Climbing Hurricane Mt.

Friday, October 4, 2013

I’d woken many times through the night, but as light was starting to dominate the morning sky, decided it was time to pack up and head for the diner.  It was 6:30 a.m.

I’d just begun rolling up my bag when Paul’s Toyota pulled into the lot.  He drove over and parked next to me.

“Did you sleep at all last night?” I asked.

“Yeah…stopped for a few hours a little ways from here and nodded off,” he said.

He doesn’t seem to need much sleep; one of his many abnormalities.  I packed and we drove to Noon Mark where I had a ham and cheese omelet and looked over the map to determine our climbing destination for the day.

“I’d like to tackle Sawteeth, but its 15 miles round trip and 2,500 feet of elevation change.  I don’t know if my hip can take that, but more importantly, I don’t want to climb it if there isn’t going to be a view,” I said.

My biggest concern was the weather report.  We were looking at a 30% chance of rain, which could mean none at all, but often meant foggy conditions and limited views.  Sawteeth was renowned for its fabulous views and I didn’t want to spend an entire day on the trail only to be looking at pea soup from the summit.  The pain in my hip I felt I could deal with.

We drove from the diner to the trail head for Round Pond; our camping destination.  It was a short hike – about 25 minutes – but a wonderfully secluded camping area seldom used and offering complete serenity.  We saw a notice posted at the trailhead indicating that a hiker from Mass., Scott Haworth, was missing.  He’d parked his car and signed the trailhead book at this location on August 30^th and never been seen again.  It said that he often hiked alone.  If he came to this trailhead, he may have been headed for the Dix Mt. wilderness area and been doing some bushwhacking to visit the four peaks above 4,000 feet.  If he did and managed to get lost, I suspect he will never be found.  The area is too vast and once off trail, practically impossible to travel.  Few people do unless skilled with map and compass and plenty of time to burn.  The undergrowth is so tangled and thick that traveling through it takes extreme patience and caution.  I avoid it at all costs.

We arrived on the pond to find our site empty and quickly pitched our tent, loaded in our sleeping gear, put up the rain fly, and headed back to the car.  On the hike back, I decided that between my hip and the overcast conditions, I’d forgo a trip to Sawteeth and climb a lesser peak, Hurricane Mt.  It was a good choice because it had a clear summit with, on a clear day, tremendous views east of Lake Champlain and the Green Mts. of Vermont.  It had a 2,000 foot elevation change in a 2.6 mile hike, so would prove to be challenging, as well.  We hiked about half a mile and were crossing a bog when the first drops began to fall.  We both put our cameras in the day pack and I congratulated myself on the decision not to head for Sawteeth.  The trail would become slippery from the rain and with the leaves that had already fallen, additionally hazardous.  Not a good day for a 15-mile climb.

We reached the summit in a little less than 2 hours and spent almost an hour on top.  It had an aging, unused fire tower, which Paul climbed in spite of the missing steps.  The views were decent, though clouds blocked most of the lake and the Vermont mountains.  I’d broken a vigorous sweat on the climb, which meant I began to cool quickly in the wind and from the cooler temperatures on top.  I know how quickly hypothermia can kick in, so I hunkered down behind a large boulder and had some lunch.  We were alone on the peak, but met some other hikers on our way down, reaching the car in about the same time it took to climb.

Since it was too early to return to our campsite, we drove to Lake Placid and visited the historical site of John Brown’s Adirondack farm.  His wife was living there when he conducted his ill-fated attempt at Harper’s Ferry in 1859.  After dinner at Noon Mark and some site-seeing in Lake Placid, headed back to the trailhead into Round Pond.  It was 9 p.m. and pitch black.  We walked in with head lamps, discussing that if they both went out, we’d be unable to take another step and would have to sleep on the side of the trail.  We would have returned in daylight and scoured the woods for firewood and sat around a fire for several hours, but since the rain was falling this was not an option.  The forecast for Saturday was more of the same, so climbing options would be limited again.

Hike duration:  Five hours.

Training Heart Rate:  90-140 bpm.
Calories burned during workout:  2500.