Adventure on Mt. Marcy

As some of you may know, my mom is a highpointer.

If you don't know, that means that she attempts to climb/hike/walk/meander her way to the highest point in each state. I've had the pleasure of accompanying her on several of her highpointing adventures, including Mt. Washington NH (climb), Mt. Mansfield VT (climb), Mt. Frissell CT (hike), and Jeromith Hill RI (meander). I also drove to the top of Mt. Greylock in Massachusetts to pick her up, but I don't get to count that as my own high point since I didn't make the hike. Instead I paid an outrageous fee for parking and took a nap in the sun while she and Susanna raced up the trail to meet me. (I rather preferred my method...)

Mt.Marcy is New York's highest point, located in the lovely Adirondacks. Mom's hope was to summit it while Seth and I were still living in VT, so she would have a place to rest after the hike, and of course, so she could see Vermont and our newly pleasant little house one last time.

We scheduled the hike for Memorial Day weekend, thinking it was our last long weekend in New England, and assuming that surely, at that late date the mountain would be winter free. We booked a suite at a lovely Bed and Breakfast in Keene Valley and watched with growing concern as the uncommonly cold spring (late winter might be a more appropriate phrase) refused to loosen its grip.

The trail to the summit of Mt. Marcy was described to me as a 15-16 mile round trip. That seemed like a lot, especially since the summit trail to Mt. Washington was shorter and I barely made that. A 15-16 mile meander along dirt paths might be one thing, but this was a 15-16 mile hike up and down a mountain. I was rather afraid of not making it. Given my tendency towards sit down strikes, I was desperately worried that I would spoil everything and we wouldn't make the summit. Mom would have to come back another time because I wasn't hardy enough, and we would have wasted a bunch of money, time and energy in a failed attempt. (I knew all too well that my failure would stick, and gnaw at me forever.) I did two things to prepare myself and make sure this wouldn't happen. I started doing Crossfit workouts with Seth to get in shape, and I made sure I summited Camel's Hump to clear out all of my sit down strike karma.

Two weeks before our scheduled summit on Saturday May 25, Mom checked the whether and declared that it was rainy and cold. "That's good though," she said, "because its sure to change between now and then." Change it did! Mom and I checked the weather every day. We checked it for Lake Placid, we checked it for Keene Valley, we checked it for the summit elevation of Mt. Marcy, and we checked if for the mid-point elevation of Mt. Marcy. I think it was different every day, it was different even between locations, and it was different between Mom's source (Accuweather) and mine (weather.com). As Saturday May 25th drew near, the weather took a lousy turn for the worse. The line of severe storms that caused the first tornados in Oklahoma were set to arrive in the Adirondacks Friday night. It was going to rain, snow, and gust from Friday to Monday.

Then it actually changed again, and the severe storms hit the Adirondacks and the Green Mountains on Thursday night. There was so much rain that there were flash flood warnings all across the region, and many people awoke on Friday morning to find basements flooded, bridges out, and roads impassible.

This certainly didn't help my fears of failure, but I was hopeful anyway. Perhaps, since the storms came early they would blow right on through and Saturday May 25th would be sunny! Seth and I had each taken half days so that we could leave in the early afternoon, take Thunder to his sitters (thanks Robin and Thom!), and hop over the lake in time to meet Mom for dinner. That didn't work out exactly. We left late, had detours on the way (flooded bridges), and when we were 20 minutes from the house, I realized I had forgotten my hiking boots. (Doh!) Not a very auspicious start.

Finally around 7:15 or so we reached the B&B, where Mom had already found our room and was napping until we came. She had instructed us to call her when we got there so we didn't have to bother the owners and she would just come get us. When we got there I realized I didn't have any cell phone reception! We walked in the front door thinking that maybe someone would be around and could tell us where our room was, or maybe Mom had already woken up and was waiting for us.

Silence. The whole inn was completely shrouded in silence. We tiptoed around the front entry room looking at guest books and comment cards, and found a Check-In sheet that listed COHEN in the Hurricane Suite and even listed directions to our room! I was totally awe-struck. We arrived and made our way to the room without talking to anyone at all! It was miraculous! Presumably not all hotels and inns can rely on people to be intelligent enough to check themselves in, but I was delighted none-the-less. We settled in with Mom in the Hurricane Suite, and went out into the torrential rain to find dinner.

