| Summary | |
| Owner | MITOC Gallery Administrator |
| Creation Date | 2006-03-06 09:22:20 UTC-0500 |
| Description |
Participants: Eric, Matthew, Mike S, Bobby, Darren, Christie Continuous hours above Treeline: 23 Maximum visibility: about 50 ft Minimum Temperature: about -5F not counting windchill (which was about -40F) Casualties: Two foam pads (probably in Tuckerman's by now), one rainfly that couldn't withstand 1.5 feet of drifting snow. Results of final two on two hockey match: Eric and Matthew 2, Christie and Mike 3 Author: Eric Gilbertson Back in February Mike S floated around this brilliant idea of playing hockey above treeline at Lakes of the Clouds, just below Mt. Washington. I did a little research and found no documented cases of it ever being attempted before, so it had to be done. Now playing hockey above treeline is nothing like lacing up for a casual IM game at Johnson - you have to first off haul all your hockey gear in addition to full winter gear up several thousand vertical feet in the snow, you have to find the Lake and a suitable camping site close to the ice (close, because you don't want to get lost in a whiteout between the ice and your camp), you have to lace up your skates as quickly as possible before getting frostbite on your exposed fingers, and finally you have to fight the constant 40-50mph wind and blowing snow to skate around your opponents and send the puck between the two ice-axe goal posts. Surprisingly, there were six hardy MITOC hockey players up for the challenge (we were hoping for a full 5 on 5 game but hey, 3 on 3 is pretty good), and after Mike found a second car for the group at midnight friday night, we were all set to go. We started at the Mt Washington cog railway at about noon Saturday and took the Ammonnoosuc trail, the most direct route to Lakes of the Clouds to allow maximum ice time. A bit of advice to the next group that hikes with hockey sticks: don't try to carry them on your packs, they're too long. We all had them strapped on sticking up about 3 feet above our packs, and they caught on about every tree we passed. Negotiating blowdowns was a nightmare, and we soon decided to forgoe our hiking poles and just hike carrying the hockey sticks. There were quite a few people returning down the trail by that time, and they all complained about it being too windy and snowy above treeline and suggested we wait until Sunday. Hah, those wimps, I thought, not prepared for a little rough weather. By 2:30 we were at the edge of treeline and took a final, quick break to add layers and cover all exposed flesh (quick, becuase it was about 0 degrees and extremely windy). Luckily someone had tied little orange markers on the bushes to mark the trail, otherwise it would have been rough finding the lakes of the clouds. We found the lake around 3 oclock and immediately scouted out a place to set up our tents. Man, it was so tough setting those things up in the wind, even though we dug down a few feet into the snow to create a wind barrier. Our site was right on the edge of the lake, and next to this massive snow wall that had to be at least 5 or 6 feet deep and basically covered the whole north eastern side of the lake. At the last minute Saturday morning Matthew and I had grabbed a couple snow shovels, and we soon put these to good use digging out snowcaves in this massive wall (we knew those tents would be freezing since the wind would slice right through them, but a snowcave would be toasty warm). Matthew shot an awesome movie of me digging out a snow cave while the wind is drifting snow in almost as fast as I can remove it. We took turns digging and eventually got it big enough for two people. Darren dug another two-man cave, but unfortunately we only had two shovels for six people, so someone would have to sleep in the tent. As it worked out, Matthew and I shared our cave, but Mike, Bobby, Darren, and Christie each felt too guilty staying in the other cave while two more people froze in the tent, so they all four crammed into the three-man trango tent (I suppose that was pretty warm too). With all this digging and setting up camp, we didn't really have time to get in any hockey, so we decided to save it for sunday. If setting up a tent in the wind was hard, cooking was even worse. We had three stoves, but the nozel on one of the fuel bottles froze so it couldn't hold pressure. So Matthew cooked with one outside, sheltered (sort of) by the snow wall, while the rest of the gang cooked inside the vestibule of the tent. It was so hard to boil water with the wind blowing out the flame and numb fingers unable to adjust it that we decided to quit after just one small pot of pasta and fill up on cold food in the comfort of our sleeping bags. Mike, Bobby, Christie, and Darren stayed in their tent the rest of the night, and Matthew and I crawled into the snow cave around 7pm, after draping a rainfly over the entrance to prevent all the drifting snow from coming in. Our sleep was short-lived, though, because by 8pm the fly had started sagging in with the weight of about a foot of snow, and we were worried we might get trapped in there. Matthew bravely got out of his warm sleeping bag and adjusted the fly so that the drifting snow might fall off better, and we went back to sleep. That grand plan was to summit Washington in time for sunrise the next morning, and we had told a bunch of people to look at the summit camera at 6:15 to see us, but alas it wasn't meant to be. I got out of the snowcave at about 4:30am Sunday morning and it was basically a whiteout. I couldn't see 10 feet and was worried I wouldn't find my way back to the cave if I ventured too far away to check on the other guys in the tent. Later I learned that it was sunny and clear at the summit for sunrise, but that was because the summit was actually poking above the clouds, and it still would have been suicidal to try to reach the summit. Instead, we slept in for another 1.5 hours and then got ready for some hockey. The ice was about 75 percent clear of snow since it was so windy (the wind and blowing snow hadn't really relented at all since we reached treeline), but it was a little rough in places where rime ice had formed from the solidifying blowing snow. Matthew and I laced up quickly before our fingers got too numb, put on our full above treeline gear (face mask, goggles, etc) and started skating. We couldn't actually see from one side of the lake to the other, the blowing snow was so bad, but it was really fun letting the wind propel us down, with our bodies acting like sails. Whenever I got cold, I just skated up wind and the exertion warmed me right up. For the hockey goals we pounded two ice axes into the ice and connected the wrist loops at the top. We limited the rink size so that it was possible to see from one goal to the other. At about 10:30 the rest of the gang in the tent finally convinced themselves that it was worth it to get out of their nice, warm, comfortable sleeping bags and brave the cold. (By then we practically needed a zamboni out on the ice!) Bobby was feeling sick, so the rest of us rotated around playing two on two games. We got in some good matches, and it was pretty clear that the upwind team had the advantage (if the wind is at your back you just flick the puck and the wind carries it halfway across the lake). In the final match Matthew and I played Mike and Christie, and they barely snuck ahead winning 3-2. Our whole group then gave one final shot at Mount Washington, but it was more to convince ourselves that we were making the right choice not to summit (we only made it a couple hundred feet before losing the trail in the poor visibility, so we turned around). The hike back to the trailhead was awesome because the trail was really steep and had about 8-15 inches of fresh powder on top. So a good portion of the descent was spent on our butts glissading. We're thinking about having this be an annual MITOC hockey trip, so get ready for next year! |