Total trail mileage: 1812.8
Starting location: Lonesome Lake Hut
Ending location: Greenleaf Hut
Weather: Rain last night. 67 degrees in the morning. 54-74 degrees
during the day. Cloudy and mostly cloudy and foggy throughout the
day. Very windy.
I am at
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=44.033812,+-71.679161
Helping out with the Hut Croo was actually pretty fun this morning. I
felt like a crew member without having any of the responsibility.
Stomp and Super Guide woke up at 3, saw the rain, and decided to
abandon their crazy idea of attempting the double traverse. So, they
were around. After taking care of my assigned "work" (doing a little
sweeping) and talking to the guests for a while, I headed out on the
trail.
I forgot to mention yesterday that despite the long day and slow
progress, I was surprisingly not exhausted. I thought I would be
tired out with these climbs, but I am not. It just took a long time
yesterday.
The trail was so much easier today. Yep, there was a lot of elevation
gain, but it didn't include the steep rocky sections that I had to
navigate up yesterday. I was actually making decent time, which makes
me feel much more confident about the rest of the Whites.
Franconia Ridge is now my favorite section of the trail by far. I was
almost to tree line when the clouds started to lift a bit. I figured
that was going to be the nicest view due to the cloud cover, so I
stopped on the side of the trail to have lunch. While eating, the
clouds lifted a little further. I got up to the ridgeline. The
clouds would occassionally dissapate, and when they did the view was
unreal. It was like something in a movie. One second there was a
white cloud; the next there was a rocky mountain.
I ran into a thruhiker from 2008 and her dad and ended up following
them for the whole ridgeline. We reached the peak of Mt Lafayette,
but unfortunately it was completely clouded over and the clouds were
not lifting. It was very windy at the top. The weather report had
called for 40-50 mph winds with 80+ mph gusts. I am not sure if it
quite reached those speeds but it was up there.
I had two options at that point: (a) continue on and try to make it to
Galehead Hut or the campsite just before it or (b) take the 1.1 mile
side trail to Greenleaf Hut. The first option would be risky since I
didn't know how much time I would need to get to the next campsite and
it was already 4pm. The second option would mean a short day and a
1.1 mile steep detour off trail. It didn't really take much thought.
I figured I have plenty of time so I don't need to rush through this
section and I really want to see the view from Mt. Lafayette. Taking
the second option gives me a second chance to see the view.
So down I went. Fortunately the Hut Croo let me do work for stay and
I was the only thruhiker here tonight. The Croo here today is a fill
in Croo so the normal Croo can have a couple days off. The fill in
Croo is a group that Crooed together 20 years ago. Again, I felt like
a member of the staff and helped with dishes during Dinner service. A
lot of people had tons of questions about thruhiking so I tried to
answer them the best I could. After dinner, the sunset was one of the
better sunsets I have seen on the trip.
So, 2 for 2 on the huts and another really awesome day in the Whites.
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