Overnight at the Mt. Washington Weather Observatory
.jpg "Overnight at the Mt. Washington Weather Observatory")
I know it's just September, but at my house we're already planning this winter's major expeditions. For example, I've got a very big birthday coming up in February and we're planning to celebrate it with a night at the weather observatory on top of Mt. Washington (6,288 ft) in New Hampshire.
I've written about Mt. Washington before on Section Hiker: It's the highest peak in the northeastern US and is known around the world for it's fierce and unpredictable weather conditions, especially in winter. So much so, that many winter climbers train on Mt. Washington before to attempting ascents on Denali or Rainer.
While the average winter temperature at the summit is a balmy 5 F degrees above zero, the real danger is posed by wind chill: hurricane force winds between 73 and 100 miles an hour occur two out of every three days during the winter months. In addition, the upper slopes of the mountain are fogged over about 60% of the time, reducing visibility to 50 to 100 feet, and hikers can become easily disoriented.
For my birthday adventure, participants take a snowcat tractor to the summit via the Mt. Washington Auto Road, an 8 mile route to the top that starts just outside Gorham, NH. Anyone could come on this trip except for one gotcha, which is that the snowcat breaks down once and a while. So participants must have experience using crampons and an ice axe to get down the mountain in the event of a mechanical failure.
Once at the observatory, we'll have the opportunity to learn about mountain meteorology, including the instrumentation and techniques that have been adapted to Mt. Washington's extreme conditions. Overnight accommodations are very basic with all participants sleeping together in a chilly, but heated bunk room.
Although this trip is a ways off, I'm looking forward to it tremendously, except for the part where I have to train my wife in how to use an ice axe and walk in crampons. Maybe I'll pay someone to teach her instead. But she's a trooper, and has accompanied me on other similarly taxing and out of the ordinary adventures before, like the time we took a vacation on Montserrat during an active volcanic eruption!
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Sorry, but Mt Mitchell in North Carolina is acually the highest peak east of the Mississippi. Clingmans Dome, Mt Guyot and Mt LeConte the the Smoky’s are all higher the Mt Washigton, which is the tallest peak in the Northeast.
Excellent post, as always. Sounds like great fun. I’ll get a vicarious thrill just hearing about it.
One minor nit: Mt. Washington (at 6288′) isn’t the highest peak east of the Mississippi. That title goes to Mt. Mitchell in North Carolina (6683′ but some sources have it at 6647′). Second highest, and highest on the AT is Clingman’s Dome (6643′).
Sorry about that. Thanks for the fact checking.