Miles hiked: 15 miles in 9:55
Start: Lake of the Clouds Hut, NH
Finish: Pinkham Notch, Route 16, NH
Elevation gain: 4,806'
Finally the day to summit Mt. Washington was at hand. I skipped waiting for breakfast leftovers and just had a coffee and a Clif bar and headed out and up.
At the summit, the winds were brutal, although the sun was shining brightly. At one point on my descent, a very strong gust sent me flying and I struggled to get my right leg to break my fall. As it turned out, I strained my quad and hurt my knee, but didn't really notice it until much later in the day.
Yahoo! Only 332 miles to Katahdin.
One Presidential mountain after another. Fortunately, the AT does not summit all of them.
Looking back at Mt. Washington from Madison; that's the toll road winding its way to the summit.
The descent off Madison showed me just how injured I was--I could barely use my right leg, and the Osgood Trail was just miserable--tons of above tree line rock scrambling and when it finally was below tree line, it was very steep.
At times I seriously wondered if I might have to stop and take a long rest. I managed to finish without stopping, but knew that tomorrow would have to be a Zero day, a bit of a bummer.
Route from my Suunto.
Officially, peak winds were 81 mph and average 39. Two days earlier peak was 101 and average 58, so it could have been worse
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