Date: 2003-09-23
From: Madison Springs Hut

To: Route 16, Pinkham Notch
Miles today: 7.8
Weather: light rain

So, maybe I was getting paid back for being cocky yesterday about conquering Mt. Washington. Today was not the best of days...to put it mildly. We could hear the rain start early in the morning, not a lot, but enough to get the tents wet. The wind was still going at a good force, and I had heard it throughout the night whipping at the tent. I jokingly said I wanted to do a zero at the hut...Big Bird said he'd do that. Actually, I would have if I hadn't been planning on meeting my friends in Gorham. I saw Littlist Hobo pop out of his tent, but he said he wasn't going anywhere today. I donned all my rain gear, my fleece hat and gloves and an extra shirt. We got everything packed up, and started up Mt. Madison, which is one of the few Presidentials that the AT actually summits. The wind grew increasingly more intense as we climbed...a couple of gusts nearly knocked me over. We "only" had 5/10 of a mile up to, and another 5/10 down from the top of Madison. I say "only!" because in those conditions, there is no such thing as only. I also foolishly assumed that we'd be descending the leeward side of the mountain...not so. As we rounded a corner after summitting, we were headed straight into the wind...we couldn't stand up, it was so intense. We retreated behind a rock face to figure out what to do. We looked at the map to see if there were any other trails that we could take. There was one that was another 4/10 mile further down the AT, and one that we had passed 1/10 mile back up the Trail. We went back to the latter, but then thought it would be shorter to go ahead to the other one. Once again we rounded the corner and got blasted with wind and rain. I was trying to tell myself "I can do this", when Big Bird yelled over the wind that this was the wrong decision...we should take the other trail. So, once again, we headed back to the trail junction. If we took this trail, the Howker Ridge Trail, to the Pine Link Trail, it would br!ing us to Dolly Copp Road, which we could then take to route 16. Therewe could get to the Visitor's Center and get dry and warmed up. The topo map showed that these trails were steep. In one way, I was okay with that, as it meant we'd be going down below treeline quickly. On the other hand, it meant that it would be a risky descent over wet rocks...nothing we hadn't done before, but tricky nonetheless. And we were already cold and soaked from being on the top of the mountain. We wended our way down the first trail...we weren't exactly on the leeward side (I don't really believe there is a leeward side to this mountain!), but we weren't getting completely battered by the elements here. It was very slow going. We went below treeline only to pop back above it several times. Each time we were blasted by weather, and we were growing tired. I continually scanned for a place to set up my tent...we could at least be inside for awhile...but there was nowhere that would work. We stopped once to eat, getting even more cold and wet in the proce!ss, but needing to fuel up to keep going. It took till 3 to get to the road...we had started at 8:30. We were looking at the map to make sure we were heading in the right direction when I heard a car. I tried to flag them down, but they sped up even faster than they were already going. So much for helping out fellow human beings. I have to say, we were looking quite bedraggled, but I was hoping it would evoke pity, not fear or loathing. We walked down the road, cars passing us in the wrong direction. A forest service truck approached...I had heard that rangers weren't very helpful, but surely this one could see that hypothermia was a possiblity in our case. So much for that..."I cannot transport you in this vehicle" we were told. Continuing on, we finally made it to route 16, where we consulted the map again. Gorham was closer than the Visitor's Center, so we decided to hitch there and go to the Barn, a hiker hostel. It took another 30 minutes before a wonderful !man in a pickup pulled over. He said he couldn't see letting people get wet...others seemed to have no problems with that...and we got into the back (he was going to let us ride in the cab, but we couldn't do that, we were too wet). The corner where he was able to drop us off was right at the hostel. We saw Taba and Slideshow Bob coming from the store and followed them in. Nova, Rif Raf (only one, now, the other got badly hurt in a fall outside of Dalton), Chafe Master J and Espy were also here. We took hot showers, put on some dry clothes, did laundry and got some food and drink. And yes, I had a number of beers. This was the first time on the Trail that I had ever felt that my life was in danger...I feel as if I looked death in the face today. I'm happy to say that it was not my day to go, but also happy that I'm off that mountain. Perhaps I'll try it again sometime in better weather, but for now, I'll be continuing on from Pinkham Notch, on my way to Gorham...and Maine.