AMC Huts Blog

Postlude-By Miles Howard

2011-10-20T10:55:00.006-04:00

I didn’t always know how to cook pancakes. I reflected upon this recently at 5:30 AM, half-asleep before a griddle of sizzling butter and batter islands. It was still pitch black outside and in some recess of my skull, a tiny version of “MacArthur Park” was playing. The cakers were bubbling to life, firm around the edges and begging to be flipped. As I turned the spatula with careful sleight-of-hand, revealing an amber underbelly on each flapjack, a murmur of terror ran through me, as if saying, “Please Miles, don’t screw these up. Please. I’ll buy you a new pair of hi-tops, I’ll clean your future apartment. Why, I’ll even erect a synagogue in your name. Just. Don’t. Mess. Up.”

Most souls who find their way to seasonal employment in the huts come with experience in cookery, education and/or hospitality. Fresh out of high school in 2007, I moved into Lakes of the Clouds Hut with no expertise in any of those fields, unless you call washing dishes and eating cold mashed potatoes from the walk-in at a fraying hamlet called The Granite Café a job. What I did have was a pair of hiking boots, a bag of Halloween costumes and the stubborn hope that I would be hired for my love of the White Mountains and taste for theatrics, having enjoyed many a BFD (the breakfast skits) during previous hut visits.

Either my “Aw, Shucks” candor was more affecting than I realized or the applicant before me had come into the AMC’s Joy Street office with human flesh on their chin. I got the job. Before I knew it, I was skipping my prom to go toss sacks of flour into a rat-proof closet and learn the art of “proofing” yeast, 5050 feet above sea level, rime ice still frosting the boulders.

There were hiccups. My first attempt at cooking a breakfast for 93 people was a near disaster. Having never used a griddle before, I attempted to cook a batch of pancakes on the griddle cover, with the burners on high heat. Had a fellow croo member not noticed the smell of burning wood, recovering from the experience might have required psychotherapy. Another evening, I announced to a full dining room of guests that I would be serving a traditional British pudding dessert called “Spotted Dick”. The announcement was received with stunned faces and muffled laughter from a table of large French Canadian men. Clearly, I had not taken into account that some of our horrified patrons had not ventured outside the United States, let alone New England. I stayed in the kitchen for the rest of the evening, brewing coffee and avoiding eye contact with the crowd.

But things got better. Despite never quite mastering traditional yeast breads, I taught myself how to bake Irish Soda Bread for the ages, stuffing the beast with almonds, walnuts, whole-wheat flour and other ingredients not normally employed during the Michael Collins years. I developed a passion for soup cooking, turning out endless concoctions of savory meet stewed in wine for hours with stocks, vegetables and enough spices to make a Spaniard swoon. Eventually, I grew to view “cook days” not as challenges on par with a military patrol but an opportunity to slay my audience not with undercooked chicken (which, thank god, never happened) but elation: of how French onion soup, steaming lasagna rustico, and deathly sweet peanut butter squares could taste so good, let alone exist in this blessed patch of wilderness.

I have thought of this endlessly throughout the past weeks. As the leaves brown and winter’s breath creeps into the long, dark nights, I am preparing for a departure from the huts. Not just a seasonal one, a final exit as well. The last five summers – and this current fall – have been kinder to me than I thought possible for people my age, in our troubled economy. But with a college degree under my belt and a burgeoning interest in editorial media, urban dwellings and a Danish electronica artist named Trentemøller, I know I have reached the end of my lease in this indescribable place.

The temptation to prolong my stay is strong, as there is much that I will miss: the bristling anticipation of a hungry dinner crowd. The warmth of a bunk after a long day of work. An endless supply of Goldfish. That first cup of coffee in the small hours, when the birds have just stirred to life outside. But more than anything, I will always cherish the huts’ enduring backbone of good labor and good humor at all times. Where cooking, cleaning and assisting others is not outsourced but embraced with unabashed pride. Where one will not only learn from a mistake, but can learn to laugh about it as well.

The spirit of the huts is something I do not expect to encounter again, wherever my work and travels take me. Hopefully, I’m wrong, for in this age, that spirit and its tenants seem more important than ever. When the present is at conflict with the future, a home-cooked meal and a friendly face leap beyond their origins, into the realm of idols, where a whisper of assurance can still be found. Often, a pot of chicken is just that: a pot of chicken. But sometimes, it’s all we have left.

With love and gratitude,

Miles Howard

Lakes 2007

Lonesome 2008

Zealand 2009

Carter Hutmaster 2010

Madison Colonel 2011

Zealand Hutmaster Fall 2011

The magic of the huts

2011-10-13T15:19:00.012-04:00

I firmly believe that the huts are magic. Out of the huts, I’m not a morning person. I’m not particularly fond of clearing tables or doing dishes, and my desire to carry heavy things up and down stairs is minimal. However, three seasons in the huts have found me bouncing out of bed at 5am to start flipping pancakes, dancing as I send hundreds of dishes flying through the sinks, and even enjoying packing significant percentages of my body weight down the Crawford Path to Lakes or up the Old Bridle Path to Greenleaf.

Now, I know that I’m idealizing. There are definitely days when the last thing I want to do at 5am—or even at six on days when I’m not cooking—is get out of bed and make breakfast; when explaining for the 20th time that we ask all visitors to pack out ALL of their trash starts to feel old; when I just don’t feel like scrubbing oatmeal out of the bottom of a pot. I definitely spent the first few weeks of this fall season in a fight with the Old Bridle Path, hearing myself whine “noooooooo” as I packed up the never ending sequence of steep ascents that cover the last mile of the OBP. But no matter what, coming around the corner and emerging into the Greenleaf yard—my backyard—brings a smile to my face.

I’ve always loved the White Mountains; I dreamed of working in the huts ever since my first visit to Lonesome as a kid and felt like I’d developed a pretty good knowledge of the area over many hiking trips. Now, I know these mountains with a new intimacy. I know every curve and contour of the Old Bridle Path and the Greenleaf Trail, the Ammonoosuc Ravine Trail and the Crawford Path. The names of plants and trees pop into my head unbidden and I can instantly identify the other peaks and ridges that surround me. At this point, I know the White Mountains better than I know the neighborhood where I grew up. I love looking up from scrubbing those gooey oatmeal pots and watching the morning’s valley fog disperse, revealing an ever changing patchwork of fall colors beneath. I love the energy of 48 new guests every night—and the opportunity to get to know smaller counts of 3 and 4. And, there’s nothing better than sitting outside with my croo members—my coworkers, my roommates, my friends, my alpine family—watching the stars after a long day of hard work together in the mountains.

If you talked to different croo members, you’d get different answers as to what makes the huts magical, but nobody would deny that magic. Yes, there are days when we’re tired and stressed about the quality of our soup or the weight of our packboards. There are days where all we want to do is curl up on a couch with a movie, a bowl of ice cream (which can go straight into the dishwasher afterwards) and an adoring dog at our feet. But take it from me, while the couch/movie/ice cream/dog combo is great, it can’t beat the magic of the huts. It can’t beat having your e-mail auto-reply up for months at a time or working so closely with 4 other people that everyday chores start to resemble choreographed dances. It can’t beat a daily diet of incredible sunsets and homemade bread or feeling your hard-earned muscles propelling you to the perfect perch on the side of a mountain. And while the actual percentage of our lives spent in the huts is relatively small, the magic of the huts is something that I know we’ll all treasure forever.

Emma Gildesgame

Greenleaf-Fall 2011

Early Signs of Fall

2011-09-23T09:40:00.011-04:00

Whether it's the oak leaves going from green to yellow, the alpine grasses turning a golden brown or frost on the car windshield, the early signs of fall are here in the Whites which marks my favorite time of year to be outside and enjoying the mountains.

I returned yesterday from a trip up to Greenleaf Hut where I was able to visit the fall crew, eat some spiced apple cake and hang out with a wonderful group of high schoolers from Long Island who were in the Whites for their first time. Although we've had a couple sub-freezing nights on the summits producing that quintessential visual of frosty mountain tops and colorful valleys, my trip up the Old Bridle Path was a pleasant one with temps in the high 60's and a light breeze to keep me comfortable. As I started at Lafayette Place, there were already a few leaves on the ground but as I ascended the 2000 ft to the hut, I could see more and more colored speckles on the trail and as I emerged out of the woods, I was able to get some great views of early color in Walker Ravine below Franconia Ridge.

At the hut, I was lucky enough to catch some great evening light on Lafayette just before the sun set behind Cannon Mtn. to the west. Unfortunately, the sunrise the next morning was hidden by the thick fog which is typical in Franconia Notch but it created a quiet, ocean-like feel for my hike down Agony Ridge and back into the hardwoods. As I sit here at Pinkham Notch, I'm excited to get back out soon to see how other parts of the Whites are changing with the season. I know there's been some moose and beaver activity in the Zealand Valley, beautiful ridge hiking along the Twins and Bonds and some late season trout fishing up at Lonesome and Carter. As the leaves and temps continue to change this fall, we'll keep you updated with photos and some reports but don't just take our word for it, come on up and enjoy the Fall!

Notes from a croo

2011-07-12T09:26:00.004-04:00

It's now mid-July, which means that the summer is in full swing. So far, it has been an absolute pleasure and joy to have the opportunity to work at the brand new Madison Spring Hut.

Typical hut summers start by arriving at a hut which looks like it has been unused for an entire winter, with dirt collecting in all the small nooks and corners of the building. For the first few days, the croo is alone at the hut, has time to bond, and most importantly, scrub. Every single surface ends up getting scrubbed. However, the early season transformations at Madison this year were slightly different.

Upon our arrival, a vastly different hut greeted us. Chop saws and scaffolding stood where tables and benches should be. Sawdust covered everything, instead of soot and grime. Our first task; finish the hut. Surprisingly quickly, all the last details fell into place. We polyurethaned walls, painted trim, and oiled floors. And then the chopper came. 'Flies' as we call them are like Christmas. First, there's the early morning expectation of just sitting and waiting for that sound of helicopter blades off in the distance. Then the cargo nets come. Net after net filled with goodies. We finally got benches and tables. We got droves of canned goods, bags of flour, and even a case of candy! Slowly but surely, our summer was about to start. Then it all happened: June 2nd we finally served our first meal of the season, though we had 2 paying guests and approximately 15 construction crew members.

Since then, time has flown by. These days, guests fill up all of our bunks most nights of the week. Dinners are served to 52 hungry souls, and after breakfast we wish them luck with their daily adventures. Soups simmer all day, bread comes fresh out of the oven, and pancakes get flipped zen-like before breakfast is served. We (the croo) go on day hikes to visit our friends across the ridge and on ridges afar. The mountain cranberries flower and pass into fruiting.

In times like these, it's easy to realize that not too much has changed at Madison. We've got a beautiful new hut, but the heart and soul of the hut hasn't changed.

I would personally like to thank all of the people who have been important in the rebuild, including all the donors, the various departments of the AMC which have been working on the project, the project architects, and the construction crew. I would also like to especially thank all the guests we have had, as they have continued to embody the spirit of Madison, and without them, the hut would be incomplete.

Johannes Griesshammer
Sixth-season croo member

Summer's Here!

2011-06-30T11:42:00.011-04:00

The huts have been open for a few weeks, but now that school is out and the summer solstice has passed, we can officially say summer is here. Crews have settled into their huts, fine tuned their cooking skills, identified the best "krump rocks" and are ready for a busy Independence Day Weekend. Below are some photos showing the beginning our season. If you haven't already been up to a hut this summer, we look forward to seeing you soon.

Madison Hutmaster, George Heinrichs, serves his father and the AMC's Presidents Society at an opening event on June 17th.

A Lakes crew member preps veggies for their alpine salad

A member of the AMC's professional trail crew builds a rock staircase on the Lonesome Lake Trail

Zealand Hutmaster, Jeff Pedersen, packs his first load of food for the season

Freshly baked foccacia cooling at Lonesome

Madison Naturalist, Johannes Griesshammer, "dives" while third year crew member, Leah Hart, "moves"

Greenleaf first years, Kelly Dennen and Katie Schide, serve split pea and ham soup to a hiking group from the mid-west

The 2011 summer Hutmasters at Lakes for "Hutmaster Set"

Madison Update- We're open for business!

2011-06-08T16:49:00.029-04:00

Just like we had planned, Madison Spring Hut opened it's doors on June 2 to kick off the start to the 2011 full-service huts season. After spending four years conceptualizing, designing, fund-raising, planning and building, we're proud to have the new Madison looking and functioning like the 21st century hut we envisioned.

There are so many people who contributed to the project and all deserve much credit and thanks for making this a success. From AMC staff to chapters, members, donors, the OHA, JBI, LDa, WMNF, volunteers, contractors and many many others, thank you for your support. But, if it weren't for the talented and skilled Construction Crew members who dug deep over the fall, winter and spring suffering through horrible weather, broken equipment, unexpected obstacles and a very tight timeline, we wouldn't be here today. Thanks for a job well done CC.

Since the hut opened last Thursday, there have already been two full-houses and it's looking like a great summer is ahead of us. The crew is quickly learning the intricacies of the new hut, using the new green systems, unpacking food, finishing last minute projects and turning this new building into a true high mountain hut. Although this is no easy task, there couldn't be a better group of dedicated people to do it. Between the six crew members, they've all worked prior seasons in the huts, three have been Hutmasters, four have been Assistant Hutmasters, two have been Naturalists and combined, they've worked at all seven other huts.

So, there are two great reasons to come and visit Madison this summer, we have a beautiful new hut and a friendly, experienced and energetic crew. Although this is a new chapter in the huts, the tradition that was started at Madison years ago, of offering high mountain hospitality to all, is as strong as ever. Here's to a great summer and to the spirit of Madison!

