The Descendants of Noah

Observation Deck

Our great ancestor Granpa Noah once said: "Crap, will you look at all that rain!". Our brother tMail said: "It's fucking water. Who cares. I drink water and then piss it out."

Sunday, May 4, 8:30am, Irving Station at Fabyan Junction, NH across from Bretton Woods ski area. Up Jewell, to Gulfside to Alpine Garden (tapping Nelson Crag?) and then summiting via the eastern snowfields if we can see what we're doing.

At least Noah had a boat.

[Update 4/4 11pm] Pictures Are Online: tMail's here, mutha's here.

[Update 4/5 7am]:

tMail's Trip Report:

My trip reports starts Saturday...missed call from MadDog but I have a voice..."Tmail, whats up! Wanted to know what is going on tomorrow, I don't mind getting a little wet, I would really like to get out"

Think the cash register sound...Cha Ching...I call Mutha..."Hello Dan there" its Sue..."He is outside setting Vermont on fire hold on"...Mutha gets on the phone...TMAIL..."Mutha...MadDog called he wants to go hiking" Mutha says..."aaaaaa ok"...Tmail..."mutha listen going to be wet but we need to get out there test the gear...live the experience...come on we are in it together...Fuck it...we are BAD BOYS!!!!!"

I depart at 5.30am sharp and head North to meet Brother Mutha at the Irving gas station. I pull in and we each put our driver side windows down a mircomillimeter because of pouring rain and words are exchanged like "Hi" "Hi" "Its raining" "drive to trail head"..."ok"

We drive separate cars to trail head get dressed in driving rain...and pay our 5 dollars each...to park, by the way I will get that 5 bucks back at some poing in my life!!!

We hit the Jewell trail in Marmot Precip gear which I admit it keeps you dry...the pants work...and jackets clam bake...but I wore short sleeve shirt underneath and was able to wear the jacket all the way to the summit of Bad Boy. Conversation included...marathons, Gannett, tripping, mosquitos, monorail, cog rail way, guitar hero, snow pack, Great Gulf, dead people, Edgar Allan Poe, Cog Rail again...

Highlights of the trip...

Cog Railway
Getting black lung from the Cog Railway
Some guy standing on summit that rode up on the cog asking us if we were cold while he was shaking to death
A crow that flew 10 feet from my head
The Clay Loop was interesting we need to check out in summer...it reminded me of scenes from the Bible Golgotha and Mt Sinai...it seemed eerie in the fog and it was really really quiet...

Also Mutha didn't want to admit this but we baptized him with a piece of coal and mountain snow melt water...

Mutha's Trip Report:

At the Irving gas station the winds were high and the rain steady, suggesting a day to really test the rain gear. By the time we actually started out on the trail the rain was light and that was pretty much the end of it. After a clothing change at the summit we were so warm that on Clay we stripped down to base layers. Also on the summit: we found the winter-hiker summit sign-in book. It's in the alcove/entry to the Visitor Center where we often change out of the wind, just to the left of the door, mounted on the wall. It's funny I've never noticed it before.

I'd just like to go on record on this blog for making the following statement which, if we're lucky, will get googled somewhere, somehow: The Mount Washington Cog Railway is the biggest piece of shit abomination against nature and the peaceful, tranquil and pristine qualities of the Mountain. The soot, coal, acidic, sulphurous smoke is disgusting. Any tourist paying their hard-earned wages to that organization is getting ripped off and is supporting an insidious form of eco-terrorism. God Damn The Cog Railway.

Aside from the cloud of cog railway soot, the conditions were near perfect. Visibility was about 50yds and things were really calm and quiet. The following exchange on the descent from the summit was a class tMail/mutha. We were on the Jewell trail at the trail junction with the Clay Loop trail which (so you don't have to get out your maps) heads north out over Clay and meets up with the Gulfside trail, which we could then take back to Jewell, intersecting it a bit lower than where we were currently standing:

tmail: what do you want to do?
mutha: uh... [looks at watch] ... well, it's about 2pm, so i don't really care about doing Clay.
tmail: yeh, uhhhh
[we stare into the fog]
mutha: bascially, i'll follow if you want to do Clay, but if I were alone I'd just head down now.
tmail: yeh, fuck Clay.
[we stare into the fog]
mutha: you know what we could do?
tmail: what?
mutha: we could go out a bit and check out what's going on and then just come back the same way... which could be kind of dumb...
tmail: let's do it.
[not only did we head out over Clay, but we did the whole loop. it was worth it]