I was above tree line and completely enshrouded in a cloud
What you must understand is that the White Mountains live in their own little world. The peaks insist on competing with one another over who can torment the hikers the worst. The Whites create their own weather, 24/7/365(366). The battle has begun.
I was woken up at 4:30AM this morning by another hiker and was unable to fall back asleep. I naturally began packing up and preparing for the day. After eating breakfast, packing up, and lounging around, I was walking north with Cookie at 7:00AM, I believe.
Before leaving, I overheard Cookie have this interaction with an incoming SOBO:
Cookie:"Everyone's leaving, so you can have first dibs on the bunks upstairs."
SOBOder:"I know where everything is, I've done this before."
Cookie and I spent the initial climb out of the road laughing about this conversation. Cookie was just trying to be helpful, and this SOBO, who felt she was better than everyone else, was having no part of that. Cookie and I resolved to not be very friendly to the rest of the SOBO's we meet. Damn SOBOders.
After walking a road walk we noticed a large land mass in front of us, and that's when we began our ascent into the heavens.
The entire ascent up Moosilauke was steep, rocky, and slippery due to the cloud we were walking in. I noticed that the higher I climbed, the shorter the trees became. This is when I realized we were closing in on tree line, and that we would soon be completely exposed to the elements.
On the ascent I met my second SOBO, Grace. She was a whole lot friendlier that the German I met at the hostel. I talked with her a bit and then we went our separate ways, she continued on her way to Georgia.
By the time we reached the summit of Moosilauke I was above tree line and completely enshrouded in a cloud. I could see 15 feet in each direction. After chatting with Barefodder and Jack on the summit, we began the imfamous descent down the north side of Mousilauke.
The intial descent was very gradual, but it's all relative in the Whites. From the Beaver Brook Shelter on, however, is where the battle begins. This is a two mile stretch of numerous steps created on steep rock slabs, and there are some places where you need a railing to navigate safely down. This is easily the most time consuming descent of the trail thus far. However, you can keep yourself occupied by looking at the waterfall that the trail follows for a large portion of the descent.
After lunch near the fall we finished the descent and rolled into Kinsman's Notch around 12:45PM. Cookie did not need to go to town, but I did for resupply. We planned on meeting tomorrow at Lonesome Lake Hut.
Once I rolled into Lincoln VIA the first car that passed me, I got a bunk at the "One Step At A Time Hostel", run by Chet.
I hit the PO, only to discover that my winter gear had not arrived, which is a scary scenario. I shall now do something quite idiotic: Finish the Whites and Maine without proper winter clothing, and hope I don't die a painful death.
Addendum, added 8/11/08: I did not die a painful death.
Tomorrow I shall slack pack Kinsman's Notch to Franconia Notch. I've heard this is a section of trail that can be quite dull, we shall see.
And that's the way it was.
Kirby
Ga>ME 2008.
