Waumbek
New member
- Joined
- Oct 27, 2004
- Messages
- 1,890
- Reaction score
- 209
From today's Littleton Courier:
Start of another winter peakbagging season nears
By MIKE DICKERMAN
With the official start to winter just a few days away, it’s a sure bet that many hiking enthusiasts are already making plans to conquer their first White Mountain 4,000-Footer of the new season.
“Bagging” the 4,000-Footers in winter has become an increasingly popular pursuit in the past 15 years and it’s certainly no coincidence that the number of winter peakbaggers has risen simultaneously with the dramatic rise in the popularity of snowshoeing. As I pointed out in one of my columns earlier this year, the number of winter 4,000-footer finishers hit a record high last year with 21 hikers completing the list of 48 New Hampshire peaks. And in the last 13 years (1991-2004), some 147 hikers have finished the list, as opposed to 160 people who finished the list in the 30 years previous to 1991. In effect, the number of finishers just about doubled in a little more than one-third of the time.
Having completed the winter list myself back in 1991, I have seen firsthand how dramatically the winter hiking world has changed over the past two decades. Certainly when I first began to take my winter hiking seriously the number of other trampers I’d see on the trails was minimal. That’s not to say there weren’t other winter hikers out there, ‘cause there were. But it seemed they were usually found mostly on the more popular and easily accessible trails, such as around the Notches (Franconia, Crawford and Pinkham) or the Northern Presidentials.
Nowadays, though, it seems like there are people climbing the high peaks on a much more frequent basis. I see vehicles parked at the various trailheads practically every day of the week (not just on weekends, as it used to be), and they’re not just hiking around the Notches, but all over the Whites.
Because there were so fewer winter hikers back when I was doing “The List,” it also seemed that unless you were planning a trek on one of the more popular trails, chances were you’d be faced with the arduous task of breaking trail for much of the day. For that reason, I did very few serious winter hikes without at least one or two other companions. This allowed for us to continually switch off as lead hikers, thus preventing any one of us from completely wiping ourselves out as we ascended through anywhere between 6 and 18 inches of untouched snow.
Today’s winter trampers, I think, have it a little easier since it’s become increasingly difficult over the last few years to find a major trail that hasn’t already been broken out. In other words, unless you’re hiking the day after a major snowfall, chances are the trail you’ve picked will already be packed out by the time you get there.
Looking back at my winter hiking days, I’ll readily admit that many of the winter peaks I climbed wouldn’t have been reached if I hadn’t managed to team up with several larger groups of hikers--primarily Appalachian Mountain Club members, who strongly believed in the credo that there’s “force in numbers” when it comes to winter hiking in the Whites. I can remember a couple of trips in particular where our group was quite sizable in number. One was a late January foray up remote Owl’s Head Mountain in the Pemigewasset Wilderness, where our contingent of about 20 snowshoers needed all of eight hours just to reach the wooded summit. This was a particularly grueling trip as it was long (probably 15 miles) and included a steep and tedious bushwhack ascent from the Franconia Brook valley.
I’ll never forget the final five miles back to the Lincoln Woods trailhead along the former J. E. Henry’s and Sons logging railroad grade. There were by far the longest, hardest miles I’ve ever encountered on any hike, summer or winter. Several times, in fact, as I slowly negotiated the interminably long and level stretches of grade as it parallels and East Branch of the Pemi, I felt I simply could not go on any longer, and in the darkness that had overcome us I remember sitting down in the middle of the trail and saying to myself, “I’ll never make it back to the car. I just can’t take even one more step.”
Another memorable group hike I took part in was a winter traverse of the Twins (North and South) with a side trip to Galehead thrown in for good measure. I was feeling especially strong that day and even though the trail was unbroken with maybe a foot of new snow, I did more than my share of trail breaking, frequently jumping ahead in line just so I could get back in the lead again and again. All this breaking eventually took its toll, however, and I “hit the wall” as our group of about 15 hikers was slowly making its way up the Twinway to the summit of South Twin. I went from having all the energy in the world to having spent just about every ounce of energy allotted to me for the day. The final 400 feet up to the summit were among the toughest I encountered in all my winter ascents, and we still had one more summit to go. Fortunately, after a well-deserved lunch break, I recovered enough to make the trip over and up to the summit of North Twin. From there it was all down hill, I reminded myself, and I made it out of the woods none the worse for wear.
By this time next week, winter will have officially arrived and in accordance with the standards set by winter 4,000-Footer standard bearers Miriam and Robert Underhill (more on them next week), who were the first to complete the New Hampshire 4K list in winter, the three-month dash to collect peaks in this coldest of seasons will have begun. If the past couple of winters are any indication, I’m sure there’ll be plenty of traffic in the woods and on the peaks, and the challenges will all still be great, even if the trail breaking is kept to a minimum. To all of you currently in pursuit of the winter 4,000-Footers, good luck and good snowshoeing.