Madison Update- Just one more week

2011-05-23T21:14:00.008-04:00

As promised, here are a few more photos from this past weekend showing the progress up at Madison. We're into the final push and while we train summer hut crews at Mizpah this week, CC will be finishing up their work so the Madison crew can move in on Saturday. Stay tuned...

Tom Bindas building stairs for the main entrance.

A look down the bunkroom hallway from one side to another.

A finished set of bunks.

A bit more plumbing and the kitchen will be done.

A nice view after weeks of rain.

Madison Update: T-minus 2 weeks

2011-05-16T11:10:00.014-04:00

In the spirit of today's shuttle launch, the countdown clock has started for Madison liftoff and we are only 2 weeks away from finishing the renovation for the upcoming summer season. The AMC's Construction Crew has been very busy over the last few weeks assembling bunks, building the kitchen, stringing electrical wires and finishing off some final exterior work. With warmer weather and late sunsets, crews have been working 12+ hour days to finish on time and the payoff has been big. After spending last weekend helping out, I got to see first hand the efficiency of the crews and the incredible craftsmanship that is being put into the hut. Below are some photos from May 7th & 8th. I'll be back up again this coming weekend to check the progress and will post some more photos soon.

Construction Crew member hiking in for his weekend shift

Old bunkroom windows being removed along with some final shingling on the new bunkroom

New pine paneling in the Adams side bunkroom makes a BIG difference. Bunks will be assembled and walls built to make three smaller bunkrooms.

This is the Madison side bunkroom split up into three smaller rooms

The new bunk boxes, built in bench and small privacy screen by the headboard. Ladders and mattresses will be coming soon.

Looking back at the hut and Mt. Madison from the Gulfside Trail

Madison Update- Back to Work

2011-04-05T15:29:00.030-04:00

The Whites got up to 12 inches of heavy wet snow from the April Fools nor'easter but despite the prolonged winter weather, the AMC's Construction Crew is back at Madison and back to work. Blessed with calm winds and clear skies last Thursday, we were able to airlift food, lumber and supplies to begin the spring construction.

Although our crews hiked out from the hut last November, many people have stayed busy over the winter getting ready for the final push. For the past 6 weeks, there have been 4-5 people in the Pinkham wood shop ripping, cutting, milling and sanding thousands of pieces of wood that will be assembled into bunks, shelves, ladders and benches. The work has been slow and tedious at times but the payoff is big. With 2/3 of the fine wood work finished before it even gets to the hut, assembly will be quick and efficient and less wasted wood will have to be flown in and out. Plus, with a new design for our bunks and ladders, there can be a lot more time spent on the detailed wood work shown by the stack of bunk bed posts resembling Thor's giant meat tenderizer.

The winter has also been a good time to finish up final design plans and purchase everything that the crew will need to run the hut this summer. For the last couple of months, we have been creating endless spreadsheets with items ranging from library books to mattresses to spatulas and soap dispensers. Some of these items have been stored at Pinkham but many are being purchased now to be airlifted in May.

With the first crew arriving at the hut last week, the weather wasn't much different than it was when they left. Temperatures were in the teens, visibility was poor and the wind was stiff. With all the snow that fell over the last 4 months, there were drifts over doors and windows and even a small one around the wood stove. Much of the "construction" that happened those first couple of days was in the form of snow shoveling but now that they have found the well and dug out the front door and stovepipe, the interior construction has resumed. In just the last week, the dining room and bathroom floor has been laid with the kitchen and bunk room floors next. After that, the kitchen will be built, the old bathroom converted into a third bunk room, energy systems installed and the bunks assembled. It sounds like a short list but it will take a huge amount of effort over the next two months to get the hut finished on time.

I'll be up there helping out and taking photos to keep everyone updated. For more info on Madison Spring Hut Reopening and special deals, check out the link.

Thinking Summer

2011-01-25T09:34:00.011-05:00

A couple of weeks ago, the 2011 summer Hutmasters and Assistant Hutmasters gathered at Carter Notch Hut to start our planning for the upcoming full-service season. After hiring our leadership teams in December, we had a lot to talk about and there was no better place to do it than a hut. We met at the 19 Mile Brook trailhead and took a leisurely walk up to Carter, catching up on how school was going and life since last summer, enjoying the snow covered trail which is a rare sight for these summer hut workers. In the photos, you'll notice some shorts and t-shirts but I can assure you it wasn't -22 degrees like it was yesterday, rather a balmy 45 degrees on the day after New Years.

We arrived at the hut to meet the Late Fall Caretaker, Jeff, who will also be the Zealand Hutmaster this summer. The group pulled together a delicious lunch of burritos, nachos and birthday brownies to celebrate Harrison's 21st birthday, who will be the 2011 Lonesome Lake Hutmaster. Conversation over lunch ranged from topics such as guest service, food, education, safety, and how to be bosses. Although this group is well versed in hut operations from their years as crew members, for many of them, this is their first opportunity to be the one in charge so we spent considerable time discussing what it means to be a leader in and out of the huts.

As many of these talented young leaders heard from an old hutman at the OHA's (Old Hutman's Association) Annual Meeting last fall, the years spent in the huts have a lasting affect on ones career and life. The lessons learned of teamwork, responsibility, integrity and leadership are invaluable no matter what career path is chosen and where one decides to go. This message happened to come from Three Star General, Richard Trefry, who worked in the huts in the 1940's and is the longest serving General in U.S. history. As the General reflected on his achievements, he eloquently spoke to current crew members stating that his experience in the huts was the best preparation he could have had for his life as a leader. He also challenged them to work hard, take responsibility for themselves and others, uphold the traditions of the huts and serve others the way Joe Dodge inspired him to. From the discussions we had at Carter, our leaders clearly got the message.

As we packed up our bags that afternoon, we knew the next time we would see each other would be for training in late May. For the next few months, Hutmasters and Assistants will be going to class, taking exams and staying busy with their lives outside of the huts. But as we get closer to summer and even on days like today, I know they'll be thinking about the General's words, what kind of leader they want to be and how to run their own huts to the best of their abilities. There's a lot of time between now and then but I speak for myself and all crew members in saying we're already thinking summer and we're looking forward to it.

Madison Update- Fall Work is Complete

2010-12-01T11:07:00.015-05:00

After working on the hut since early September, the AMC's Construction Crew boarded up Madison for the winter and hiked out last week. For the crews who have been working on the hut, it's been a long fall. After dealing with sub-zero wind chills, snow and ice, postponed airlifts, frozen water pipes, icy trails, broken equipment and all the other challenges that come with working on a construction site above tree-line 3.8 miles from the road, they were ready for a winter break. To witness the progress they've made though is amazing.

Despite their challenges, the Construction Crew has almost finished exterior work and is well on their way to finishing off the interior. In a little over two months they have demoed the wooden hut, added an additional wing, rebuilt the entire structure with new bathrooms, dining room, kitchen, crew room and attic, installed windows, cedar shingled the roof and exterior walls, pine paneled the dining room and bathrooms, strung electrical wires and started the plumbing. When the crew hiked out last week, they were well ahead of schedule.

Over the winter, we'll spend time looking at the details of the kitchen, dining room and bunk rooms. Shelves and cabinets will be pre-assembled, kitchen items will be purchased and bunk layouts mocked up. When the Construction Crew hikes back in to Madison in April, they'll have plenty of work to do before it opens for full-service. New energy systems using solar PV panels, passive solar heat and wind will be installed, the fir floor will be put down, interior paneling finished, kitchen built and new spacious bunks will be assembled. There's still a lot of work that needs to happen but with the way things have been going, we're all looking forward to the hut being ready to open for on June 2. Check out the photos below and look for the next Madison update in the spring.

Craig Pedersen measuring a board for the food storage room.

Ryan Albert cutting a piece of pine paneling for the new dining room.

Jeremiah Macrae-Hawkins boarding up the attic window for the winter.

Tom Bindas, Project Manager, and crew relaxing near the stove after a long day.

The new Madison Spring Hut with Mt. Adams in the background.

Madison Update: September 17-October 18

2010-10-20T16:42:00.012-04:00

September 17-Airlifting lumber and supplies on a rare clear day

September 18-Demo complete, new deck added along with bathroom bins

September 19-First walls are raised along with the 2000lb carrying beam

October 2-Walls and roof up, starting to shingle

October 2-View from the dining room front door looking towards the future kitchen, crew room and bathrooms

October 3-Bathrooms being closed in

October 9-Dining room and bunk room ridges meet with J.Q. Adams in the background

October 18-Windows installed just in time to keep the snow out

October 18-Construction Crew workers finishing exterior shingling and enjoying the winter weather

Progress at Madison

2010-10-18T10:21:00.002-04:00

More progress to report at Madison...

Madison Update-Demo Time

2010-09-15T11:20:00.013-04:00

A lot can happen in five days. I never thought that a hut could be completely dismantled in such a short amount of time but it happened last week. On Monday, the AMC's Construction Crew hiked up the Valley Way as the last guests were hiking out. After three years of planning for this project, it didn't take them long to get to work.

As the fall hut crew was boxing up food, kitchen supplies and cleaning out the crew room, Tom Bindas, Project Manager, and Kieth Wehmeyer started disassembling bunks in the south bunk room. Because the stone bunk house is the only part of the structure being preserved, it will serve as living quarters, kitchen and wood shop for the construction crew while they rebuild the rest of the hut. Pictured in the temporary kitchen is Bethany Taylor, the head cook for one of the work crews.

After the sink, stove, shelves and food was moved into the bunk room, the real demo work started. Tom and Kieth kindly took a wall down in the dining room and crew room for the fall crew to exit out of. They then moved on to the remaining crew room walls, roof and dining room. With a couple saws, pry bars and some muscle, the hut quickly disappeared behind the clouds and by Saturday, September 11th, the sun came out to reveal not much more than the old Madison #3.

With Saturday being the first clear day of the week, we took advantage of it and started airlifting building supplies to the hut. More than 32 tons of lumber, concrete, tools and food was lifted to the hut, which is only half of the 60 tons that will be needed to finish the construction. The timing was perfect as the demo work was coming to an end and new lumber was needed to start rebuilding this week.

As joists get put in and walls start going up, I'll try to keep everyone updated with new photos and stories from the crew because as we've found out, a lot can happen in five days.

Mid-Summer Visits

2010-08-05T18:18:00.012-04:00

There's been a lot going on in the huts over the past few weeks. Counts have been high, the weather has been hot and Jesse and I have been busy visiting crews and helping out with the inevitable rescues that come with this season. Below are a couple photos of the recent happenings in the huts.

Arran Dindorf and Patrick Scanlon serving tomato bisque at Lakes

Nick Anderson and Ashley Storrow catching a 50 mph gust at Lakes

Lakes of the Clouds from Mt. Monroe

Jesse Billingham and a large group carrying down one of their own on the 19 Mile Brook Trail

Carly Jesset and Luke Teschner giving a dinner talk at Madison

The Madison crew preparing breakfast for a full house

Fall Hiring

2010-07-12T18:50:00.005-04:00

The first month of the summer season came and went and it's already mid-July. After getting out to visit all of the huts in June, Jesse and I have been recently focusing a lot of attention on the coming fall season. That's usually the case in the Huts Department. We hire, train and send our crews out into the huts and then we immediately start thinking about the next season. It doesn't provide a lot of opportunity to really soak in a whole season from start to end but, that's how it goes.

For the last two months, Jesse has been going through our database, reading applications and narrowing the pool of fall applicants down. Last week we interviewed about 25 fall season applicants and happily, we met a lot of great potential hut workers. We talked with folks who grew up in the Northeast and came to the huts as children, we met people who've hiked the Appalachian Trail and even one person who lives in Portland, OR. It's always great to meet these interesting people who are excited about working in the huts and after interviewing well over 500 applicants during the last four years, we've become pretty good at identifying those who have what it takes to do well in the huts.

There are many things we look for in hut applicants; outdoor knowledge, cooking experience, prior work experience and ability to work closely with their peers are just some of them. The number one thing we look for though is customer service experience and desire to hold up our tradition of offering high mountain hospitality to all. As I like to say to applicants, the huts are more than just a motel on the side of a mountain and that it's the personalities on the crew that help make a hut experience unique.

Knowing the immense responsibility that the hut crews have, we take this hiring process seriously as there is only so much training we can do and after that, it's all up to them. As I heard from an OH today (Old Hutman), you can train people how to cook, how to stir compost and how to pack heavy loads but it's much harder to train them to have constant enthusiasm, to be warm and friendly and to be excited about sharing the AMC, the Whites and the huts with guests every day.

Once we have our new crew members picked, we start to play matchmaker. We assign returning crews to huts and pick Hutmasters and Assistant Hutmasters. There are many things to balance on a hut crew like personalities, seasons in the huts, gender, cooking experience and special skills. It's a lot to consider but we've taken a couple days to think about it and tomorrow, we make our final decisions. For those reading this who happened to apply for the huts, we'll be in touch by the end of the week, just as we promised.

We'll be back out to the huts soon enough for some more updates and photos. The fall season starts on August 19th and we'll be enjoying every bit of summer until then.

The Spirit of Madison

2010-06-30T14:14:00.020-04:00

Today marks the end of an era. Madison Spring Hut as we've
known it for decades closed it's doors for the season and when it opens next spring, it will be a newly remodeled hut. Starting today, the AMC will be renovating Madison and over the next 9 months, the hut will be almost completely disassembled (keeping the current stone bunkhouse) and rebuilt with waterless toilets, an expanded dining room, rearranged bunk rooms, a new kitchen and crew room and will have upgraded energy systems. The job is a challenging one given the location, the timing and the size of the
project but the AMC's talented Construction Crew will be working 7 days a week to get the hut closed in this fall and will return in the spring to finish the interior and to open it for the full-service season.

