Anecdotes : Earning the Summit

I recently had the opportunity to summit Mount Washington in New Hampshire, and the experience brought to light a few aspects of verticality for me. It’s the tallest peak in the Northeast US, famous for its erratic weather patterns. As such, it’s been commercialized with a cog railway, auto road, visitor center and museum in order to attract tourist dollars to the park. This makes for an interesting summit experience, which is quite different than a typical mountaintop. Put simply, this is a summit you don’t have to earn by climbing up to it.

I hit the trailhead around 5:15 am, and began my ascent up Tuckerman Ravine. The weather was perfect, which is quite rare for the area. About half an hour into the hike, the first kiss of sunlight bathed the slope in an amber hue, which gave the forest a spectacular glowing quality. I continued on past the tree-line and reached the floor of the ravine a little after 7 am. The ascent up the ravine wall was wet from storms the previous night, which made for slower goings, but the brilliant early morning light more than made up for it. By the time I reached the top of the ravine, I was greeted by an amazing view back down with the sun still hanging low in the sky. At that hour, the entire mountainside was nearly empty so I was mostly alone, save for a handful of other climbers. For those couple hours that morning it felt like the mountain was letting me have this pristine weather all to myself, which made it all the more special.

From there, the path up to the summit was a vast field of rocks and boulders, with some small patches of green here and there. Pictured above is the view from the top of the ravine looking toward to the summit. This was the alpine zone, and it was a mile-long balancing dance along the tops of rocks, with the summit in sight above me. My legs were starting to burn, and I was sweating from the constant exertion. It was a simple transaction: the mountain was giving me these views and the experience of climbing her, but my body and mind had to put in a lot of work to earn it. It took me a little under an hour to make my way to the summit, and when I got there it was nothing short of surreal.

I reached the summit before the car and train traffic began to arrive, so for a time there were only a handful of fellow hikers up there with me. There were no lines to get to the summit proper, so I could walk right up to it and have the spot to myself. Our little group was taking in the moment and reveling in our accomplishment. It was quite a rare thing to be on this summit, in these conditions, without crowds surrounding us. I snapped a couple photos at the summit sign, then walked around to explore the peak a bit. The visitor center was just beginning to open as I walked onto the roof and saw the first train making it’s way up to the summit. It was awkwardly chugging along up the thin spine of tracks laid out along the slope, carrying the day’s first group of visitors. Pictured below, you can see the train making it’s ascent with the rest of the Presidential Range behind it.

About 15 minutes after I reached the summit, the calm silence was broken by the train’s obnoxiously loud horn, announcing its arrival at the summit. Shortly thereafter, the car and motorcycle traffic added a steadily-growing amount of people to the mix. The calm, serene summit experience quickly shifted into a bustling center of activity. I found a spot away from the noise and spent a few minutes there to have a snack and take in the view. I thought a lot about what it means to be in a place like this, and how the experience of verticality has been trivialized by modern technology.

Traditionally, in order to get the view I was admiring, one would have to earn it by climbing up to it. Nowadays, with modern technology, a view from a high place is seldom earned in this way. A high-rise lift in an urban tower can shuttle people thousands of feet into the air without any physical effort put forth by anyone inside. Similarly, the cog railway on Mount Washington performs the same action. Not only do these acts trivialize verticality, but over time they make it commonplace and less special for those involved. The joy and euphoria I shared with my fellow hikers before the train arrived was due to the work we put in to get there. As I sat there resting, I could feel the morning’s effort in my muscles, reminding me of what I had accomplished. I can’t imagine anyone who drove or rode to the top could share these feelings.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying I’m entitled to solitude on the summit simply because I climbed up to it. The tourist dollars generated by the train and auto road go a long way to preserving and maintaining the park as a whole, and it was great to see all kinds of people enjoying the experience of being at the summit. I love to see others enjoying the outdoors as much as I do, and for this, I say the more the merrier. Still, it’s an interesting contrast to ponder, and it occupied my thoughts for the remainder of the day.

