Built To Roam: Seek The Peak: Wanderlust's 1st Anniversary

Last Saturday, July 21 marked the one year anniversary of Wanderlust. Over the past year I have written and photographed over thirty hikes, logging a total of one hundred and four miles (also a few hikes that haven't been posted yet). I am excited to continue writing this blog and I'm grateful for all the support I've received over the past year, whether it be through reading along, complements and encouragement, and especially to all of the people who have come with me and agreed to my crazy, semi dangerous, and sometimes last minute plans. If it wasn't for you I wouldn't be able to write this blog or experience the places I've hiked to, so thank you. And please, please continue to let me drag you on trips. Special shout out to Nicole, Mark and Mike M. for being the top three hikers in that order, thanks guys!

Seek the Peak

In order to celebrate the one year anniversary of Wanderlust I decided to participate in the Mount Washington Observatory's yearly Hike-a-Thon to raise money for the non-profit organization. Basically the goal is to have people sponsor your hike to the top of Mount Washington where the observatory is located, by donating money which will go to benefit the organization. An individual is required to raise a minimum of $200 to participate in the event, and i'm excited to say that in the 7 days I spent fundraising, a total of $285 was raised, so huuuuuuge thank you to everyone who donated to help me reach this goal. My final total, and donors names can be found here, and more information on the observatory and the Hike-a-Thon can be found here. Also a big thanks to Mark for agreeing to hike with me, and even though he did complain and threaten to kill me more than a dozen times, I was glad to have him along.

We headed up to New Hampshire on Friday night during rush hour traffic which was one of the best decisions I've made in a wile. We pulled into the campsite in Shelburne, NH at around 10 pm and started setting up camp. After a short side trip to get Subway which resulted in us getting locked out of the campground until a half cocked dude let us in, we headed to bed to get some sleep before the big hike. At 6,288 feet, Mount Washington is the tallest mountain in the Northeastern United States and is home to some of the world's worst weather. We started up the mountain at 8:30am intending to take the Lion's Head Trail up to the summit and Tukerman's Ravine Trail on the way down. Seek the Peak doesn't require a set time or specific route to take up the mountain, just that you hike (or attempt to hike) to the top and back down again, and hopefully finish by 4pm in order to attend the after party and dinner. We powered up most of the mountain by around 11, with just the final Head Wall to go. Hiking at this point was on loose rock piled on top of more loose ass rock and my legs started to hate me making the pace slow down considerably. Usually when you are struggling up the side of a mountain, or maybe it's just for me, it seems like everyone who passes you is either a skipping eight year old kid or a smiling old man, which of course makes me beyond pleased. But I sucked it up and made the final push for the summit around 11:30 only to be greeted by a parking lot full of jorts and sandle wearing sons of bitches running around like a scene from a Richard Scarry show. Mount Washington is an unusual summit due to the amount of development located on the peak and the multple ways of transportation up the mountain, and while this does take away from the solitude and gratification that usually accompanies summiting a mountain, it's still a great experience and the views are world class. After eating lunch and and stealing some shitty cookies from the Mount Washington Observatory tour we headed back down the mountain, taking the Tukerman's Ravine trail this time. Tuckerman's ravine Trail heads down exactly that, a ravine, and it was nothing short of steep and brutal on the knees. on the way down we met a 39 year old dude who was hiking Mt. Washington four times in one day in celebration of his 40th birthday, which is completely insane considering it took me (a pretty alrightly in shape 26 year old) 7 1/2 hours to do it once. Four miles down the side of a steep mountain is way longer than you would expect when every step destroys your legs just a little bit more. By the time our limping bodies had made it back to the parking lot that dude had passed us a total of 3 seperate times, and as if that wasn't embarassing enough, when I went to shake his hand on one of his pass by's I tripped and he said "Careful there guy, wouldn't want you to get hurt.". I'm a moron. But we finished just shy of four o'clock and headed over to the after party to check out the vendor tents, get some swag and eat a giant meal. After filling a bag and my stomach full of stuff I didn't need, we sat back and "enjoyed" the band and prize drawings. It was at this point when our tiredness and soreness culminated into a 10 minute laughing fit over an older dude with a Santa like beard who, western grip or not, couldn't get a wooden fence stake out of the ground, and screamed "Fucken!". Needless to say, hilarious. We got in the car and headed home around 7:30 pm, finishing off a great weekend. Thanks again to everyone who donated, I completely appreciate it. I'm gonna need someone to hike it with me next year because I sure as hell don't think I can convince Mark to do it with me again. Cheers.

Mileage: 9 Miles