Mom had called to the High Peaks Info Center at the trail head to find out about current mountain conditions. They told her that Saturday was expected to bring 60 mph sustained winds on the summit, 6 inches of new snow, and below freezing temperatures all day. They didn't recommend that anyone hike Marcy at all that weekend. We discussed the weather over dinner, and decided that we would not be hiking on Saturday May 25th after all. On Saturday, we would see how Sunday May 26th and Monday May 27th were shaping up.

On Saturday we went down to breakfast, ate way too much delicious food, and then Mom and I left Seth in the silence of the inn to study for his big exam which was coming up. It was still raining in torrents, and we weren't quite sure what to do with ourselves. We went to some lovely Adirondack shops where I splurged on an Adirondack throw that came with a leather carrier. It seemed so perfectly Adirondack that I had to have it! I was struck with indecision about which throw to get, but that quickly passed. We drove up towards Lake Placid in the hopes of seeing the Olympic high jumps that still launch into the horizon. As we got closer to Lake Placid it started snowing!

We came back to the inn for a late lunch with Seth, and then invented a new card game - 2 person Liverpool Rummy. We had to change the rules a bit to allow the game to move and flow with only two people, and to make it challenging enough with only two people. We had great fun sitting in front of a roaring fire and playing cards in the silence and comfort of the Inn's "living room."

When we checked the weather, Sunday was supposed to still be drizzly, and though the weather on top of Mt. Marcy looked better - only 40 mph gusts today and no new snow - Monday's forecast looked downright glorious. Sunny with highs in the 60s, or 30s on top of the mountain, and gusts of only 20 mph! We decided that we had to hike Monday, which would put us in a bit of a rush to hike and drive back to Vermont on the same day, but the difference in the weather was worth it.

Sunday (after another delicious and stuffing breakfast) Mom and I visited John Brown's Farm, went for a short walk on their trails, did some more window shopping, and then went back to the Inn to collect Seth and go for a proper dinner at a place called "The Hungry Trout" up by Whiteface Mountain and ski resort. Wow. I have never had such delicious fish! Then we explored the Adirondack Flume which was raging just outside our windows. We didn't spend too much time though, we needed a good night's sleep for our big hike!

Monday morning we woke before dawn. We had a 35-40 minute drive to the trailhead and we needed to be heading up the mountain as early as we could. We had a hikers breakfast scheduled at the Inn for 5am. (This was the first day that Seth and I met one of the owners, who knew of our intentions and was happy that we finally had good weather!) We might have had a secondary motive for getting an early start, which was that if we left early enough there might not be anyone there to tell us we couldn't. There wasn't. There was another car there with some other crazies getting ready to head up as well, but they didn't try to stop us! We signed in at the trailhead documenting our hopes and fears in one word: SUMMIT??

Our first destination was Marcy Dam and we got to it quickly. We took a  quick look about and kept going. Soon (too soon) we hit snow. First it was just little patches here and there, then it covered things, then it was everywhere, and suddenly we were falling into our knees with every step. After an hour or so of such trudgery we were falling into our thighs with every step.

Lord have mercy this mountain kicked our butts. Ankle, knee then thigh deep snow, downed trees everywhere slowed our progress and wore us out. Our feet were freezing from being under piles of snow all day. After a while we reached a steep rocky section, which was only nice because the rocks provided somewhere we could sit and eat lunch.  We even propped our feet up on other rocks and let them sit in the sun a bit. Then we had to keep on goin'. Soon we crossed Marcy Creek! Yes! That means we're semi-sortof close, maybe! Or maybe not. We just kept going without seeming to get anywhere.

I was not going to let this mountain beat me. I had reached an unreasonable and unsafe state of mind and probably would not have turned around for anything unless we got to the summit first. Mom was not going to miss this high point, there was no other time to do it! I was not going to have a sit down strike. I was an energizer bunny of unreasonable mountain climbing. Mom and Seth both made valid and totally sensible arguments for turning around at various points, but I kept myself well enough ahead of them on the trail so that they had to keep going. Finally at some point we reached a little flat section where we could see out towards other mountains. A view! How nice! Then we popped out in a little clearing where we could see the summit. It looked sooo far away. We were going soooo slowly.