After a few minutes of reflection at the summit, I headed down the opposite side to make my way over to Mount Monroe, pictured above with the Lake of the Clouds Hut on the right. It was around 10:30 am, so the trails were getting more crowded as more hikers made their way up. As I got to the Lake of the Clouds, I was stunned by the glassy water surface and how it perfectly reflected the dramatic landscapes surrounding it. Places like this are usually quite windy, so this was yet another reminder of how ideal the conditions were that day. Pictured below is a view at the lake looking back at Mount Washington. This is in stark contrast to my first experience at this place, which I’ve previously written about here. It was in November, and I was in near-whiteout conditions. The wind was howling, visibility was limited, and the air was icy. It was an exercise in opposites, and I felt extremely fortunate that the mountain was allowing me to see her in such a different light this time.

I continued on and made the ascent up Mount Monroe, which was a much more typical summit experience. It was a little past 11 am, and there were maybe a dozen hikers up there, chatting away and taking in the view. There was talk of different paths taken to reach the top, and plans for which paths to descend back down on. Advice was shared and photos were taken. Some hikers were familiar with the area, while others were there for the first time. We were all united by our experiences climbing to the top, however, and together our little group enjoyed the moments we had on top of the world. I sat down to have a snack and reflect on the contrasting summit experiences between Washington and Monroe. Pictured below is the view from Monroe looking south.

There’s a deep, but fleeting connection between people in places like this. Everyone is sharing the experience of verticality and the effort it took to achieve it. Had we rode a train or driven to the top, this connection wouldn’t exist. Part of the euphoria of a summit experience is being surrounded by like-minded individuals, and there’s a sort of tribalism that forms for those moments. Each of us was at that place because we were willing to put in the mental and physical effort required to get there. We’d taken various routes to reach the summit, but for those fleeting moments the mountain was collectively ours.

While on the peak, I was reminded of a previous summit experience at Mount Mansfield in Vermont the previous year. The weather was rainy and windy, so my fiancé and I decided to drive to the top rather than hike it. When we reached the parking lot near the summit, we got out, hiked around a bit, then drove back down. The weather no doubt hindered our enjoyment of the place, but something else was missing. There was no sense of accomplishment, no collective euphoria, and to be honest I remember more about the breweries we visited afterward than the summit itself. I made no transaction with the mountain that day, and got very little reward because of it. As I compared this to my experiences on Washington and Monroe, the contrast between the two really hit home for me.

After descending down Monroe, I returned to the Lake of the Clouds Hut to rest and prepare for my main descent. I left the hut around noon, and made my way along the Boott Spur trail. The photo at the top of this post is from this trail, looking back at Mount Washington and Tuckerman Ravine. It was the best view of her I’d had all day, and it felt like she was giving me one last gift before we parted ways. The summit of Mount Washington is well-known as having the worst weather in the US, but you’d never know it from that day. For the 12 hours I was on her, she gave me one of the most unforgettable experiences of my life. As I made my way back to the trailhead, my body burned with fatigue. It would continue to do so for days afterward, acting as a reminder of the transaction made between man and mountain that day.

Looking back, I don’t believe I could’ve had that experience if I didn’t earn it. Even with the ideal conditions, it would’ve been similar to my experience on Mount Mansfield. Drive up, snap some pictures, enjoy the view, and drive back down. There would’ve been no relationship developed with the mountain, and no transaction would’ve been made.

It also made clear to me why people climb mountains. It gives us the ability to achieve verticality, which is accompanied by immense pleasure and a sense of accomplishment, shared with like-minded individuals who also put in the the effort to achieve it. For mountaineers, it’s a source of pure joy, as legendary climber George Mallory puts it:

If you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won't see why we go. What we get from this adventure is just sheer joy. And joy is, after all, the end of life.

Read about my first experience climbing Mount Washington here.