In many ways, the construction of Madison Spring Hut in 1888 was a revolutionary idea that created the beginning of the AMC Hut System that we have today. Built by AMC members for $701, Madison was a small stone shelter used by hikers traveling in the Northern Presidential Range. For many years it was a refuge and destination and with it's increasing popularity among mountain travelers saw the addition of a caretaker, Madison #2, a third stone building which is the current bunkhouse, a dining room and kitchen addition, and a complete rebuild after a devastating fire in 1940. In the last seventy years, minor improvements have been made, but the alpine conditions have taken their toll and the huts is overdue for reconstruction.

For the past three years, many people have been involved in planning the renovation, designing the new hut, fund raising, contributing money, and putting together the logistics of building a hut above treeline, 3.8 miles from the road. To be able to hike up this morning and help the fall crew start packing away dishes, removing old plaques and disassembling the interior felt like a reward in itself. To kick start the project on such a beautiful late summer day was icing on the cake.

I will be keeping everyone updated on the progress of the work this fall, through photos and guest bloggers. If you are interested in learning more about Madison, the renovation and the fund raising campaign which is still going on, please check out The Spirit of Madison.

Spring Flowers

2010-06-10T16:40:00.013-04:00

I hiked over to Lakes yesterday for an early season field visit. The huts have been open for a week and I wanted to say hi to the crew, check in on a couple things and also see some of the incredible alpine flowers that have started to bloom. Instead of taking my normal route of the Crawford Path from the summit of Mt. Washington to the hut, I took the scenic route.

I started from the Auto Road and hiked down the Huntington Ravine Trail through a small and quickly melting snowfield to the Alpine Garden Trail. I then skirted my way around the east side of Washington to the Tuckerman Ravine Trail, the Davis Path and then the Camel Trail to the hut. It was a beautiful day with great visibility, cool temps and a light breeze. To my pleasure, I was able to see many different plant species, most notably Diapensia, which is in full bloom. Below are a few photos from my hike.

Looking south on the Alpine Garden Trail

Diapensia

Lapland Rosebay

Mt. Washington from the Davis Path

Mt. Monroe and Lakes of the Clouds from the Camel Trail

Tuckerman Ravine from Lion's Head

Spring Airlift

2010-06-01T20:21:00.038-04:00

There are two ways to get food and supplies up to the huts, by
helicopter and by carrying it in on your back. Every May the huts get flown non-perishable food and supplies that last through the summer. Flour, soap, blankets, tomato puree, propane, construction materials and everything in between will get flown up by a helicopter with each hut averaging about 30,000 pounds of supplies.

The beginning of this process starts back in February when AMC's Storehouse Dept. starts purchasing everything that will eventually get up to the huts. Food and supplies are ordered over the next couple of months and stored in eight different tractor trailers, one for each hut (try imagining half a tractor trailer's worth of food being stored in Zealand's attic, or a whole one for Lakes). This process alone takes over a month of work from the Storehouse crew who has to count everything when it's delivered to Pinkham Notch and accurately distribute the correct amount of food for each hut.

After all the food and supplies have been moved to the trailers, they are driven to the airlift sites. Each hut has it's own airlift site which is usually the closest open area to the hut where a helicopter can fly into. Depending on the weather and the winds, the pilot and the AMC crew will choose which huts to fly on a given day. A convoy of trucks will meet at the airlift site with last minute items, nets, hardware and a lot of people to move all of those boxes.

For all hut airlifts, there's a top crew and bottom crew. The top crew consists of 4 people who are flown into the hut who will be the ones that receive the nets of food, open them up and stack all of the food inside the hut. They are also the ones to hook out-loads that are being flown from the hut to the bottom crew. The bottom crew stays busy by making up nets of food and supplies that weigh as close to 800 pounds as possible. That's the limit for the helicopter we use, so we try to get close without going over the line. 800 pounds seems like a lot but when you look at a trailer full of food compared to one net load, it's easy to see why it takes a couple hours to supply a single hut.

Once all of the food is flown up, the caretaker or hut crew will spend hours moving boxes up to the attic, inventorying everything and storing it until it is finally consumed by our guests. At the end of the process, this food has been handled 8-10 times, driven by vehicle, flown by helicopter, cooked by hut crews and finally eaten by hungry people.

Helicopters have been used by the AMC to get supplies into the huts since the 1960's. It's a finely tuned system to maximize our in-loads and out-loads and to be as efficient as possible. Whenever something is flown in (food, propane etc), we match it with an out-load of empty propane cylinders, solid waste or trash. This makes it so that there is no wasted trip back and forth which shortens the amount of flying time. Of course, even with the best planning, weather has a great effect on when, where and how much we can fly. As usual, our schedule this year was slowed down due to rain and gusty winds, something that is all too common in the mountains. As of last Thursday, our spring airlift was complete. Now, all we have to do is get the rest of the fresh and frozen vegetables, fruit, meat and cheese up to the huts. Stay tuned for a post on the old school way of doing this, packing.

Summer Training Montage

2010-05-19T13:40:00.007-04:00

A few weeks ago, as several strapping alumni of the huts set off into the woods with the grueling task of re-opening Mizpah, Greenleaf and Galehead for the summer, the North Country was walloped by a blanket of snow.

While these valiant hutmen and hutwomen chipped away at month’s worth of ice, scrubbed every imaginable surface with bleach rags, and unpacked an entire summer’s worth of AMC apparel, I was involved in a notably less admirable endeavor over 2000 miles away, hunched in the fluorescent cavern of a school library, working out a fifteen-page paper on post-structuralist cinema, wearing a facial expression you tend to see on Olympic squatters. I tried to imagine what Francois Truffaut might say about feminism, but instead, all I could think of was the weirdly endearing sound of a full house at Lakes of the Clouds, slurping down gallons of hot soup in communal bliss.

Ever since I received my 2010 croo assignment in December, the promise of being Hutmaster at Carter Notch Hut for the summer had taken up permanent residency in my mind. I couldn’t enjoy a meal of fried chicken and waffles without wondering how I might cook it for 40 guests. I couldn’t jaywalk through LA traffic without worrying about who would assemble a rescue team if an Audi clipped my hip. I couldn’t even attend a T-Pain concert without wondering if some moves from his dance crew might spice up one of our blanket folding demonstrations.

Summer croo training can be observed in many forms and environments, perhaps right around you. That neon-clad jogger running through Boston Common might be hauling crates of pork products up the Gale River Trail next month. Similarly, that sprightly looking youngster with an armful of sequined dresses at the thrift store cash register might be wearing one those dresses whilst baking loaves of sundried tomato bread within the coming weeks.

What’s certain is that preparing adequately for a season in the huts is always a shot in the dark. All the bench presses and Italian recipes in the world can’t prepare you for arriving to your hut and finding it encased in snow, just as practicing your Boschian painting techniques may not be appropriate for creating a colorful yet amusing dinner menu. There is an outlet for any ability or talent within the huts, but realizing it takes great patience, confidence, and a little bit of improvisation.

Perhaps that challenge is what keeps so many of us coming back to the huts year after year. That, and the unpredictability it carries. Between the coworkers, the locations, and the guests, it’s impossible to have a summer that doesn’t feel unique. The oft chance that one year my croo will be serving stuffed shells to Daniel Day-Lewis or waking our guests with a full instrumental rendition of “Purple Rain” is as driving a force as my hope that the dwindling East Coast mountain lion population won’t skyrocket while I’m packing boxes up the Nineteen Mile Brook trail this season.

I’d like to continue this beard-stroking rumination about the huts, but seeing as the season begins in a week, I think I’ll pause here, go do some lunges, and leaf through The Barbecue Bible. After all, you can’t foresee the future, but you can certainly prepare the mind and the muscles for it.

Miles Howard

2010 Carter Hutmaster

Make the Hut a Hut

2010-05-11T17:34:00.021-04:00

These were my simple instructions for the Ream Team this year and our mantra while we opened Mizpah, Greenleaf and Galehead for the 2010 season. Making the hut a hut was no simple task, in fact, it took our team of seven people, six days to convert these empty, dirty, boarded up buildings into the AMC Huts we know and love.

To put it simply, Ream Team's job is to hike to a hut, scrub every surface inside, unpack food and kitchen supplies and then repeat. There of course is a lot more that happens but with an experienced group like the one we had, they could interpret the simplest directions and know what had to happen for the hut to really become a hut. Having four people on our team who worked last fall made the job a little less daunting. Because they were the last ones to see the huts before they were boarded up, they knew exactly where everything was stored and where it belonged.

As we practiced Mr. Miyagi's wax-on-wax-off techniques with bleach rags, a healthy discussion was held throughout the week on each hut's condition and a final grade was given to the previous fall's crew. All three huts were in great shape so a big thanks goes to everyone for their hard work, but a special thanks goes to the 2009 Fall Galehead Crew, nice job. Below are a few photos showing our week of work.

Mizpah Spring Hut with 10 feet of snow hiding the front door

Scrubbing the winter layer off pots and pans

A thorough bleaching of the Greenleaf dining room

A nice end to a long day

Galehead's mattresses drying in the sun after a deep cleaning

This hut's a hut

Summer's Just Around the Corner

2010-04-28T17:15:00.014-04:00

When I took a hike up to Glen Boulder this past Sunday it was 70 degrees and I was wearing a t-shirt and shorts. I never would have guessed that Pinkham Notch was going to get hit with over a foot of snow three days later but I was quickly reminded it's April in the Whites, and anything can happen. Myself and a few others will be heading out to open Mizpah, Greenleaf and Galehead starting this Saturday. It's hard to think the summer season is only a month away when I look out the window and see snow plows and fresh ski tracks but, with the forecasted 70 degree weather and some sunny skies this weekend, summer should hopefully be just around the corner.

Pinkham Notch Visitor Center April 28th, 2010

Seth Quarrier shoveling the Pinkham steps

Flowers starting to bloom

Glen Boulder April 25th, 2010

Zealand Visit

2010-04-20T20:25:00.021-04:00

With the great spring weather that we had last week, I decided to take a quick walk into Zealand for the day. We recently transitioned from our winter season to our spring season so I wanted to say hi to our new caretaker Matt and I also wanted to check in on the progress of the new roof that the AMC's Construction Crew is working on.

I was able to quickly get up the Zealand Road, which will be re-opened by the Forest Service in the next couple of weeks. I hit the trail and for about the first mile it was mostly snow free. After taking the 90 degree right turn away from the river, I came upon the classic spring time trail feature which I like to refer to as the "monorail." Although taking the monorail into Zealand sounds fun, it doesn't make for the easiest hiking conditions. As pictured, the monorail is a strip of snow going down the center of the trail which looks out of place compared to the bare woods. It's created by hikers, snowshoers and skiers who pack the snow down over the winter into a dense base that takes longer to melt than the unpacked snow in the woods. It usually starts off in a narrow strip of snow and as you climb higher, it gets wider, deeper and makes for slow and slippery progress.

After passing the bogs and ponds and almost running straight into a moose--sorry no photos--I made it to the hut. I was greeted by Matt and Tom, the project manager for the construction work at Zealand. Although it was just Wednesday afternoon, the crew of four had done a great amount of work since Monday when the materials were airlifted in. Tom, Jeremiah, Nathaniel and Carl had completed one side and were busy putting stick-tight down on the old plywood. The rain was supposed to come in later and they hoped to finish shingling the back half by the end of Thursday. The new roof is a welcome sight as the old shingles were put on in 1989 and they were at the end of their 20-year lifespan. With luck, the new roof will last another 20.

I got the chance to catch up with Matt, who had been enjoying being back at Zealand. Although Matt has never been a self-service caretaker, the last time he worked in the huts was in 2004 when he was the Hutmaster at Zealand. Since then, he has traveled the world, taught English in Korea, lived in Texas, rode his 1970's motorcycle across the country and now he is back at Zealand for the next month and a half. There hasn't been much change since he worked there 6 years ago. The Zealand Falls still put him to sleep at night, the view towards Mt. Carrigain continues to capture attention and the more solitary experience of caretaking has been happily welcomed.

After a snack of Clif bars and apples, I packed up my things, took a few more photos and another walk around the hut. I headed down the trail and was happy to see the very first signs of spring with buds coming out, green grasses sprouting, birds singing and a fast melting monorail beneath my feet.

Winter Finally Came

2010-03-08T12:22:00.021-05:00

Although it hasn't been the snowiest winter on record, we're still experiencing full winter conditions high in the mountains. With the 4 day storm from 2 weeks ago came 52 inches of new snow in places and has brought snow depths at the huts to well above average. Today's snow stake at Carter measured 67 inches while Hermit Lake is still taking the lead at 75 inches. Because of all this snow, I recently made a trip up to Lonesome Lake Hut to help the caretaker, Dave Weston, with some heavy snow removal.

I decided to ski the trail knowing there was a lot of fresh snow higher up and I thought it would be a challenging and fun ski down, which it turned out to be. After about a 40 minute climb up the Lonesome Lake Trail, I skied across the frozen lake and found Dave hard at work shoveling the stairs that had collected deep wind blown drifts.

Because we were both fairly tired at this point from our early morning work out, we went inside for a quick snack of freshly made donuts. These weren't the kind from the local Dunkin Donuts or Crispy Cream, these were the ones much like the lumber jacks made 100 years ago when the White Mountains were being heavily logged and that is why the recipe for them is called "Lumber Camp Donuts."

After our snack, we went back outside to continue the shoveling. First, we shoveled off the roof of the bathroom which had collected over three feet of snow in sections and it needed to come down. Using some improvised techniques, we were able to get the heavy load off safely. Of course, all the snow on the roof ended up on the walkway so we had to shovel that as well. We then moved on to the propane platform, the basement door, the stairs and the porches hoping that the wind wouldn't blow it all back during the night. After about 3 hours of shoveling and trudging around in waste deep snow, I packed up my stuff and Dave joined me for a ski across the lake and down the trail.