Start of another winter peakbagging season nears
By MIKE DICKERMAN
With the official start to winter just a few days away, it’s a sure bet that many hiking enthusiasts are already making plans to conquer their first White Mountain 4,000-Footer of the new season.
“Bagging” the 4,000-Footers in winter has become an increasingly popular pursuit in the past 15 years and it’s certainly no coincidence that the number of winter peakbaggers has risen simultaneously with the dramatic rise in the popularity of snowshoeing. As I pointed out in one of my columns earlier this year, the number of winter 4,000-footer finishers hit a record high last year with 21 hikers completing the list of 48 New Hampshire peaks. And in the last 13 years (1991-2004), some 147 hikers have finished the list, as opposed to 160 people who finished the list in the 30 years previous to 1991. In effect, the number of finishers just about doubled in a little more than one-third of the time.
Having completed the winter list myself back in 1991, I have seen firsthand how dramatically the winter hiking world has changed over the past two decades. Certainly when I first began to take my winter hiking seriously the number of other trampers I’d see on the trails was minimal. That’s not to say there weren’t other winter hikers out there, ‘cause there were. But it seemed they were usually found mostly on the more popular and easily accessible trails, such as around the Notches (Franconia, Crawford and Pinkham) or the Northern Presidentials.
Nowadays, though, it seems like there are people climbing the high peaks on a much more frequent basis. I see vehicles parked at the various trailheads practically every day of the week (not just on weekends, as it used to be), and they’re not just hiking around the Notches, but all over the Whites.
Because there were so fewer winter hikers back when I was doing “The List,” it also seemed that unless you were planning a trek on one of the more popular trails, chances were you’d be faced with the arduous task of breaking trail for much of the day. For that reason, I did very few serious winter hikes without at least one or two other companions. This allowed for us to continually switch off as lead hikers, thus preventing any one of us from completely wiping ourselves out as we ascended through anywhere between 6 and 18 inches of untouched snow.
Today’s winter trampers, I think, have it a little easier since it’s become increasingly difficult over the last few years to find a major trail that hasn’t already been broken out. In other words, unless you’re hiking the day after a major snowfall, chances are the trail you’ve picked will already be packed out by the time you get there.
Looking back at my winter hiking days, I’ll readily admit that many of the winter peaks I climbed wouldn’t have been reached if I hadn’t managed to team up with several larger groups of hikers--primarily Appalachian Mountain Club members, who strongly believed in the credo that there’s “force in numbers” when it comes to winter hiking in the Whites. I can remember a couple of trips in particular where our group was quite sizable in number. One was a late January foray up remote Owl’s Head Mountain in the Pemigewasset Wilderness, where our contingent of about 20 snowshoers needed all of eight hours just to reach the wooded summit. This was a particularly grueling trip as it was long (probably 15 miles) and included a steep and tedious bushwhack ascent from the Franconia Brook valley.
I’ll never forget the final five miles back to the Lincoln Woods trailhead along the former J. E. Henry’s and Sons logging railroad grade. There were by far the longest, hardest miles I’ve ever encountered on any hike, summer or winter. Several times, in fact, as I slowly negotiated the interminably long and level stretches of grade as it parallels and East Branch of the Pemi, I felt I simply could not go on any longer, and in the darkness that had overcome us I remember sitting down in the middle of the trail and saying to myself, “I’ll never make it back to the car. I just can’t take even one more step.”
Another memorable group hike I took part in was a winter traverse of the Twins (North and South) with a side trip to Galehead thrown in for good measure. I was feeling especially strong that day and even though the trail was unbroken with maybe a foot of new snow, I did more than my share of trail breaking, frequently jumping ahead in line just so I could get back in the lead again and again. All this breaking eventually took its toll, however, and I “hit the wall” as our group of about 15 hikers was slowly making its way up the Twinway to the summit of South Twin. I went from having all the energy in the world to having spent just about every ounce of energy allotted to me for the day. The final 400 feet up to the summit were among the toughest I encountered in all my winter ascents, and we still had one more summit to go. Fortunately, after a well-deserved lunch break, I recovered enough to make the trip over and up to the summit of North Twin. From there it was all down hill, I reminded myself, and I made it out of the woods none the worse for wear.
By this time next week, winter will have officially arrived and in accordance with the standards set by winter 4,000-Footer standard bearers Miriam and Robert Underhill (more on them next week), who were the first to complete the New Hampshire 4K list in winter, the three-month dash to collect peaks in this coldest of seasons will have begun. If the past couple of winters are any indication, I’m sure there’ll be plenty of traffic in the woods and on the peaks, and the challenges will all still be great, even if the trail breaking is kept to a minimum. To all of you currently in pursuit of the winter 4,000-Footers, good luck and good snowshoeing.
