My White Mountain Emotional Rollercoaster: Part Five, Pierce

Note: This post describes events that occurred on August 7, 2023.

The night before, as I was getting ready to sleep, I heard hikers arriving in the fading light. The headlamp of the caretaker shone into my tent as he guided these hikers to the overflow area just beyond my platform. I got up to pee and saw four tents being pitched nearby. The next morning, I got up around 7:00 and all of the tents were gone. These thru-hikers were so dedicated to progress that I didn’t even see them: they arrived when I was in bed and left before I got up.

I looked up the weather for the day. There were increasing winds and a chance of thunderstorms forecast for later that day. It looked even worse tomorrow. I felt pressured by the weather report to try to get a move on. I wondered if I would have to finish the whole traverse today. The thought made me anxious. I got packed up and headed to the cooking area to make breakfast.

As I was heading out, a couple entered the space and began making breakfast. They asked me if I was thru-hiking. Unexpectedly, my emotions got the best of me and I found myself saying yes through tears. I apologized for my emotional outburst and explained that I was nervous about getting through the Presidentials. I was worried about needing to outrun the weather but being too slow. One of the hikers was very reassuring. She said they covered that stretch the day before and it was fine. She said it was easy to get to Lakes of the Clouds hut, and I should focus on getting there and then making a decision. She was encouraging, saying if I made it this far I could definitely handle what was ahead. They asked how far I had come and I told them it was around 800 miles. They said I would be fine, look how far I’ve come! I thanked them for their kindness and headed out.

I was embarrassed by the exchange, but I felt I couldn’t help it. The White Mountains were really stressing me out. I didn’t believe them that the trail was easy because I knew to stop trusting subjective trail reports like that. But as I made my way to the next hut, I found they were right. I summitted Pierce, which was easy going as far as White Mountains are concerned. Then I followed the Appalachian Trail around, not over, the summit of Eisenhower, thinking to myself that this must be the first time we could have gone over a peak and didn’t. The Crawford path was relatively flat and sandy, gently ascending to the hut. The path brought me above treeline, where the wind was stronger and the trail more exposed. It was manageable for now, but I imagined any stronger winds would make for very difficult walking. After bypassing another peak, Monroe, I arrived at the hut.

I first helped myself to some free breakfast leftovers and then approached a member of the croo at the reception area to ask about the weather. I said something like, “This is kind of embarrassing, but I’m not sure if it is ok to continue up Washington given the current weather, what do you advise?” To which she responded, “There are 80 mph gusts in the forecast for this afternoon, I don’t think that sounds good!” She advised me that I could try for work-for-stay in a few hours. I expressed concern about the weather for tomorrow, which was forecast to have winds gusting up to 100 mph. I asked if there were restrictions on multi-night stays. She said they typically don’t allow it, but assured me that if the weather was terrible, they wouldn’t kick me out. I could stay.

The croo member did mention the option of going to town. There was a blue blaze that would take me off the mountain. It was steep but not exposed after the first half mile. The thought of adding additional tough and steep terrain to my already difficult trek was not very appealing. I wouldn’t go hungry at the hut, so it didn’t matter that I didn’t bring a bunch of extra food. If I went to town, I could shower and do laundry, which would be nice, but wasn’t necessary. A town stay would be more expensive than staying put. It just made sense to stay, so that’s what I planned to do.

I perused the bookshelf in the dining area and to my delight, found my favorite books! I was stoked to have a legitimate reason to spend more time digging into these. I spent my afternoon continuing to read the alpine field guide I had been working through the day before. As the afternoon wore on, the sunny weather quickly transitioned to wind and drizzly rain. We were in a cloud, with no visibility out the hut windows. I was glad to have such a nice shelter. Eventually I found myself wanting to read a story, and I picked up a book I had been meaning to read for some time, The Unlikely Thru-Hiker. I really enjoyed it and continued to read for the rest of the afternoon and evening, getting about halfway through the book.

That night, I was one of three thru-hikers staying at the hut, and the only NOBO. I supposed that this was probably due to the bad weather. Most hikers probably decided to go to town instead of staying on trail. That meant that I had no competition for my first work-for-stay, which I easily secured at 4:00 p.m. After dinner was served to the paying guests, I scrubbed out some charred drippings in the oven and swept the kitchen. In exchange, I ate salad, honey mustard chicken, and lemon cake. It was a delicious spread, and I was satisfied with the arrangement, although I ended up eating and going to bed later than I normally would. Lights were out at 9:00 p.m., but some guests lingered at the tables playing cards by the light of their headlamps. I ended up setting up my sleeping pad in the dining area around 9:30 and drifting to sleep soon after.