Even with a few feet of snow on the trail, it's a difficult challenge to maneuver through the tight trees that line the winding path. The added cushion of the fresh snow was nice to have and although it took a while for us to finally get that big winter storm, I'm glad it came and hopefully there will be more to come.

End of the Season

2009-10-22T16:11:00.014-04:00

A lot has happened over the last couple months in the huts. Summer crews came and went, fall crews took over, hot meals were served, BFD's were performed, Junior Naturalists graduated, fall foliage crept in and is now quickly leaving, injured hikers were assisted, evening programs were given, walls and floors were scrubbed, Mountain Watch data was collected, friendships were made, the latchstring was always out and now the 2009 full-service season has come to an end. Below are some images that will help capture the latest happenings in the huts.

Guests eating dinner and enjoying the view at Lakes of the Clouds

Berry pies being prepared for the evenings dessert

AMC's Search and Rescue Team carries an injured hiker out with Twin Mt. Fire Dept.

A Lakes crew member scrubs the hard to reach areas before closing

A Construction Crew member makes room for the next propane cylinder to be flown up

Mizpah crew members serve hot soup to hungry guests

First snow of the year. Huntington Ravine from Pinkham Notch

A full moon rises over Mizpah

The last pack out

Madison Carry Out

2009-06-29T22:14:00.015-04:00

Hut crews have a number of responsibilities, one of them is to participate in search and rescues for lost and injured hikers in New Hampshire's White Mountains. Last week the Madison crew had to carry a thru-hiker who injured his knees, 3.9 miles down the Valley Way Trail, it was a long day.

It started on Monday with the crew getting a report that a thru-hiker, Doug, was moving very slowly towards the hut and needed assistance to get there before dark. It took two crew members no more than 20 minutes to reach Doug on the Gulfside trail but, after hiking from Georgia to the Northern Presidentials, his knees could no longer carry him and it took 2.5 hours for them to return to the hut. Doug spent three nights at the hut resting his legs, icing and trying to recover so that he could make the trip down and go to the hospital under his own power. On the third day, Doug and the crew realized he wasn't going to be able to walk out and that he would need to be carried.

Jesse, the Huts Field Supervisor, and I started coordinating the carry out from Pinkham and then hiked up a litter to the hut on Wednesday in preparation to start carrying after breakfast the next morning. While we were up there, we had the chance to visit with the crew, eat a delicious ham dinner, watch a spectacular sunset and meet some great guests which included a group of firefighters from New York City who were hiking to Lakes the next day. We got to bed early knowing that it would take all of our energy to carry
Doug's 185 pound frame down the trail.

With just 9 people, we started at 8:30am on Thursday morning. Ideally you have 12-18 people on any litter carry but we knew we had many AMC volunteers and NH Fish and Game officers coming up the trail to meet us and we wanted to get a good head start. The trail was wet, steep and very narrow at the top making it slow going. We switched out carriers every 5 minutes as arms and backs got tired quickly but, we made it down the steepest section, "the thousand yards," in a little over an hour to meet our first relief team.

As the trail widened and more helpers met us, the pace picked up and things were moving like clock work. Spirits were high as the rain had cleared for the first day in over a week, we had plenty of help and Doug was as patient as he could be, despite the bumpy ride. We arrived at the trail head after 4.5 hours of backbreaking work, which is pretty good time for the Valley Way. Unlike the other volunteers who took the rest of the day off, the Madison crew did not have much time to relax as they had to be back to the hut by 5:00pm for dinner. With no surprise to many, they made it back up in about an hour and a half.

Moving In

2009-06-10T13:31:00.013-04:00

Below are some photos of the Lakes of the Clouds crew hiking to the hut for their first time. When they arrived at the hut on Sunday afternoon, a volunteer crew had done a great job at starting the opening process but, the crew had three days to prepare the entire hut for the summer season which meant long days of scrubbing all surfaces, counting food and kitchen items, organizing displays and the library, and getting mentally prepared to host and serve a different group of 90 guests every day for the rest of the summer. Happily, I can say that Lakes and the other seven huts are now open for the summer and so far we are off to a great start.

Leaving Mt. Washington Summit in high winds and cold temps.

Crew members getting used to their packboards

Lingering ice on the lake

Front coming in from the west

The crew enjoying a short break from opening on one of the last snow fields

Hut Crew Training

2009-06-09T09:57:00.010-04:00

The 2009 full-service season is here and we had another great kick off to the summer. Below are some photos of our first week of training up at Mizpah.

Crew members making their way up the Crawford Path

Preparing a meal using fresh baked bread

Alex DeLucia teaching crews about rock stair construction

The Carter crew making their first food requisition

Sharpening musical skills for morning wake up

Ream Team '09

2009-05-13T18:47:00.012-04:00

Every year during the first week of May, an elite group of experienced hut men and women ventures out to Mizpah, Greenleaf and Galehead to scrub, bleach, wash, sweep and "ream," the huts to prepare them for the summer season. This year, the crew of seven consisted of Gates Sanford, Taylor Burt, Amelia Harman, Dominique Dodge, Dave Weston, Jesse Billingham and myself. We have all worked in the huts for years and know what a well functioning, clean hut should look like. This experience and knowledge is important because upon our arrival to these huts, they looked far from how they should. For seven days, we were tasked with turning these cold and empty buildings into the classic AMC huts that we know and love.

A typical two day reaming of a hut starts with us arriving in the early afternoon, hungry and tired after a technical walk through high streams and deep snow, posting holes every other step for the last mile of trail. We walk into the hut to see a mountain of unorganized, labeled boxes covering the dinning room tables from the airlift the week before and feel slightly overwhelmed knowing the amount of work ahead of us. The AMC's Construction Crew is there taking the shutters off the windows, hooking up the water and making sure that all systems are in working condition. After finding a bunk for the next two nights and a snack of peanut M&M's and Ruby Red Grapefruit juice, we tackle the attic and kitchen simultaneously.

Half of the crew starts moving the dishes, pots, pans, cooking essentials, library books, guest logs, cleaning supplies and miscellaneous boxes out of the attic where everything is double bagged in trash bags to stay clean and dry over the winter. The attic is then scrubbed, floor to ceiling so that all of the food currently on the dinning room tables can be organized and stored for the summer. While this is happening, the crew in the empty kitchen is scrubbing and preparing to receive and organize all of the supplies that are sitting in limbo somewhere between the attic and kitchen. What comes next is, scrubbing and organizing of the bunk rooms, dining room, library, bathroom, crew room and basement. Posters and displays are hung, pillows are fluffed and blankets folded, retail items are inventoried and stored behind the desk and then the caretaker is left to finish the remaining work as the Ream Team moves on to the next hut.

As could be expected in early May, the weather did not cooperate this year but, spirits were high as we all knew that the summer season was just around the corner. Stay tuned for new posts on summer training and opening week.

Winter in the huts

2009-03-18T11:13:00.026-04:00

A winter hiker crosses Lonesome Lake with Cannon Mtn. in the background

Lonesome caretaker Erica Marcus doing some daily snow removal

Winter wonderland at Hermit Lake Shelter in Tuckerman Ravine

Zealand Valley, Whitewall and Carrigain Notch

Carter caretaker Dan Cawley enjoying his evening by the fire

Residents of bunk room 3 at Lonesome Lake sign their names in frost

A Mountain Classroom

2008-10-10T12:31:00.013-04:00

Staying in a fall hut is a different experience than visiting in the summer. The cool, dry weather and brilliant foliage provides some of the best hiking conditions of the year. The huts start to get slower and there are times where it may just be you and a few other people enjoying the whole hut to yourselves. But, the weekends are still busy with full houses and hikers out enjoying the trails one last time before the winter weather hits the peaks. Another special part about the fall is that you may notice many groups of school aged kids, teachers and AMC instructors in the huts who are participating in a program called A Mountain Classroom.

A Mountain Classroom is an AMC program that brings students from Northeast schools into the outdoors to give them a deeper understanding of the natural world. Once the school season starts in the fall, there are many groups in the huts and I was able to spend last night with one group from St. Johnsbury, Vermont.

The hut was filled to capacity and the weather couldn't have been nicer. In groups of 10, the students, AMC instructors and teachers hiked up the Crawford path to Mizpah while learning about forest ecology, geology and Leave No Trace ethics. They arrived just before dinner, feeling happy about hiking the 2.7 miles which for many was the longest hike they've been on. Dinner was hot and plentiful and well received by all. After finishing dessert and clearing tables, the groups listened to stories about the constellations, looked for them through the partly cloudy sky and then wrote and shared their own stories of how the constellations were made. In the morning, they took a tour of the hut and observed our green technology and practices at work, then made the hike back down to Crawford Notch to go "back to school."

Although this was not your average school setting, there were lessons learned in the woods that could not have been replicated in the classroom. To see 50 young people learning about the outdoors and themselves, helping each other, looking up to their instructors and hut crew, and to see them enjoying this unique opportunity is a rewarding feeling. I am happy that the AMC is able to provide this opportunity for over 4,000 students every year and it was great to be part of it last night.

Beginning of the End

2008-09-18T20:05:00.021-04:00

This week marked the beginning of the end of the 2008 full service season with the closing of Lakes and Madison and the return of Carter to self service for the winter. The fall season was short for these huts, only 3 weeks, which was just enough time for the crews to move in, get comfortable and then endure the difficult task of closing the huts for the winter.

The process of closing a hut actually starts about three weeks before the last night it's open. Extra food is used up, boxes are collected and saved, and walls are scrubbed. This is all a build up to the last day they are open and then all hands are on deck for three straight days of floor to ceiling cleaning and emptying out the hut. Everything from mattresses, to walls, floors, refrigerators, pots, pans, sinks, and bathrooms are scrubbed by hand to ensure a clean hut is left for the opening crews in the spring. Some years this is done when it is 35 degrees and raining while other years like this one, the weather is warm and sunny with just enough breeze to dry everything out. Once all of the kitchen supplies are dry, they are bagged and stored in the attic and everything else (food, blankets, recycling) is stacked in a pile by the door to be airlifted out.

While the hut crew is busy cleaning, the construction crew takes down weather instruments and wind generators, completes last minute projects, disconnects pipes, and finally boards up all the windows and doors. It's a real team effort for those few days and when it is all over with, the hut is empty and ready for a long cold winter.

Although the high huts are closed until 2009, Mizpah, Zealand, Galehead, Greenleaf and Lonesome will be open for full service until October 18th. There should be plenty of cool weather hiking and foliage viewing before the snow comes so get out there and enjoy the fall.

Past and Present

2008-09-01T16:03:00.020-04:00

If you have visited Greenleaf, Galehead, Zealand, Mizpah and now Lakes of the Clouds, you have probably seen photos of hut crews packing Garland ovens, donkey's on the Old Bridle Path, "Ma and the boys" at Galehead and numerous photos of young people with smiles on their faces loving their jobs. Recently I visited Lakes of the Clouds with Doug Hotchkiss, an active member in the OH Association to install picture frames from the most recent OHA photo project.

The OHA is a club that has been in existence for more than 75 years with a membership of old hutmen and women who have worked in the AMC's hut system. The club owns a cabin in the White Mountains, holds annual dinners and gatherings and helps contribute to AMC capital campaigns. One way that the OHA has contributed to the huts is by collecting old crew photos, framing them and donating them to the huts to be hung on the walls for all to see.

Doug and I spent one morning installing 16 picture frames that were generously prepared by another OH, Sally Baldwin. The photos that now hang in the hallway of Lakes date back to the early 1930's and go all the way up to our current crews. Although some are more than 70 years old, the photos of the past and present look remarkably the same. We still have a tradition of taking crew photos every year and though clothing and styles have changed, the hut crews of yesterday and the ones of today both embrace the hard work, hospitality, tradition and spirit of the huts. To be able to see a 20 year old crew member and a 60 year old OH share the same stories of epic raids, back breaking pack days and some of the best experiences of their lives proves the greatness of hut work, the people inside them and the never changing majesty of the huts. With our summer season now over, another generation leaves the huts to be writers, environmentalists, doctors, teachers and to become OH. Just as we remember the Hutch's, Cog's and Ev's of the '30's, we will remember the Big Wrig's, Lavey's and LT's of this generation, whose photos will someday be hung in the halls of our huts and whose hard work, commitment and spirits will be remembered forever.

Summer Views

2008-07-15T18:54:00.025-04:00

It's been a while since I have made a post but don't worry, I haven't abandoned the blog. Actually, it has been quite the opposite as I have been getting out to as many huts as possible visiting Hut Crews, meeting hikers, eating some incredible food and enjoying the summer all so that I could report back here with some good material. Although this time, instead of writing about it, I posted these pictures to tell the story of what's been going on in the huts and I'll get back next week with some more.

	A group of hikers at Galehead playing music after dinner.
	Greenleaf Hutmaster, Hillary Gerardi, preparing heart shaped, raspberry jam filled, shortbread cookies.
	Graduation ceremony for Lonesome Lakes' newest Junior Naturalists.
	Galehead crew warming up for their morning wakeup call.
	A family enjoying hut ghost stories at Mizpah.
	A moose who wanted to join me in fishing at Lonesome Lake.

Summer Training

2008-06-07T13:03:00.033-04:00

The last few weeks have been busy to say the least as the 2008 full-service season is finally here. This is certainly a milestone as we have been planning and preparing for this since mid-November when we chose our Hutmasters and assigned huts for the summer. After spending the winter planning every detail, the hut crews are out there, the huts are open and the summer season is under way.

We kicked the season off with a week of training for all 49 crew members who are working at the eight huts this summer. Everyone took a Wilderness First Aid course if they weren't certified in it already, we learned about the AMC, White Mountain National Forest, and spent three days at Mizpah covering everything from cooking to guest service, search and rescue, interpretive resources, education, green technology, trail maintenance and of course how to successfully perform a Blanket Folding Demonstration.

