a short while. Once we got near the top of the ravine rim ice was forming on the rocks and tundra plants. We then went through a small balsam forest that was above the tree line but was protected from the fierce wind that Washington is famous for. They were coated in rim ice and looked beautiful. It was also really neat to see the colorful alpine flowers.

The summit was socked in so we could not look up and see it. However, we could hear the generators and the cog railway up top and could tell we were closing in.

The last 500 feet is a rock hop where you follow rock cairnes (sp). The wind was really beginning to blow and we were getting sprayed with rim ice. Part of the fun though. Strong gusts would practically knock you over if you weren't ready for them. The higher we got the more rim ice.

Finally we reached the auto road and the summit was within our grasp. We crossed the road and climbed up the stairs to the visitor center.

On the very top the wind was blowing more than 50 miles an hour. I heard someone say that gusts were registering more than 60 mph. Views of the valley below were not visible through the fog. None the less it was incredibly rewarding to be there. We did the last little climb to the tiptop and sat down beneath the summit sign to take our pictures. No one else was around to take them for us. It was around 11am.

We then went into the visitor center which was open, thank goodness. We had lunch, chilled out for a bit, checked out the museum and I bought a shirt, sticker and trail map in the shop.

While we were there the train summited and I took a few pictures of it. By now scores of tourists were making their way up and also fellow hikers were also arriving. We wanted to have the solitude and the trail to ourselves which we enjoyed on the way up, so we initiated our descent at around 1230.

On the way down we took some more photos and it even started to snow (flurry) around the time we got to the Lions Head. The wind was really pounding at the Lions Head too. There we talked to a few female hikers who were considering turning back because of the strong wind.

This time we stayed on the Lions Head trail for the entire time till we reached the tractor path.

We got back to the car around 3:30.

Mt. Washington is quite a mountain. I have always been partial to Mt. LeConte in the Smokies but after hiking Washington it's difficult to look at LeConte the same way. I think LeConte still holds the top spot though.

Anyway, I think this was the hardest hike I have ever been on. The entire hike was a challenge, especially the offtrail portion. I loved every bit of it though. It was great hiking with my brother again. Total milege was aproximately 8 miles and the elevation gain/loss was around 4300 feet.

Today, we walked around Boston and took in a lot of the sites here. Beantown is a nice place. I really enoyed this entire trip. Now I should go to bed because I have a 7am flight and that means getting up at 430am. Ouch.

My brother and I took a ton of photos. I'll post them tomorrow when I get back to DC.”

“cool climb man.

Glad you didn't fall off the cliffs this time

You've now nailed the non-southern sixer of the southern sixers.”

“Nice trip report! Don't you hate when you go off-trail and the more you climb the more stubborn you get about turning around to look for the real trail? Thank gawd you retook the trail, but that's the stuff you remember fondly (once your safe, back home!).”

“Thank you for the detail. It is so awesome that everything is okay and you are safe again. Im so jealous that you hiked this beautiful mountain. But I had a great time back to bay area and I hiked Mt. Diablo on Sunday. I will post my trip report and the photos soon.

EarthNsky - welcome home...:o)”

“Cool TR. We got "off trail" on the Wonderland at Mt Rainier 2 years ago. Yep...turned into a full body experience. Glad you guys were safe.”

“oh, by the way, can't wait to see your pictures...”

“Sounds like a great trip even with the "detour". It is really nice spending time with siblings. I spent 2 weeks in Hawaii with my little sister about 3 years ago and remember every detail. I never thought we had that much in common until that trip. I make it a point to keep in touch better since then (she is in MI and I am in MN.) Glad you had a good one...”

“here are the photos from my climb on Mt. Washington.

Mt. Washington Pics - Russ and Rob”

“Great pictures, looks like you had almost as much adventure as I did.”

“yeah, the off trail stuff was hairy while we were in the middle of it. Looking back it totally rocked. That was the closest I have come to true mountaineering.”

“They are awesome pictures. Thank you, EarthNsky.”

“Great trip report!! Makes me want to go. I didn't realize you were nashvillehiker. (Right?) Beantown is fun, too.”

“Enjoyed the photos.

Was that Tuckerman Ravine shown in the headwall across the canyon in photo #36? (I'm a left coaster, never been there).”

“Yeah, that is the headwall of the Tuck just below the Lionshead”

“Nice trip report and fine pics Earthnsky. Mt. Washington looks so different depending on the season, the weather and time of day.

I've never day hiked to the top, though I've hit the peak 4 times on backpacking trips (including w/Sirpete and Walkindude).

Weather was great in Beantown yesterday.”

“it sure was. I had a great time on Washington and in Boston. My Boston trip pics

Yeah, I want to find a way to get back up to the Whites this summer. Go hiking with me bro some more.”

“Cool pics!”

“Great pics Earth, love the summit sign with the blown ice all over it, looks collllllddddddd”

“thanks”

“it was quite cold once we hit the Lions Head. The Summit was probably around freezing and the windchill was pretty bad. It was awesome. I could barely stand up on the summit.”

“Looks like you had a great tour of Beantown, too. Nice pics. The Brimmer St. sign in one pic brought back memories - I had a girl friend who lived on Brimmer.”

“Seeing the USS Constitution was cool. I loved trying to stand on the summit of Washington against the wind.”

“Man, it's been two weeks since I climbed this mountain and all I can think about is how much I want to go back and climb it again.”

“stalker”

“lol, that mountain does that to one's self. So many hikers find themselves obsessed with its alpine zone and ravines.”

“I agree Mt Washington is nice, but the mobs of people didn't turn you off?”

“I got lucky. I was up and down before the mobs really started showing up. Plus, Memorial Day was kind bad weather up there on Washington and I think that kept the mobs down.”

“I didn't have mobs of people on June 6th, either. That might have been due to the forecast - rain was called for all day when I checked the evening of the 5th, but it turned out to be a beautiful day. There were quite a few people on top that either drove up the toll road or rode up on the Cog Railway. I've heard that the Tuckerman Ravine trail can be like a conga line at times. We also got a pretty early start up the mountain.”