We decided on a definite turn back time. If we hadn't summited by 2pm we had to turn around or face darkness and potentially getting lost in the woods. We didn't want to do that. We had to turn around by 2.

Next we hit an interminable section of steep, straight, trail. This section was pure agony. The snow was at its deepest, but the trees around us were just scrubby evergreens so we were out in full sun. Not only was the snow slushy but the bottom layer was really really wet. When your boot shot through it was miserable. It was also straight, so you could see exactly how far to the next turn, and how slowly you seemed to be not getting there. The big doozy was that we could see the summit. It was winding in and out of view, and not getting any closer.

On one of these straight-a-ways Mom decided to ditch her backpack. Her pack was the heaviest, and her back was aching. She stowed it on the side of the trail and we kept going, now she was free and light and faster than ever.

Finally, finally we reached a little rocky outcrop. This was the beginning of the summit. It was so amazing to walk on stable ground after all that time! Seth took his stabilicers off and stowed his pack on the side of the trail too. We alternated between rock and ice covered snowdrifts. We had to crawl over those, dispersing our weight so as not to fall into chest or shoulder deep snow! Finally I shed my pack too. A little more climbing and we were at the summit! The wind was howling and fiercely cold. It was 2:15, past our mandatory turn around time, but we took a few minutes to snap proof of our success and explore the summit area. Soon we realized we were turning into icicles in the wind and bolted back down the rocks.

We reached my pack, hooray! There's Seth's pack, hooray! The snow now was even slushier after spending the day basking in the sun. The river of melted snow running downhill under the snow was deeper, and with every step our feet fell through into ankle deep icey water.

There's Mom's pack, what progress!

Then the real horrors began. Seth reported that he couldn't feel his feet, and he stumbled and fell down the trail unable to move his toes to try to balance himself as we plodded through the snow and ice water. I began to fear that his feet were going to be frost bitten and totally unusable for the rest of his life, and it would be all my fault for pushing everyone and forcing the summit. Mom gave him her poles and he relied on those for balance adjustments. Our legs were feeling rubbery and I wasn't sure how much longer we could keep going downhill. One nice thing was that we had met a trail crew on our way down, which meant all the blown down trees had been chopped up and cleared from the trail. So at least we didn't have to climb over and under tree trunks. We found evidence of their passing in sections covered in wood chips and tree branches strewn about on the sides of the trails. We took to referring to these as tree massacrees.

When we finally reached Marcy Dam we didn't even stop to look. We had to get off that mountain and eat. We still had to drive home to Vermont and even pick Thunder up before we could go to sleep. We tried several times on the way down to call Robin and Thom, who were watching Thunder, and at least let them know we'd either be late, or if they didn't mind we'd be there in the morning! We could never get reception though, and were stuck worrying all the way down. After the dam things were quite pleasant. If we could forget our exhaustion long enough to appreciate the setting sun filtering through the pine trees, the smell of mud and dirt and pine sap permeating the air, the birds in the trees celebrating the spring weather, we could almost pretend we were out for a pleasant after dinner Memorial Day hike!

About 2 miles from the parking lot I totally lost steam. I didn't think we would ever finish. I thought my legs would give out with each step. Mom and Seth assured me that we were "almost there." Unfortunately I've come to understand that both of them are willing to lie to my face to boost my spirits. This tactic drives me particularly crazy, and I've come to understand the phrase "we're almost there" to mean "we're no where close to being done, but I know you can do it, please don't be mad at me." At this point Seth gave ME the walking sticks and I was really depending on them towards the end!

Several we're-almost-theres later we finally were there. Back at the trailhead and ready to sign out. SUMMIT?? was replaced by SUMMIT!! and we noted our times. We had checked in at almost exactly 7am, and it was now almost exactly 8pm. It had taken us 13 hours to climb this mountain! We drove back to get Mom's car, then stopped at the closest open restaurant we could find, had huge steak dinners and then headed back for Vermont.

Luckily this time we didn't have another high point scheduled, we were able to spend the entire week relaxing with crossword puzzles and good company, enjoying the fact that Mom could cross Mt. Marcy off of her list!

For Mom's side of the story and pictures, visit her blog here: http://www.carollander.blogspot.com/