For some, this was their first Gala (as we call it) and for others this was their third, fourth or fifth. For the hut crews working this summer and for the many who have worked in the past, life in a hut is more than just a summer job, much like staying in a hut is more than going to a motel on the side of a mountain. The community created in the huts by the people inside them is something which draws both crews and visitors back year after year. The huts are great facilities located in some of the most beautiful areas in the Northeast but, the spark, energy, humor and hospitality of the staff inside them makes the house a home. I saw the spark last week during training and I hope that you get the chance to see it this summer too.

Below are the 2008 Summer Hut Crews (missing Galehead which is coming soon)

Carter
Madison
Lakes
Mizpah
Zealand
Greenleaf
Lonesome

Lonesome Lake Renovation

2008-05-02T08:59:00.022-04:00

For the past three weeks the AMC's Construction Crew has been hard at work renovating and updating the bunkhouses and main hut at Lonesome Lake. The bunkhouses were built over 40 years ago and were due for some serious rehab. This project is two-phased: first, bigger windows, new doors and metal roofs were installed this spring and in the fall new pine paneling will be added inside the rooms as well as cedar shingles for the exterior.

These renovations have been more than just repairing a few old hinges and window sills. Each room has been outfitted with new windows and doors installed specifically to increase the amount of light in each room. "More light in bunkrooms" has been a common request from guests but we have had to balance this with the unique energy concerns of the huts. Instead of simply putting in more light bulbs, we've opted to install much larger windows, plus doors with window panes. We've also put in translucent fiberglass sheeting above the porch to further increase light flow into the area around the bunkrooms. Hopefully, guests will appreciate the additional light and the significant energy savings of these efforts.

The people responsible for this work are the AMC's Construction Crew. Based in Pinkham Notch, they do most of their work in New Hampshire and Maine but recently have done jobs as far away as AMC's Mohican Outdoor Center in New Jersey. Their duties run the gamut from fixing leaky faucets to running major construction projects. They are active in the frontcountry and backcountry, often spending long days to keep the club's facilities running well and in good shape.

Their efforts often go unnoticed; quietly adjusting a solar panel or monitoring the Clivus composting toilets are not particularly glamorous affairs but, without their hard work, the Huts simply would not exist as they do today. Last year, for example, the Construction Crew spent many weeks digging near Carter Notch Hut, installing a new septic system. No backhoe or heavy-duty excavating equipment - instead they moved massive boulders and an incredible amount of dirt by hand.

Of course, not all their work is of the backbreaking (and mind-numbing) variety. Many of the senior staff are highly skilled welders, architects, plumbers, carpenters, and electricians who have worked for the AMC for decades. The quality of their craftsmanship is the best testimony to the caliber of their skills and although that craftsmanship is often understated, hopefully you'll remember it when sitting down on Galehead's porch or climbing into your bunk that they built on site, often without the aid of equipment we take for granted in the valley.

Spring Skiing

2008-04-12T19:20:00.022-04:00

With all of the snow that we have, the natural thing to do is enjoy it while it's here. For those that like to do this on skis or snowboards, the past two weeks have been perfect. Since my last entry, the weather has been warm and sunny, drawing thousands of spring skiers to Mt. Washington and Tuckerman Ravine to earn their turns and enjoy some of the best terrain in the east.

On one of those warm, blue bird days, a group of us decided to take advantage of the weather and go for a ski. We hiked up the Gulf of Slides Ski Trail to the main gully where Zealand Falls Caretaker, Anthony Brezzo, is pictured contemplating the ski down. The hike up was steep but the ski was fast and rewarding. Looking to get over to Tucks, we hiked up the Boot Spur Gully and then skied down Hillman's Highway where Jesse Billingham is pictured. We got some water and a snack at Hermit Lake and met up with the caretakers Chris Fithian and Luke Ingram (shown hiking into the bowl). We finished the great day off by skiing down Right Gully and the Sherburne Ski trail to Pinkham Notch to show off our sunburns and rest our sore legs.

There have been many people of all abilities enjoying this great spring ski season and making trips like our own. If sliding down steep snow with boards on your feet while avoiding rocks and crevasses is not your idea of fun, there are plenty who simply sit on the rocks, do some people watching and soak in the sun. This past weekend saw over 4,200 visitors at Hermit Lake for the first 70 degree Saturday we've had and for the Tuckerman Inferno which is a run, kayak, bike, hike and ski race. Chris, an accomplished telemark skier finished with a first place time on the ski leg of the Inferno at just over 17 minutes up and down Left Gully while Luke, the USFS Snow Rangers, the Mt. Washington Volunteer Ski Patrol and many other volunteers were busy with crowd control, answering questions and pointing out hazards.

Looking out my office window at the snow covered Tuckerman Ravine Trail, the 4,000 plus crowds are gone but there are still many determined people with skis on their backs to get out and enjoy the snow. Check out tuckerman.org for the latest conditions and warnings and outdoors.org to get info on staying at the Hermit Lake Shelters. Although you may not have seen snow since February and you might now be more interested in playing golf or tennis, we still have plenty of snow and great skiing so come on up and enjoy it while you can.

Return of Spring, and the Blog

2008-04-06T11:48:00.020-04:00

Spring is a time of change, new beginnings and the time to get ready for a busy summer in the huts. As the new Huts Manager, I will be continuing what Mike started with the Huts Blog, making posts as regularly as possible to keep all updated, informed and entertained.

On most days, it still feels like winter here in the North Country but, there are small signs of the coming summer. On my most recent visit to Lonesome Lake Hut, I arrived on a warm spring night with temperatures in the mid 40's and alpenglow on Franconia Ridge. When I left in the morning it was in the 20's, snowing, and summer couldn't have felt further away.

For those of you who haven't been to the Whites this winter or haven't heard, we've had quite a bit of snow. So far, this has been the second snowiest winter on record in Concord, NH and more accurately one that parents and grandparents will tell you is at the top of their list too. The huts have seen their share of snow requiring an addition to our Lonesome snow stake (pictured at 74 inches), burying trail signs and making snowbanks higher than the roofs. Our caretakers at Lonesome Lake, Zealand Falls and Carter Notch Huts have all been busy shoveling roofs and walkways, clearing solar panels and building Hulk-like back and arm muscles.

Lonesome Lake Caretaker, Avery Miller, who has 7 seasons in the huts under her belt is shown performing some delicate snow removal from the solar panels which allow us to run our lights, fire system, radio, pumps and refrigerators while being completely off the grid. Jesse Billingham, Huts Field Supervisor, is pictured shoveling off the bunkhouse roof and digging out the windows in preparation for the Lonesome renovations this April which will include new metal roofs, bigger bunkhouse windows and a new fir floor for the kitchen and dining room.

Although I love winter in the Whites, I am ready for warm weather, leaves on the trees and fresh baked hut bread. Jesse and I are busy preparing for the summer season and Greenleaf, Galehead and Mizpah will be open for self-service in less than a month. For more information on the huts and to make reservations go to outdoors.org. Look for more posts to come and we'll see you out there.

Tropical November

2006-11-29T16:27:00.002-05:00

The snow conditions have changed a lot in the Whites since I last wrote. On the Sunday after Thanksgiving it was warm enough to hike in a t-shirt. In the afternoon I headed up the snowless Tucks Trail to the Hermit Lake Cabin. The last few holiday hikers were headed for the parking lot and long drives home.

Just before sunset I hiked into the Ravine. I was alone in the giant cirque. In late November the floor of the bowl is generally well on its way to filling with snow. This year it is instead filled with the roar of meltwater and acres of black rock.

A warm snowless November is no proof of global warming. But it does make you wonder what the Whites might look like in a warmer world. The Union of Concerned Scientists has a very interesting graphic showing the equivalent latitude NH may be at by late in the century if world carbon emissions continue to grow. Take a look.

The existence of global warming is no longer debated. That humans are causing it is also no longer debated by any legitimate scientists. Those of us who love the mountains contribute our share of carbon to the atmosphere. From the energy required to manufacture our outdoor gear to the gas fueling the drive to the trailhead there are impacts from our recreation. However, most people who love the outdoors seem to be ready to make an effort to protect it. There are many small actions that we all can take to help reduce greenhouse gases. The UCS site has a good list of modest changes that can make a big difference in your carbon footprint.

As I fell asleep I listened to ice crashing down the cliffs in the Ravine, and the meltwater roaring in the Cutler River. It sounded like spring. In November I would rather hear the sound of snow against a north window.

Each Step

2006-11-13T16:05:00.010-05:00

“Do nothing in haste, look well to each step, and from the beginning think what may be the end."

Edward Whymper, Scrambles Among the Alps in the Years 1860-1869

This time of year it gets dark early on the eastern side of Mt. Washington. The sun slides behind the walls of Tuckerman Ravine early in the afternoon. By 3:30 pm the entire cirque is in shadow, and it gets cold. It was just about this time last Saturday that Doug Millen broke his leg high on the mountain.

It is still unclear whether he fell and began sliding, or whether he was deliberately glissading. The result was the same: flying down the steep snow slope toward exposed cliffs his crampon caught in the snow. “I heard an incredibly loud snap, and I watched my leg bend backwards and my toe come up almost to my knee.”

Doug was climbing alone, but another hiker saw his fall, and descended to Hermit Lake to get help. It was Dave Kelly’s first day on the job as the new Assistant Caretaker. He quickly loaded a rescue pack and radioed down to Pinkham. As it grew dark he climbed through the Ravine.

The cold weather in late October brought a lot of snow to the higher summits, and the summer hiking trail through the Ravine was a technical snow slope. The 40-degree slope ended in sharp rocks sticking out of the snow like shark's teeth. A fall by any rescuer here would result in another patient.

Up above, Doug had dragged himself a few hundred feet before the painkilling effects of adrenaline wore off. He stopped just above a tightrope traverse across a cliff and very steep gullies. Fortunately, he was well-prepared, with a sleeping bag, sleeping pad, and a thick belay jacket. He managed to put on a thick jacket, and hunkered down against the wind. He watched as Dave made steady progress through the Ravine, and disappeared into the cliffs below. Fifteen minutes later Dave radioed to say that he had reached his patient, and that a rescue would require rope work.

While Dave improvised a splint for Doug’s leg, phones began ringing down in the valley. Stephanie Ritchie was on duty at the Pinkham Front Desk. As soon as Dave radioed from the Ravine she phoned NH State Police dispatch. They in turn dispatched Lt. Doug Gralenski from NH Fish and Game. He in turn called members of the Mountain Rescue Service (MRS) in North Conway. Stephanie rounded up AMC volunteers at Pinkham and on the phone. Most of us were thinking about dinner when the phone rang. I had just hiked out from Zealand Hut. I had to dig deep into my closet to find my winter gear.

By 5:30 the Pinkham parking lot was busy with people stuffing gear into their packs in the blue glow of their headlamps. Eric Pedersen and I headed up the Tuck’s trail along with a few Fish and Game officers. The moon was very bright, and we could see Lion’s Head and Raymond Cataract looming through the bare branches.

By 6:30 we were climbing the snow slope past Lunch Rocks. At Pinkham it was calm and in the mid-20’s. In the Ravine it was blustery and in the low teens. The wind chill was below zero. Chris Fithian, the Head Caretaker, had hiked back up from Pinkham and worked with Ben Schott of the AMC to drag a litter up to Doug and Dave. Tim Martell from MRS arrived soon afterward with rope and technical gear. He set an anchor and began planning the lower.

Though the weather was cold, it was clear and bright with moonlight. From where the litter was anchored you could look over your crampon points to the floor of the Ravine, 300 feet below. You could watch the headlamps of rescuers moving uphill in twos and threes through the dark boulders far below.

Alain Comeau soon arrived with Travis Piper and a number of other MRS volunteers. Alain is an accomplished climber and guide. He is an expert on high-angle technical rescues, and teaches these techniques to guides, EMS professionals, and military special forces. The MRS members scamper around on steep ground as if it is level. Within 30 minutes they set up a traverse line for the litter, and began moving Doug down the mountain. With several lives depending on their rope work, the MRS members have no room for error. Working in the dark they triple check their work, and back up each connection to the ropes. They must strike a balance between being extremely safe, but also moving quickly in the cold. Within an hour and half they had moved Doug off the dangerous terrain, and below treeline.

We stopped briefly at Hermit Lake to warm the foot on Doug’s injured leg. Then it was back out into the cold to sled the litter down the Sherburne Trail. The snow here made the work a lot easier, and we all talked about what great skiing it would make. Taking turns pulling the litter on flats and rises, and restraining it on the downhills we made it down to the snowline. Only a few hundred yards from parking lot Lt. Gralenski met us with a Forest Service 6-wheel ATV. This carried Doug the final feet to the Pinkham pack-up room. As we carried him through the door I looked at my watch, it was 12:30am.

Edward Whymper’s often-quoted warning to climbers can’t be quoted enough as winter arrives. The margin for error in the mountains is never great, and in the winter it closes almost completely. Doug took a chance by climbing alone, but he had considered “what might be the end” by bringing a sleeping bag and extra clothes. The end of his mis-step was a nine-hour night rescue and orthopedic surgery to insert a rod and pins. Over 30 people from 6 groups were involved in the rescue. Though Doug will not be able to climb Washington again this winter (he runs the NE Ice website – neice.com) he will recover to climb next winter. Given the fall on the Matterhorn that inspired Whymper’s warning, he was lucky.

The Snow Report

2006-10-29T18:45:00.003-05:00

The season for hiking in sneakers and shorts with a water bottle and a candy bar in your pack is over. On Thursday I hiked up to Hermit Lake to check in with the new winter caretaker. In Jackson the sun was coming through my kitchen window. But, looking north I could see a thick cloud bank sitting on Mt. Washington. As I hiked up the Tuckerman Ravine Trail it turned from mud, to slush to knee-deep powder snow. At Hermit Lake the wind was piling up snow in 4-foot drifts. The caretaker Chris Fithian reported that he hadn't seen the the Ravine wall in 4 days due to the clouds of blowing snow. It was in the mid-20's with a windchill near 0.

