The tallest mountain in England, Scafell, is 3,209 feet above sea level. By contrast, there are 48 mountains in New Hampshire that are over 4,000 feet. There is an unofficial club of people who like to climb all 48, and right from the word go, I knew I wanted to be a member of this club. I've signed up to a couple of hiking groups online, but haven't quite got up the courage (or in the case of the winter hikers, got enough experience/crampons) to go. So with the arrival of my long time hiking buddy Matt (see http://walkingtheleedscountryway.blogspot.com/), it was time to start the journey.
We spent some time researching our options for today's hike. We ruled out anything that was rated difficult or above, and were surprised to find that not one 4,000 footer is marked as anything less than moderate on most websites. After a recommendation from a family friend, we eventually decided on Osceola, reported to have amazing views from the top and measuring in at 4,315 feet. Matt, as always, downloaded a map and spent some time creating "Walkbot" which would help us find our route and give us useful stats on elevation and distance.
It was meant to be a simple 4 hour hike (2 up, 2 down), so we set off at 6am to try and catch the cooler morning sunshine ("we" also include my mother-in-law. Our previous hiking experience together included hot pastrami pizza before a noon hike, so things could only get better). A beautiful drive ensued, including going over the Kancamangus pass in glorious clear sunshine. We arrived on time to start at 8 and started to walk. It was at this point that Matt mentioned that we had 2.5 miles to the first peak, then a simple ridge walk to Osceola, coming in around 3.5 miles. This sounded like a long distance to cover in 4 hours, but we were already en route at this point.
The first 1.5 miles or so were delightful. The land rolled slowly upwards, meandering across small streams and halved tree trunks served as wide tight ropes to help us cross some of the boggier parts. At this point, our moderate hike became strenuous. The gradient sharply increased, and Matt became quickly introduced to why New Hampshire is known as the Granite State - there were rocks everywhere! We had to scramble, climb and stretch ourselves up the hill, to the point where we decided that if you didn't have to use your hands to climb, it wasn't "up". The glimpses of the Presidential range and the cool breezes made it fun, and we took many breaks to allow the lactic acid to break down and our heart rates to relax.
After a good hour of this, we reached East Peak, 4,156 feet in elevation. This we discovered meant that today was going to be a double bagger (i.e. getting two 4,000 peaks for the price of one hike), which suddenly made the sweaty t-shirt and lack of lunch more bearable. However, East Peak definitely falls under the category of "peak bagging", mountains that have poor or no view, but still measure over 4,000 so you need to tick them off. We discovered that the simple route that we had planned to go wouldn't have taken us to East Peak, so I'm very glad that we don't have to revisit it, as it's simply a cairn in the middle of some woods, with no view worthy of the name. After a quick photo stop, we were on our way to Matt's "ridge walk".
The map Matt had downloaded was a bit fuzzy as you zoomed in, which meant that it was hard to work just how many contour lines we would need to cover. The answer, as we crossed the saddle from East Peak to Osceola, was many. There was around 500 feet of descent, followed by 800 feet of climbing, including The Chimney, a vertical rock climbing experience (but with some easy hand and foot holds, so it was more exciting than dangerous). However, the ridge part was a great description, and the feeling of walking on the top of the world with the wind in your face and views glimpsed through the trees on both sides is one that isn't easily forgotten.
By the time we reached the peak of Osceola, we were in need of a break, and what a place to have one. You get around 220 degrees of view (according to websites) and the sheer height of the peak means that the sides drop away steeply, leaving you with a slight sense of vertigo. We were able to see for miles, and unlike similar views in the UK's Lake District, where you know that over the next hill lies a big town and more people, here you just know that you'll just get more of the same view of big mountains and trees. It's a view that I'll never get bored of, and it just boggles my mind every time that the whole state is one massive forest, but it's one of the smallest states in the nation and that America just goes on for miles and miles.
The walk down was tough to say the least. Our legs were still feeling the burn from the exertions of the climb, and some of the rock formations that we had to climb down were scarier than when we went up. The comment that we made the most was "how on earth did we climb up this?!". We were much quicker coming down (3 hours to the peak, 2.15 to the bottom) but we were all still pretty tired and sweaty as we arrived in the carpark. For the toughness of the hike, the view at the top more than justified the effort involved, and I'm delighted that I've started my 48 club collection with not one, but two peaks. I'm already starting to plan how many I can check off while the weather is still good enough!
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