Nate poked a hole in Mount Washington... He did... I swear!

Before I tell the exciting story about our trip to Mount Washington, I'm going to start with the boring part... Well, I guess it wasn't all that boring. We have rented a house in North Conway and we went to stay there Saturday night because we wanted to do a trip on Mount Washington on Sunday. A couple of days before, the propane company called Nate to tell him that someone had called because they thought there was a propane leak at the house. Instead, it wasn't a propane leak, but we were out of propane. They told Nate that they filled up the propane tank and that they turned it back on and all was good. Well, we got to the house Saturday night, and it was cold in the house. Not just the usual heat is off type of cold, but no heat for a few days maybe a week type of cold. We turned the heat on and got ready for bed. Nate woke up in the middle of the night and checked and sure enough, the heat was not on and the house was still frigid. Needless to say, I didn't sleep much... But we still got our stuff ready in the morning and made a trek to the mountain. We have heard rumors that it had been snowing a lot on the old rock and the I think this first picture does show you how much snow they have had. The last time we went to the lean-to, there was snow, but it's almost buried now... 

 We didn't really have a good plan when we got to the mountain, which isn't usually the best idea, but there was just the two of us, so it wasn't too bad. We got to the lean-to and Nate asked if I wanted to go further up. I said, "sure, but let's stay safe". We decided to try and check out Hillman's highway. Here is a picture on our way up Hillman's highway. I forgot my sunglasses in the car, so my hood was doing a good job blocking the sun...

Since I forgot my sunglasses in the car, I had been wearing my goggles on the way to the lean-to. When we got to the lean-to, I put my goggles down on the shelf (second mistake). When I went to put them back on, I realized that the inside of the goggles had frozen up because I'm a sweating beast. My knight in shining armor, put them close to his body and warmed them up. Then once they thawed, I said that he could wear them. Here he's putting them on our way up Hillmans... 

After one of my least-favorite trips on Mount Washington where I think I told Nate that my mom was going to kill him if anything happened to me, I like to assess my own limitation and then say, "Nate, I'm stopping here". We got to a particular spot and Nate started cutting across the top a steep section and I watched what he was cutting across and then I watched a very small slab fall away from where he was cutting and I knew my own ability of climbing and knew that if anyone was going to be causing an avalanche today, it's most likely going to be me and decided it was not worth going any further up. So, I told Nate to keep climbing knowing that by the time he got where he wanted to go, I might have most of my stuff put together and by the time that he came back down to where I was, I might have everything on. Here I am putting my stuff together: 

While we were on Hillman's, some nice man came hiking up behind us. He said that he was just over at the Little Headwall and it looked really good. So we got down Hillman's, which was super light and fluffy and fun, and we decided to venture over to the Little Headwall. Since my gear was all put together and my skins were mushed to each other, I decided I would just carry my board. And I remembered why I purchased a split board again. HOLY SMOKES that is HARD work!!! So, we climbed up the Little Headwall and once again, I got to a point that I decided any further up would probably be not a good thing for me and told Nate to keep going... Here is Nate trying to climb further up...

And Oakley following... 

And Scout... 

I put my board back on and enjoyed the views fora  bit... It was really a gorgeous day!! Wildcat is the resort in the right of the picture. I do love when I am sitting higher than Wildcat...

Looking up towards where Hillman's is... 

Looking back up at Scout on the other side of a tree... 

After I got my stuff on and watched a few skiers and snowboarders coming down the little shoot and falling on their bums, I decided that I wanted to move a bit to see if I could watch Nate come down. So, I moved down and a little to the right...

Nate on a steep section...

So, Nate comes down and he falls up the mountain from me and then falls just down the mountain from me. When he was trying to get up, he just said, "Ok" and he looked at me and said, "Don't move!". He very slowly crawls away from where he was and then looks at me and says, "Slowly and carefully, move toward me". I didn't want to look because I knew I would get scared so I just got up and falling leaf carefully towards Nate. When Nate tried to stand up, he poked a hole through the snow....

Not sure if you follow Mount Washington news, but a man died last year after he fell into a crevasse while climbing Mount Washington... Needless to say, we hightailed it out of there.

Two last pictures. This is me either on Hillman's or the end of Little Headwall, I'm not quite sure.  

And Oakley and I cruising the Sherburne.

We made it back safe and sound and very thankful that there were no mishaps. I think we have a few more trips up to the rock. I am looking forward to the spring in southern New Hampshire, but hope that the mountains stay a little more winter like. It gets a little harrier up in the north country this time of year.