It was not long before an older gentleman arrived at the caretaker's cabin in jeans, a cotton sweatshirt and wet sneakers, inquiring how far it was to the summit. Chris did his best to introduce the topics of clothing, trip planning, and the wisdom of altering plans to fit the weather. He described the messy, miserable, viewless hike with all its post-holing (some into streams) and floundering. However, the gentleman seemed to be looking for a Shakelton-type adventure, and he headed out into the wind. Soon after two well-equipped hikers from Quebec came into the cabin. They had spent the night at Hermit Lake, and tried for the summit early in the morning. They spent an hour and a half just getting to the base of the headwall. The snow was very deep, and even with goggles it was impossible to see through the spindrift.

Today I headed up to Mizpah Springs Hut. On Saturday Mt. Washington recieved 4.5 inches of rain, and over 10" of snow. The trail was knee-deep mud in some places, and crusty snow in others. The crew was closing the hut, and cleaning up after a flood. All the rainfall and melting snow on Saturday created a flash flood in the hut. Water had come rushing in under the front door of the hut and soaked the first floor. During the night, however, everything froze up again. Today it was in the 30's in the hut, and the crew worked fast to stay warm.

I had to leave early to make it to Crawford Notch before dark. The wind had picked up, and there were new blowdowns across my footprints from the morning. They were the only ones on the Mizpah Cut-Off. Heading down with my hood up I could hear the gusts coming over the ridges to the west before they hit. It's a cold sound, the hollow roar of wind through a forest without leaves.

In the Notch it was snowing, the flakes melting on the pavement, and reflecting in the headlights of passing cars. A few miles down the road and down in elevation it was raining. Late fall in the mountains...

Talking About the Weather

2006-10-25T15:07:00.002-04:00

The weather is turning up here. After a warm and sunny September and early October it has grown cold. On Friday night the summit of Mt. Washington had wind gusts over 130 mph. Down in the valley 50 mph winds snapped large trees off at the base of their trunks, and took down power lines. One line fell on a car causing it to explode and light up two others like a summer movie special effect.

These photos are from my Monday morning commute to Pinkham. People who don’t live in the Northcountry sometimes find it quaint or simple that small talk here revolves around the weather. But as winter comes on the weather becomes worthy of discussion. By June when it stops snowing (see May posts for proof) we’ll have the Red Sox to ease us into conversation.

Masting

2006-10-25T14:45:00.003-04:00

It has been snowing up high in the Whites. As the snow comes the full-service huts shut down. This past Sunday the cooks at Greenleaf, Galehead and Lonesome flipped their last pancakes of the season. It was cold and spitting snow as I headed up to Galehead. I stopped to watch the flakes fall on a stand of mountain ash and down into the river. The ash is falsely named because it is actually a member of the rose family. It is a shrub, albeit a big one. Birds love its berries. They stay on the tree through the winter giving wintering birds an important food source. Almost as if they were waiting to make ice wine most bird species will wait until after the first frost to eat the berries. By then the starches will have turned to sugar.

The mountain ash are rioting this year. Or, as biologists call it, masting. In the photo you can see that the trees along the riverbanks are red with clusters of berries. In a normal year each tree would have less than half as many berries. Oaks do the same thing, periodically producing huge crops of acorns, and thus many fat squirrels, and thus many sleek and fat foxes.

Humans invented the computer, but we have not yet been able to understand how or why trees mast. We don’t know what triggers the ash by the front porch at Pinkham to sag with berries in the same year as these trees along the Gale River. Scientists have observed synchronous masting in individuals of identical species on different continents. An oak in southern Sweden will produce the same unusually large crop of acorns in the same year as one in New Jersey. How that can happen is as little understood as black holes in space. Humans are clever, but insight is a different quality.

Up the mountain past the ash the trail was covered with snow. The Garfield Ridge Trail runs along the northwest side of Galehead Mountain. Already the sun is low enough in the sky to keep things frozen.

At the hut, though, the crew was staying warm cleaning. As part of closing the hut all the walls and ceilings in the hut are wiped down with bleach diluted in water. Christina, Ben, Maia and Eliza were in the dining room with their rainshells on and a water balloon slingshot in their hands. The ceiling of the Galehead dining room is too high to reach by hand, so they were firing balloons of bleach solution.

Closing a hut is a bit like selling your house then needing to clean it and move out in two days time. After the last guests leave the crew ties the 200 wool blankets into bales of 5. They will airlift these out to be washed over the winter. They vacuum out each bunk and scrub the bunkboxes and mattresses. All the remaining food from the attic is moved downstairs to be handy for the airlift out. Every surface in the kitchen is scrubbed. This year’s crews were lucky with the weather. All the kitchen utensils need to be perfectly dry before they are bagged and stored in the attic. The warm afternoon sun made the work easier. Last fall we instead had sleet, freezing rain, and 70 mph winds during the days of closing. However, at night it got cold. Inside the hut it was in the 30's and the crew took turns sitting (or lying, like Maia Pinsky, photo) in front of the ovens after dinner.

For Maia the season was ending where it began. Almost six months earlier she was here cleaning Galehead for the opening of the season and hanging the “Welcome” sign. After the hut closed she had a ticket to Costa Rica and a month of traveling. After that, she didn’t know. Maybe ski out west, maybe find a “real” job.

Most of the fall crews are in the same situation. Just out of college they have a lot of uncertainty before them. Many are facing it for the first time in their life. The structure and schedule of school is gone. Figuring out why Mountain Ash mast can seem as likely as figuring out how and where to live their lives. Though not a “real” job by most mothers’ definitions, hut work requires skills that are in demand everywhere. Creativity, self-motivation, and a sense of humor can be applied with equal success to investment banking, evolutionary biology or ski bummery. I wish them all luck.

People With Three Names who Climb Rainier

2006-10-20T15:19:00.001-04:00

Long ago, early in the summer I wrote a post about Hillary Marlena Gerardi, the Vermonter who fell while packing. Here is an update. With a kneeful of stitches she crutched up the Lonesome Lake Trail. She limped around with a knee immobilizer on her cookdays. A few weeks after her injury Hillary summited Mt. Rainier with a group of fellow Middlebury students. Here is a photo she sent of her group on the summit:

I have also included a picture of someone with a name equal to Hillary’s: Lieutenant August Valentine Kautz. Lt. Kautz was a military man, born in Germany and buried in Arlington National Cemetery. If you Google him you will find that he fought Indian tribes around Puget Sound in the 1850’s. He was then sent east to fight in the Civil War. By the end of the war he was leading a regiment of black soldiers. After the war he spent more time fighting Indians on the New Mexico frontier, and died in Seattle in 1895.

His would not be an unusual American life for the frontier days, were it not for his climb on Mt. Rainier. In 1857, during a lull in skirmishes with the Puget Sound tribes, Lt. Kautz and a few of his men set out to climb Mt. Rainier. They spent 7 days approaching the mountain through thick rain forest. As they reached the foot of one of the mountain’s many glaciers they ran out of food. They began climbing anyway. On July 15th, they climbed most of what is now considered a technical route. By late afternoon Kautz’s companions had turned back due to exhaustion. August continued on to within a few hundred vertical feet of the summit. By then it was after 5pm, and the weather was deteriorating. Anyone who has ever been alone on a mountain of any size late in the day under dark clouds can imagine how Kautz felt. What is harder to imagine is climbing a crevassed glacier and 40-degree snow slopes in soaked wool clothes and leather-soled U.S. Cavalry boots.

The glacier August Valentine ascended is now named for him. It is a good moderate mountaineering route, and most parties climb it with ropes, crampons, ice axes and modern clothing.

It was 1870 before two more Civil War veterans, also with excellent names, summited Rainier. Hazard Stevens and Philemon Van Trump climbed the mountain via the Gibraltar Route. August, Hazard, Philemon, and this season from the huts, Hillary Marlena.

*special note: Andy Hale, a fall Hutman at Greenleaf was a guide on this trip, and is pictured on the right in the summit shot (behind the camera strap blowing in the wind)

Emergencies

2006-10-06T13:45:00.000-04:00

EMERGENCIES

Last week I took some vacation time after a busy summer. I left Eric Petersen, the new Huts Field Supervisor alone at the helm of the Huts Dept. He had a stormy week.

On Tuesday evening Benny Taylor, the Greenleaf Hutmaster, called him at 11pm to report that Luke Ingram, her Assistant Hutmaster, was having a seizure. Luke had no history of seizures, or any other medical problems. After the seizure stopped he was groggy, and could not remember anything after dinner that night. His crew stayed awake with him through the night while Eric talked with doctors at the ER in North Conway, and NH Fish and Game Officers. In the early morning Luke had another seizure. The original plan was to carry Luke out. But at 6’2” and 190 pounds Luke is one of the largest crewmen in the huts, and would have been a very slow carry. After the second seizure Fish and Game officers called the NH National Guard to request an airlift by a Blackhawk helicopter.

However, a fog bank blanketed the west side of the Lafayette Ridge during the early morning. Members of the AMC Trail Crew, the Lonesome Lake crew, volunteers from the Pemi Valley Search and Rescue Team, and NH Fish and Game officers all ran up the Old Bridle Path to stand by in case Luke needed to be carried down.

However, around 9am the fog lifted just enough for the Blackhawk to hover near the hut. One soldier was lowered on a cable, and Luke was lifted up into the helicopter. The Blackhawk pilots and flight crews have flown hundreds of combat missions in Iraq. As Lt. Todd Bogardus of NH F&G told me “Those guys are good. They have flown in such tough situations that as long as no one is shooting at them they’re happy to fly anywhere.”

The Blackhawk flew Luke down to the Cannon ski area parking lot, where an ambulance waited to take him to the hospital in Littleton. After two days of every test available in modern medicine, and a consultation with a neurologist, Luke was given a clean bill of health. The doctors said that dehydration and a sodium imbalance could have caused the seizures.

The following Wednesday Eric had to rush to the Lonesome Lake Trail to help with another rescue. Dave Weston was cooking at Lonesome Lake that day. He had a few day hikers in the hut during lunch. He sold bowls of soup to a group of hikers who had ridden the tram to the top of Cannon and who were now hiking down. Half an hour later Dave got a report over the radio that one of them had suffered a heart attack less than a mile down the trail. Dave arrived within minutes and helped the man’s hiking partners with CPR. Eric ran up the trail along with a Lincoln Police officer carrying an AED. Unfortunately Arvindkumar Pancholi had suffered a massive heart attack and nothing could be done. Luke Ingram came over from Greenleaf to help carry Mr. Pancholi’s body down the trail with the same NH Fish and Game officers who had helped him a week earlier.

Medical emergencies are the most stressful situations the hut crews can be placed in. Broken ankles, head injuries, and other traumas are more obviously treated. All the hut crews have a minimum of Wilderness First Aid training, and many have Wilderness First Responder or WEMT certification. However, they are not doctors. The huts can feel very remote during a medical crisis when the ER is hours away by trail. The crews can only do their best, and then hope for the best.

Closing Time

2006-10-06T13:38:00.002-04:00

Mt. Washington recorded a trace of snow this week, and just in time Lakes and Madison will be closing for the season. Winter comes to the alpine zone early. The dwarf birch are yellow, and the sedges are a the color of rust. The diapensia are turning back to the same purple and maroons that I wrote about back in May.

Eric Pedersen, the Huts Field Supervisor and I headed to Lakes and Madison early this week to help with the closings. After the last breakfast is served the crew starts bundling the wool blankets. At Lakes the 300+ blankets are tied into rolls of five and readied for the airlift. All the dishes, pots, pans, utensils and kitchen supplies are washed, dried, and stored in plastic bags. Every wood surface in the hut is scrubbed with bleach water to prevent mildew growth (leading to some innovative techniques: photo). All the mattresses are pulled from the bunks and scrubbed. All the remaining food is boxed, labeled, and stacked in piles for the airlift.

For three days the crews get up around 7am, and work from 8am until it gets dark at 8pm. This year brought perfect weather for closing. Bright sun and slight breezes helped dry the huts and their contents. As the crews headed down the trail CC arrived shut off the water and gas. Then the shutters are bolted over the windows and doors. The hut is left empty to the rime ice, snow and storms of the winter.

Moose in Love

2006-09-15T16:31:00.002-04:00

Yesterday morning I woke up early with an appetite for pancakes and bacon. Before dawn I drove west on Route 302, through Crawford Notch, and up the Zealand Rd. It was cold and I used the heater in my truck for the first time since April. As I started up the trail to Zealand Falls I could see my breath.

The maples on the streambanks could feel the fall coming too. Many were already dropping red leaves into the cold water. As I made my way up the Zealand Valley the sky got brighter, and I stopped along the first pond to wait for the sun. What used to be large log yards for J.E. Henry’s timber have become marshes full of tamarack, beaver and moose.

I was almost to the hut, and thinking about pancakes and bacon again when I heard a large branch snap. I stopped on one foot and listened. From behind a screen of birch saplings on my left I heard a loud snort, and the suction sound of hooves coming out of mud. A moose. More snorts came, a few grunts, and it sounded as though he was moving off into the beaver bog. Suddenly the saplings 10 feet to my left parted as a giant bull moose came charging through them. He was grunting, snorting, and winking at me, puffs of steam coming from his huge cartilaginous snout. He was sassy and amorous. An artist’s rendering, drawn to scale, is included on the right.

Fortunately I have long experience with this sort of thing. As a 7th-grader who was slow to grow, I often faced similar situations at junior high dances when much larger girls came after me. I attribute much of my success as a middle-distance runner to those evasive sprints. Similarly, when I worked at Zealand 3 falls ago I faced an identical situation with an even larger moose.

