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A couple of old college buddies and I decided to hike Marcy this past Sunday. I drove up with my pal Brian and planned on staying at my buddy Nick's house in Keene. We wanted to get to sleep early but this did not occur. Let me explain. Nick lives off of Rt. 73, to approach his house you need to drive on some dirt roads and finally down a small hill. Apparently my Toyota Camry can not handle small hills with packed snow. As we were planning on scurrying off to bed to rest for our big day we realized my car was not moving from the bottom of this driveway. Instead of getting to sleep and disregarding the immobile vehicle we decided to try and get this car up the hill. The exact details do not need to be released, but after a few pulls with an old Jeep Cherokee, some pushing, swearing, Triple A, and some fine tow men from Westport; the car was pulled to safety. This information is really only necessary because after this fiasco we fell asleep at 2:30 and awoke at 4:30 ready to hike.
We were on the trail by 5:00 and still did not fully understand what our lack of sleep had to offer us. We understood .9 miles into the hike from the lodge. Our spirits were down but with tired eyes we moved forward. The trail was packed down and quite nice to hike on, much better than I anticipated.
When we reached the juncture where you can go straight up the ski/snowshoe trail or continue on the V.H. we picked the V.H. trail. This trail was not yet broken and required a great deal of work to plow through. I’m sure our 2 hours of sleep helped attribute to this great decision. After about 45 minutes of trudging, falling, taking turns leading, two guys caught up to us and said, “Oh the trail stops here?”. We politely explained to them that we were breaking trail and were rather tired and disappointed with the decision. Soon more groups caught up to us and we took turns leading. As we hiked forward more people passed us. We soon realized two hours of sleep were not sufficient for us, but more so for Brian. His claims that he was “fat and out of shape” should have been taken more seriously by Nick and I. We poked along with Brian, encouraging him to keep moving along as he expressed great concern over the men twice our age “flying past us.”
As we approached the summit Brian decided to turn around and head back claiming we would catch up. Nick and I put on our gear to attempt to summit the peak. As we were preparing many hikers came down stating they didn’t go all the way to the top because of the conditions and their lack of gear/crampons.
The ascent to the top was amazing. It was extremely windy, cold, snowy, and icy. This of course made it entirely worth it. We slowly and carefully made it to the top and exulted in our accomplishment once there. I really have never had a feeling like the one I had when I was at the top. It seemed as though I was in a different world out of a science fiction story. The cairns covered with ice were amazing to look at.
The hike down was rather uneventful and Nick may have had to wake me up when we stopped for a Clif bar break. We made it to the Camry at the lodge and saw our good pal Brian warm and cozy inside, greeting us with cheer.
All in all it was a great hike and one I won’t soon forget. Much was learned and the importance of a good nights rest was reinforced. I was really surprised by the amount of traffic on the trail. Finally, if you are still reading, I think I lost my goggles at the trailhead. If anyone found them please PM me. I’d appreciate it.
We were on the trail by 5:00 and still did not fully understand what our lack of sleep had to offer us. We understood .9 miles into the hike from the lodge. Our spirits were down but with tired eyes we moved forward. The trail was packed down and quite nice to hike on, much better than I anticipated.
When we reached the juncture where you can go straight up the ski/snowshoe trail or continue on the V.H. we picked the V.H. trail. This trail was not yet broken and required a great deal of work to plow through. I’m sure our 2 hours of sleep helped attribute to this great decision. After about 45 minutes of trudging, falling, taking turns leading, two guys caught up to us and said, “Oh the trail stops here?”. We politely explained to them that we were breaking trail and were rather tired and disappointed with the decision. Soon more groups caught up to us and we took turns leading. As we hiked forward more people passed us. We soon realized two hours of sleep were not sufficient for us, but more so for Brian. His claims that he was “fat and out of shape” should have been taken more seriously by Nick and I. We poked along with Brian, encouraging him to keep moving along as he expressed great concern over the men twice our age “flying past us.”
As we approached the summit Brian decided to turn around and head back claiming we would catch up. Nick and I put on our gear to attempt to summit the peak. As we were preparing many hikers came down stating they didn’t go all the way to the top because of the conditions and their lack of gear/crampons.
The ascent to the top was amazing. It was extremely windy, cold, snowy, and icy. This of course made it entirely worth it. We slowly and carefully made it to the top and exulted in our accomplishment once there. I really have never had a feeling like the one I had when I was at the top. It seemed as though I was in a different world out of a science fiction story. The cairns covered with ice were amazing to look at.
The hike down was rather uneventful and Nick may have had to wake me up when we stopped for a Clif bar break. We made it to the Camry at the lodge and saw our good pal Brian warm and cozy inside, greeting us with cheer.
All in all it was a great hike and one I won’t soon forget. Much was learned and the importance of a good nights rest was reinforced. I was really surprised by the amount of traffic on the trail. Finally, if you are still reading, I think I lost my goggles at the trailhead. If anyone found them please PM me. I’d appreciate it.
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