Last Saturday, Jamie and I [Brett] were back on the hill! The weather was great, 80’s at the visitor center and low 50’s at the summit. If anything, it was TOO HOT! Jamie left the visitor center, with minimal gear and regular hiking boots, around 7:30am with 6 of the 8 expected climbers. I wandered aimlessly around the Visitor’s Center until 8:15am looking for the two climbers that had yet to arrive. Upon no avail and contemplating whether or not to purchase some shorts in the Visitor’s Center [I didn’t, although I wish I had], I started up the trail to catch up with the group.

Within the 45 minutes between the time Jamie and crew departed the Visitor’s Center and the time I followed at least 300 people were swarming the parking lot, fields, and buildings. I noticed that many of them were speaking french, which isn’t uncommon since many Canadian climbers come to the states to climb Mt. Washington. It was a little peculiar because approximately 90% of the people on the trail were Canadian and there were A LOT more people that past weekends with similar weather forecasts. Soon after we broke tree line, I realized that the following Monday was a canadian holiday; they had a three-day weekend and with the fantastic weather forecast it was a perfect excuse for them to visit the states! Ah-ha!

Jamie and 4 climbers summited around 12:30am. Congrats guys! At the summit, they encountered the zoo. The Adam’s summit building and the auto road had opened for the first weekend of the year and the cog railway was in full operation. This always brings huge numbers to the summit. They were greeted by a hundred people or so as they attempted to tag the summit sign and get a celebratory picture. Their persistence, determination and effort was rewarded by being cut in line for pictures by hot dog scarfing tourists who drove or rode to the summit in the railway. WOOHOO! This doesn’t diminish the accomplishment but puts a slight stain on the memory.

I climbed to Lion’s Head, where I turned around with 1 climber and pointed out the trail and the potential hazards to the other so that he could proceed to the summit. He is an avid geo cacher, has plenty of hiking experience and had all the way points in his gps. With the great weather forecast and amount of people on the trail, I felt compelled to send him alone. We made a plan so that when he met up with Jamie and the others on their descent, he would take their radio so that we could remain in contact as he pushed to the summit and down. This worked out to perfection. Dave summited around 2pm and radioed in every time he reached a prominent landmark. Thanks for being diligent with your communication Dave! It made our [his wife and my] stress levels minimal.

Since Judy and I were down before the rest, we hopped in my car and drove to the local convenient store to purchase a few six packs so that we could surprise and have an unexpected treats for the others when they returned…they were grateful and man, did that beer taste good! All in all it was a fantastic day and we hope to see you all again [maybe next winter when the temperatures aren’t so hot?]!

The weather forecast was pretty grim for Saturday April 28th and I was scheduled to climb Mt. Washington with one climber. Cloudy, -30 wind chills, and 65 mph winds. We headed out to stick our noses into it and see what the mountain would allow us to do. Mike is a Scuba Diving Instructor from Connecticut and a fit one at that. He is starting his training for his second marathon in D.C. and what a way to do it than climbing Mt. Washington in the winter. It may be flowers and butterflies in Massachusetts but Mt. Washington is holding onto its notorious winter weather. We skipped over our normal first break and pushed straight onto the second break. Here we took 10 minutes to get a snack and water before we pushed onto Lions Head. We reached Lions Head at 10AM.. about an hour and half earlier than normal! We felt great and kept the pace across the Alpine Garden which, wouldn’t you know it, was windy as usual.. 25mph sustained with 45mph gusts. I was surprised at how much snow there was on the trail, which we had to break because we were the first to go up since the summit received 5″ of powder. The climb to split rock was slow going due to knee deep powder. We didn’t see another soul on the mountain until we began our trek down. The clouds parted as we crested the summit which gave us an amazing view as a reward. Then the clouds closed in as fast as they cleared. This continued throughout our 30 minute stay on top. It took us 4.5 hours to the summit. Depending where you stood, the wind was 30mph – 60mph. We got the full experience of Mt. Washington on this day! The descent took another 3.5 hours only taking 1 leisurely break and a few smaller ones to adjust our clothing. All in all it was a great day, setting our new guiding record of fastest climb all the while in great company! Thanks for a great climb Mike!

Sunday, we were rock climbing with Paul and Amelia! First time rock climbers and we are pumped that they chose NEM to show them a good time. We climbed a number of routes and their forearms still haven’t forgiven them fully for the 4 hours of work. It was a fantastic day to be out there…and everyone else must have agreed because it was busy! Folks were climbing just about every major route on the cliff. We’re looking forward to Paul and Amelia’s return to tackle some unfinished business on the end crag.

Hey gang, it’s Jamie your friendly NEM guide fresh from the land of the pine trees and hipsters, Portland,OR. I arrived in Portland late Thursday night where my friend, and long time climbing partner Dave Newton was waiting. After a short discussion on what we had been up too on the drive, we hit the sack for the night. The next day we started planning our assault on Mt. Hood. After packing and a quick run to Fred Meyers ( A west coast Wal-mart) for some groceries we were on our way to the mountain.
Dave and I had originally planned to climb the Devil’s Kitchen headwall so our packs were heavy to say the least. After a few hour hike to around 9,000 ft. We dug out camp and set our tent. Shortly followed by a hot tea and a broken tooth at the hands of a frozen snickers bar. After our late night snack, we turned in for the night for our 2 am wake-up. We woke up early to here the sounds of a very feisty mountain indeed. The sounds of constant avalanches and ice fall rocketing down at us like bullets. We made the Hogsback at roughly 10,500 ft. our summit for the day.
We spent the next day hanging out around Portland and trying some amazing food and micro-brews. The night before our second attempt while having a couple brews with Dave’s long time friend Simon we had thought we had scooped up another climber for our ascent on Mt. Hood. After a couple of hours talking and checking out some of Simons motorcycles, we thought he was in. Unfortunately, Simon had a few too many the night before summit day so he had to pass on this round.
We headed to the Timberline lodge (were the outside shots of the Shining were filmed) once again and spent the night in the car in the parking lot. We woke up around 2:30 am for our alpine style push on Mt. Hood. We came out of the gate at just short of a run up the mountain. After about an hour and a half or so we reached the top of the Palmer ski lift, where we had some hot coffee and hoped the white out we just pushed into would clear. As the clouds lifted, Dave and I pushed on to a much more mellow Mt. Hood. We roped up at around 9500ft just before the Hogsback. As we crossed the Hogsback we noticed that the Bergshrund that hadn’t been there the last time, had begin to show a crack. Dave and I quickly hopped the Shrund and continued through a 30ft. section of ice with a lot of run out. Once we passed the ice it was a quick jaunt to the summit at around 8:30am in amazing conditions. We took a few photos with my phone of us on top and quickly came down the mountain.
We passed a few folks on their way up awfully late and chatted with them about conditions and the objective hazards. We then took off our crampons and began to glissade our way down the hill. We even had one run of nearly 1000ft.! Although the run managed to once again tear my pants but not were my mom had just fixed them(Thanks mom). Once we hit the parking lot we quickly changed and headed to the local diner for some eggs and omelette’s.
I spent the next days doing some tourist stuff around Portland. I saw an amazing waterfall and had some awesome local cuisine. All in all Portland was amazing and I’d like to thank Dave Newton and Bailey Apple for being such gracious hosts. Dave will be coming to Mass next month and you might even see him at the local crags with us. Well gang, I’ve got a lot of really dirty gear to wash so Ta-Ta for now.