I am not sure if my beard and lack of antlers gives the impression of a shapely female moose, or if these bulls think I am winking at their girlfriend across the bog. Either way, the result has been the same: me running full speed down the Zealand Trail with a grunting moose trotting behind.

In both cases the moose have given up the chase after a relatively short distance. Which is fortunate. If they wanted to catch me, they could. Moose can run up to 35 m.p.h., and I have seen it stated that moose kill more people in Alaska than bears, using their front legs and hooves like pile drivers. I have also read on Wikipedia that the Swedish Army tried to make a moose cavalry in the late 1600's. However, they discontinued the effort after realizing that if criminals stole these hot-rod moose they would be able to outrun police on horses. Which confirms my suspicion that online research may not be as reliable as the library variety.

Selena Humphreys, the naturalist at Zealand, has startling, but less outlandish information on moose. During her evening program at Zealand she described how moose gain 600 pounds in their first year of life. And she confirmed my observation that bull moose lose their senses during the fall rut. Years ago a bull moose charged head-on into the front of a locamotive in Crawford Notch, derailing the train. During the fall the bulls do not eat, and to attract females they scrape a hole in the ground, urinate in it, then roll around in the resulting mud. Moose in love are as irrational as any other lovestruck mammal.

Ultimately, the moose I encountered was more interested in that pursuit than fighting. I arrived at Zealand out of breath and full of adrenaline. The rutting season continues into October, so keep an eye out as you hike the lowland trails. It is hard to tell what might strike a moose's fancy this time of year.

Summer/Fall Hand-Off

2006-09-06T13:19:00.002-04:00

The transition between the summer and fall hut crews is like the baton hand-off in an Olympic 4x100m relay race. The summer crews finish their lap worn out, and hand over huts that are still running full speed. The fall crews have full houses and hams to cook the instant they arrive. The last week in August is one of the busiest in the huts, both with overnight guests and day hikers.

Growing up in Maine, “Vacationland” as our license plates say, I have had a lot of time to observe vacationers. During the last weeks of the summer their actions always take on a slight edge of desperation. Minivans careen through traffic, cutting you off, the faces of their small backseat captives pressed against the windows. At the wheel is a father determined to get to one more sight, or beach, or event on the “summer fun” list.

Though minivans are left at the trailheads the crews still encounter some of this end-of-summer mindset up in the mountains. Many of the crews dealt with exhaustion, sprained ankles or sore knees brought on by over-ambitious “summer fun” lists. Too many 4,000-footers in one day, or a dayhike better done in two…

Fortunately, fall comes just at the right time. As August ended we had a week of cool, clear weather when a Northwest wind came down from Canada. Fall is a quieter season, perfect for sitting on a mountainside, listening to the leaves fall, eating an apple, absorbing what heat the sun has left.

Once the new hut crews learn to cook pancakes, bake lasagnas, answer the question “Which trail would you recommend we descend with a 6-year old if it rains tomorrow?” and the 500 other details of running their hut, they will have some time to relax. The next race, to clean and close the hut before the winter comes, will start soon enough.

Hiking with Parents

2006-08-20T17:39:00.001-04:00

I hated to hike when I was a kid. Growing up in Western Maine my parents, Moe and Linda (photos), were forever belting my brother and I into the back of the Caravan to take us on some “short, fun hike.” No matter what the White Mtn. Guide promised, the hikes were, in my estimation, neither short, nor fun. They usually ended in a view of some water falling off some rock, some swampy pond, or if lucky, a view down onto more trees and more rocks. I was a fearful child, and always concerned that while hiking I was going to be eaten by a bear, a saber-toothed tiger still prowling Evans Notch, or a panther which had escaped the circus. Like most 6-year olds my legs were at least three times shorter than the average adult’s. Since most hiking trails are built by giant trail crew members, they are not designed for short legs. How much would you enjoy hiking if every trail had steps that were placed at waist height? Not much I suspect.

Fortunately, I and my legs eventually grew, and around high school, hiking became an attractive activity. Hiking allowed backpacking, and both these activities are generally condoned by parents when it is assumed that members of the opposite sex are not going. But there are many mountains and trails, and there can’t be a parent behind every tree. Unless someone’s little sister has told them which tree to hide behind, and on which night… My parents and those of my friends said “yes” to hiking when they said “no” to keg parties in the sand pit. Hiking and the mountains promise freedom, which type of freedom depends on where you are in life.

This weekend I went for a hike with my parents. This time they were in the back of the van, and I was headed to visit Zealand. Now I wait for them (although they still beat the book times), and I carry my mom’s pack when she needs a break. On the Zealand Trail we saw a lot of kids out on their first hikes. Their bangs were sweaty, and the bookpacks they carried were sagging to the back of their knees. They didn’t have to ask, I just told them “You’re almost there.”

“That’s what they always say” one sighed, turning his back to his parents.

At the hut, the cook, Emily Taylor, was giving out band-aids for banged shins. Her older sister Hannah was visiting from Colorado and ladling out soup to AT thru-hikers. The Taylors are family dynasty at the AMC. Their mother Dijit, worked for the AMC Conservation Department, and all three of the Taylor girls have worked in the Huts. I gave Hannah a ride back to the Nineteen Mile Brook Trail so she could visit her other sister Bethany up at Carter. She talked about her parents taking she and her sisters up the trail to fish when they were small. “It used to take us like five hours to go less than a mile” she laughed. Hannah was a Nordic ski racer at Middlebury, and yesterday she was probably at Carter in not much longer than an hour.

I hope any parents of young kids who come across this post will take it as reassurance that they are doing the right thing by dragging their kids kicking and screaming on a hike to see some waterfall, some view of more mountains, or some more trees. Almost all the kids working in the huts this summer went on hikes when they were young. It might have been walks in the woods in New Jersey, or climbing Katahdin in the winter, but they were outside rather than in. If they’re like most kids, they will hike because they have to. Then they will hike to get away from you. And eventually they will hike with you because they actually enjoy it. Of course they may also completely reject the outdoors and move to the city and make great sums of money which which they can buy you a very nice retirement house in Provence. Those of you whose kids are in the huts now can take this as a thank-you on behalf of your sons and daughters for taking them on hikes when they were small and slow and full of complaints. I think most of them have had a summer that made those hikes worth it, they just can’t buy you the French country house quite yet.

(photo note: my dad (he's the one on the left) requested a crop which did not draw the reader's attention away from the text and to his toned abs, and I edited this post to reflect that wish.)

Thunderstorm Junction

2006-08-20T17:22:00.011-04:00

Thunderstorm Junction is a well-known convergence of trails in the Northern Presidentials, marked by a great cairn. It is also the name of a hiking club from Connecticuit that makes a biennial visit to the Lakes of the Clouds Hut. Once there the groups leader, Peter Boucher, dons a crisp white shirt, pressed trousers, a bowtie, and wingtips. The group of friends, family, and friends-of-friends uncorks wine from real bottles, and socializes through dinner. Afterwards, they stack the dining room tables and the three-piece “Please and Thank You String Band" tunes up for a square dance.

Bill Walach is the mandolin player, and calls the dances. On my way down to the hut on the Crawford Path I passed him, his Father-Time beard blowing in the wind, and his intstrument case poking out of his pack. I recognized him from my own summers at Lakes hosting the group. “You look like the fiddle player” I said to him, mistakenly. “Oh no,” Bill yelled over the wind, “I PLAY THE MANDOLIN!” And play the band does; sea shanties, Irish ballads jigs and reels. During the square dances everyone dances with everyone and the floor of the hut bounces with the thump of hiking boots. The band kept playing and the dancers stomping until after 11pm. It is a great event.

As the band packed up I did too. All summer I had been intending to take a walk across the Northern Presidentials at night. I had been envisioning a stroll under a full moon with the city lights and porch lights of Maine and Vermont in the distance. As I left Lakes I realized my expectations would need some adjustment. It was cold, in the low 30’s, and a wind was blowing from the northwest in 40’s and gusting into over 60mph. The Presidentials were entirely in the clouds, and so the only illumination was the cone of light coming from my headlamp.

After 4 seasons at Lakes I can hike the Crawford Path as one of those ponys at the fair can walk in a circle. However, the route to Madison only follows the Crawford Path for a mile. Over the other 5.8 miles I frequently found myself almost losing the trail in the freezing fog. Just when I though I had lost it I would spot another cairn with a white quartz stone on the top, or a path through the felsenmeer that boots had worn the lichen from. Where the Westside meets the Gulfside Trail I could smell the creasote of the Cog Railway ties on the wind. As I hiked around Mt. Clay and scoffed at the idea that this should be called “Mt. Reagan” the clouds lifted. I could see the solitary house lights in the small towns to the west, and the moving headlights of long-haul trucks on Route 2. I could also see the bulk of Mt. Jefferson looming in the light of the moon. It looked Himalayan in its bulk. Then the clouds came back down and another gust of wind almost blew me over. I pulled my hood back on and plodded on.

For every moment that I thought “What a dumb idea this hike was” as I stumbled, lost the trail, or the feeling in my fingers, I had another moment where the clouds lifted and the waxing moon came out. Traveling alone through the night high in the mountains is sublimely beautiful. The landscape has no color, no detail, and becomes elemental. Shape, line and shadow. There are no other people. It is desolate and beautiful. The peaks tower and the ravines plunge to depths you can’t see.

Passing the giant cairn at Thunderstorm Juntion the icy mist lifted and became clouds flying on the wind above the summits. I walked down through the krummholz waving in the wind and in the back door of Madison. The hut was warm and the pilot lights glowed under the stove burners. It was just after 2:00. Compared to the wind across the rock on the ridge even the snoring from the bunkrooms sounded soft. David Kaplan heard me bumping around the kitchen and came padding out to see who it was. Satisfied that it was not another hut stealing the Madison wall decorations, or another benighted day-hiker needing a blanket (there were six already sleeping on the dining room floor) he went back to bed. I soon unrolled my sleeping bag also, and caught a few hours of sleep before breakfast, and Sunday chores.

Not Only Names in the Paper

2006-08-20T17:20:00.000-04:00

I was away from the Whites and at the wedding of a friend when I received a call from the Pinkham Front Desk. The news was that the Lakes crew was responding to the report of a man suffering a heart attack. As I stepped in and out of the rehearsal dinner to check in with Pinkham I learned that the man had died, and the crew was now carrying his body to the summit.

Once I got back to New Hampshire and talked to the crew this is the story I heard:

That afternoon was one of the most beautiful of the summer. Northwest winds had cleared out the humid, hazy weather of July, and the mountains of Vermont were clear on the horizon. At 4pm most of the Lakes crew was lounging around the lake, reading, sleeping or joking. Suddenly two hikers from Quebec ran into the hut and explained in broken English and fluent French that a hiker was having a heart attack. Because Ben Lewis had the highest medical certification he was sent out with a first-aid pack and a portable radio. Brian Quarrier was sent with him because he is a fast hiker and can carry very heavy objects. They ran up across the Camel Trail to the junction with the Davis Path. Near this intersection they found the hiker and his party.

Jean Moreau had been hiking with family members when he stepped behind a rock to use the bathroom. When he didn’t emerge after several minutes his fellow-hikers stepped behind the rock and found he had collapsed and was not breathing. One hiker passing nearby began CPR while other hikers from Quebec stopped to assist. Jean’s family did not speak much English, and they explained what had happened to the French-Canadian hikers. They ran off to report the incident to the hut crew. By the time Ben and Brian arrived over 1/2 an hour had passed. The CPR efforts of the other day hiker had been unsuccessful. Jean was blue, cold, and had no respirations or pulse. Ben, who graduated from high school in June, had to decide whether to call a man dead. Given the time elapsed and the condition of Jean’s body Ben decided that Jean could no longer be saved by CPR. The rest of the Lakes crew that could be spared from dinner came up with a litter and blankets. After wrapping Jean and placing him in the litter they began carrying his body to the summit of Mt. Washington. As they traveled up the summit cone they were joined by AMC employees from Pinkham, NH Fish and Game officers and rangers from the State Park. Down at the hut 3 crew members served dinner and washed dishes for the usual full house of 92 guests.

“What made it hard” said Dan St. Jean, the Hutmaster, “was that his family and his wife were there when we got to the summit. And they were crying and speaking to us in French. None of us could explain, or give them any answers.”

The following day the Zealand crew watched a 22-year old man drown in the swimming hole they were cooling of in along the Ammonoosuc River. Down in the valley to pick up fresh supplies the crew had driven up the Cog Railway Base Road. A few miles up is a swimming hole lined with cliffs that almost every hut crew jumps in at least once during the summer. This day the river was high and Roger Schafer was pulled into a hydraulic flow and pinned under. It was several minutes before his body came to the surface. Several other swimmers including members of the Zealand crew jumped in and pulled him to shore. They took turns giving CPR until an ambulance arrived. Like Jean Moreau, it was too late.

The Zealand Hutmaster Heidi Magario wrote me a letter to tell me what they had witnessed and been involved in. It read in part “We’re involved in Search and Rescues all the time in the backcountry, and there you know that some people may die because they are far from the hospital, an ambulance, or the emergency room. But it’s difficult to accept that even in the frontcountry not everyone can be saved.”

Ben Lewis, the Lakes crew and the Zealand crew all knew that sudden deaths happen in the mountains. But now they know it in now in an entirely different way. To them the deaths of Jean Moreau and Roger Schaefer were not AP headlines tucked inside the Boston Globe or accident reports in Appalachia. They were men with families, men they tried to help. The crews carried their weight up the mountain and the river bank.

Summer Break

2006-08-20T17:06:00.000-04:00

My apologies for not posting more regularly during the last two weeks. Things in the Huts Dept. have been extraordinarily busy and have kept me away from this web log. And I took a trip to Maine for the wedding of friends. However, I made some espresso this morning, and sat down at the keyboard to bring you some of the news of August in the Hut System…

Morning Light

2006-07-31T18:08:00.000-04:00

Photos from the a trip down the Auto Rd. after a visit to Lakes-of-the-Clouds:

MadFest

2006-07-31T17:54:00.000-04:00

Photos from the annual hut crew dinner party at Madison:

Wilderness is...

2006-07-18T11:12:00.000-04:00

What is Wilderness? If you want a lively ideological debate amongst people who prefer to be outside rather than indoors it is a good question to ask the rancher, the hiker, the snowmobiler or the mountain biker. I won’t get into it here. But I will tell you what the Pemigewasset Wilderness was to me last week: mud, bugs, and slugs.

Ana Roy, the Field Naturalist, and I headed into Galehead via 13 Falls. The ghost of J.E. Henry is here also. We hiked his old logging railbeds 8 miles from Lincoln Woods into 13 Falls. In places the ties and the corridor vanish, swallowed by the hardwoods (photo). Hiking along in the rain through dense forest it felt like an expedition along the Amazon. Once you cross the Forest Boundary the trail closes in (photo). A beaver dam has flooded one section and you have to tightrope your way across (photo). We met a moose on the Franconia Brook Trail (photo).

We left the parking lot at 4 and didn’t reach the campsite until 7. In those hours of walking I found it incredible that so few men could have cut so many trees in such a short time. J.E. Henry’s lumberjacks cut the Owl’s Head and the surrounding slopes in only three winters, 1901, ’02 and ’03. They did it with single-bitted axes, cross-cut saws and teams of woods horses. The old-growth spruce (most were 250 years or older) have been replaced by hardwoods. Unlike the granite quarries of Barre, the old shoe factories of Lewiston, or even the stone walls across New England the signs of these men’s great labor are all but gone. There are rotting railroad ties, rusting rail spikes, yellowed news of the Depression on old papers in northcountry attics (the Henry’s built a paper mill to use the smaller timber) and the frames of old factory houses on the back streets of Lincoln.

If there is a modern equivalent to the lumberjack in spirit and strength I think it is the shelter caretaker and the trail crewman. At 13 Falls we visited with Emily Meacham. We arrived in a hard rain and set up our tent. Emily invited us to cook dinner under the tarp that serves as her kitchen. As we boiled water we decided how many boxes of Annie’s macaroni and cheese we needed. With four people I thought three boxes would be more than enough “Oh no,” Emily said, “I eat two boxes myself.” That day she had done eight miles of hiking (up to Garfield, over to Galehead and back home) and eight hours of trailwork. Her current trail project includes building a rock staircase on the Twin Brook trail. To build a staircase you need stairs, and Emily has been quarrying 100 to 300 pound rocks from the woods. After this work she comes back to the site to welcome campers, point out the water, ask them not to pee in the outhouse (she has to compost the waste and it makes that work harder), and to store their food in the bear boxes. Once you hear about her day her pasta requirements are less surprising.

More adventurous omnivores would find plenty of protein among the slugs of 13-Falls. I have never seen so many. Emily finds them on her plate and bowl every morning and night. They are on the trees and under your tent fly. It is the China of slugs.

It rained hard all night. The drops were heavy and sounded like golfballs on the tent fly. I didn’t sleep much. In the morning it slowly cleared and Emily forded the Twin Brook with us to give us a tour of the falls (photos). The falls were roaring after the rain, and pools were dark like tea. Ana felt the duty to jump in, as the pools of 13-Falls are not quickly accessible to those of us from the valley.

As the sun came out we headed up to Galehead and Emily headed to her trail project. That night at the hut it rained softly as the sun set (photo). One night in a wet tent put the luxury of the hut mattresses and bunkrooms into context. I had been taking them for granted.

All Quiet on the Eastern Front

2006-07-14T16:40:00.000-04:00

On Thursday I hiked up the Aqueduct Road, hoped over the spillway in the dam in the 19-Mile Brook, and arrived at Carter just after 6pm. At the 7 full-service huts soup bowls were clattering on plates, and the cooks were barking out orders in the kitchens. At Carter a couple was reading quietly, and Bethany “Benny” Taylor, the Caretaker, was cooking a pizza. This hut is like an eccentric 92-year old man. The stone building is the oldest standing structure in the hut system, and it sees fewer visitors than the younger huts. It is worth a visit. In the ice caves beyond the woodshed ice persists through August. The ponds were once known as the Lakes-of-the-Winds. Up on the ramparts you can look down onto the fields of Jackson and the fattening pavement snake that is North Conway. There is a wildness to this Notch that reminds me of prints of the White Mountains from the 1800’s. In those prints there is an exaggeration in the jaggedness of the peaks and the depth of the shadows in the woods that is rarely matched in the actual landscape. Carter Notch is an exception. The cliffs of Wildcat rise out of the large pond in a jagged wall. Hundreds of feet above you can hear the wind scouring the rock and whistling through the krumholz.

I worked at Carter one late fall season. At that time of year the sun set behind Wildcat by 2pm, and I often went 4 days without seeing another person. It was one of the best times of my life. Solitude is a unique experience, and often confused with loneliness or exile. For the few months I lived alone by the Carter ponds I felt completely at home and content with my own company.

After eating pizza Benny and I went out to the Ramparts and watched sunset clouds sail over Wildcat like pink blimps. The porch lights were not on yet down the valley, but in the notch it was growing dark. Our four guests were already in bed. It was a typical summer night at Carter.

A Hutmaster Marries

2006-07-08T16:33:00.000-04:00

Being a bachelor, I can’t claim to know much about marriage. However, I have always felt that working in the huts gives crews good practice at married life. They learn to live with other people and share living space. They go to bed at the same early hour as married people, and they stumble around the kitchen together early in the morning. The crews that grow the closest are the ones that communicate with each other the best. Working in the huts also develops qualities prized in bachelors or bachelorettes: the skills to cook a great meal, the ability to fix things around the house, a nice figure, a sense of humor, and a sense of duty when it comes to cleaning toilets.

I imagine Shamar Whyte noticed many of these things when he met Michelle Dodge. On July 1st Shamar and Michelle married in the Jackson Community Church. Shamar is from Jamaica, and when he applied to Hobart College he thought that it was in New York City. It is in New York, but in the distant western hinterlands. Michelle is from the northcountry, the great-granddaughter of Joe Dodge. She rarely mentions her connection to the man who built the hut system, and her own rise to Hutmaster has been through hard work alone.

While Michelle finishes college Shamar has been living in Jackson with her family and selling insurance. He drives all over rural New England through snowstorms and a landscape very different from Jamaica. In the wintertime among all the white snow and white people he may be the only Jamaican north of Boston. I first met Shamar last summer after he had hiked up to Greenleaf to visit Michelle. Without exaggerating I can say that he had black fly bites as big as golf balls on his arms. He is a devoted man.

As a bachelor I generally don’t get very emotional at weddings. However, Michelle and Shamar had a very moving ceremony. Michelle’s sister Dominique spent 4 years at a Scottish conservatory studying the harp. She played a song she had written for her sister, and I finally understood why the harp is a holier instrument than the saxophone. Shamar’s family members sang. I don’t think the church in Jackson had ever echoed with voices like these. You either have it, or you don’t, and the Whyte’s have it. Their pastor was Pojen Lee, a Jackson character who comes from Taiwan. He encouraged them “NOT to become one, but to remain two INDEPENDENT people standing STRONG and upright together inside a circle of TRUST.” Shamar and Michelle are two of the kindest people you could ever meet. With Shamar’s good humor, determination and politeness, and all Michelle’s hut skills they are well-prepared for a long and happy marriage. I wish them all the best.

Photos of Greenleaf and Galehead Visits

2006-07-02T10:54:00.000-04:00

Here are some photos from recent trips to the Galehead and Greenleaf huts. The visits coincided with a brief break in the incessant rain of the past two months.

I'll be away for a few days during the July 4th holiday. When I return I'll post some photos from the recent wedding of Michelle Dodge, the Mizpah Hutmaster.

First Day on the Job

2006-06-23T18:48:00.000-04:00

A week ago Ben Lewis was stuck in Cheyenne, WY. This spring he graduated from high school, and like the Donner party he headed West with high hopes. The dude ranch in Dubois, WY (said Due-boys) where he had a job put him to work in the scullery. Instead of sage, far-off thunderclouds, and the Tetons he saw nothing but grease, baking pans, and burnt soup pots. Soon enough Ben was headed East. Somewhere near Cheyenne his Subaru died, unable to face another crossing of the Nebraska plains. His older brother Malcolm is on the crew at Lakes, and told me about his predicament. When I spoke to Ben about filling an open spot on the crew at Lakes he was about to get on a Greyhound to Denver.

On Thursday Caitlin and I hiked down to Lakes to meet him. In the valley it was overcast, still and humid. At the summit the wind was gusting past 50, driving a cold rain into your face hard enough to hurt. Caitlin and I soon found we were under-dressed in our trail sneakers and thin windclothes. As usual I considered how this poor preparation would read in an Appalachia accident report: “Despite years of experience in the weather of the White Mountains Mr. Kautz’s pack contained only some frozen waffles for the hut crew and a cotton sweatshirt.” Just as I considered turning back Caitlin and I came upon two men wearing blue jeans and plastic fishing ponchos. “Quite the weather” they said with smiles, and disappeared into the fog.

Caitlin and I bucked up and carried on, arriving at the hut in slightly better weather. The Lewis Bros. were both asleep, having spent the previous night hiking to Mizpah and back on a social visit. Before we could wake them up a breathless hiker arrived at the hut reporting a hiker with an injured ankle. I borrowed some dry pants and we put our packs back on. Fifteen minutes down the Ammonoosuc Ravine Trail we came upon the gentleman sitting with his wife.

Marshall (not his real name) was from New Jersey and hiking Mt. Washington for the first time. He had slipped while climbing up a wet ledge and slid about 8 feet. His ankle rolled when he landed. Marshall was complaining of extreme pain and a “crunching” sound when he tried to stand. His ankle was swollen and he was sure that he would not be able to walk. He was nauseous and pale. He was also 6’3” and 250 pounds.

Using a portable radio I called back to the hut for the litter, as well as down to Pinkham to ask for more carriers. The Galehead naturalist Selena happened to be visiting Lakes on her days off. She ran the radio at the hut while the rest of the crew came down the trail. We put Marshall into the litter on a foam pad and a sleeping bag. The eight of us took our places around the litter, and on the count of three, lifted him.

If you have not carried a litter before, the best way to simulate what it feels like would be to take a 5 gallon pail to the trailhead of your next hike. At the trailhead fill the pail with water so that you have 40+ pounds in one hand. To make the experience realistic it would also help to have a well-trained 30-pound beagle who could hop onto the top of the pail at the steeper sections of the trail. As the litter takes up the center of the trail you’ll need to hike in the brush on the side of the trail. All this is to say that even with a fairly light patient carrying a litter is physically demanding.

With only eight of us to carry Marshall everyone was at their limit. Getting the litter up over the wet ledges was tough. We could only move about 30 feet at a time before we had to rest. Everyone, from Brian Quarrier who is the size of a black bear, to Lynne Zummo who weighs 100 pounds, was straining, grunting and panting. We sounded like a colony of walruses trying to hike uphill.

Just as we were becoming exhausted Katherine Siner and her father arrived. Katherine is from St. Johnsbury, and her father serves in the Vermont National Guard. A few days before he had returned from a 2 year deployment in Iraq. Now he was hiking up with Katherine to visit the hut. Mr. Siner looked the kind of man you’d want next to you in a fight. He had a close crewcut and was the size of a refrigerator on legs. He had a sweat towel around his neck. He looked at the scene for a moment with his hands on his hips. Then he went to the front of the litter, the heaviest part. He grinned and said “At least no one is bleeding and no one is shooting at us.”

With Mr. Siner leading us on we made it to the hut. It took us only 15 minutes to reach Marshall, and over 2 hours to bring him back up. At the hut he made a remarkable recovery. After a physician looked at his ankle and wrapped it in a brace he found he could indeed stand, and walk quite well. He decided he would prefer to stay at Lakes for the night and rest, then walk to the summit in the morning. All of us on the litter carry preferred this as well.

After putting the litter away the crew washed up. It was 5pm and time to start making salads and setting tables for the 92 guests waiting for dinner. Ben Lewis was having a big first day in the huts, and he looked a little tired. As Caitlin and I packed our bags to leave I asked him if the day made him wish he were still back in Cheyenne. “No way” he said.

Thunderstorms

2006-06-22T09:59:00.000-04:00

Standing above treeline watching a line of thunderstorms coming can feel like standing between the rails of a freight train mainline. On my way to Mizpah I hiked the Crawford Path up to Mt. Pierce. Up on top the wind was getting gusty and the sky was black in the west. Bolts of lightning were walking east over the foothills. The few raindrops that fell were the size of marbles. I headed down into the trees and toward the hut.

Along the way I stopped briefly to admire the work of the AMC Trail Crew. Along the Webster Cliff Trail they have been replacing bog bridges, over 50 so far this month. Each plank weighs 75 pounds, and had to be carried to its bridge site from the nearest airlift zone. Bog bridges span mud pits, so setting the timbers is a muddier job than catching a wallowing pig that knows it might become bacon.

Just after I got into the hut the storms arrived. It rained so heavily that it was hard to hear the thunder over the roar of the water coming down. Tristan Williams and Heather Day burst back through the door from a day hike in the Dry River Wilderness looking like they had fallen out of a boat. Brian Quarrier arrived soon after looking dazed. He was on the ridge coming from Lakes when the lightning started striking. He sprinted across 3 miles of wet rocks and down the Webster Cliff Trail which was now flowing like a river.

My first summer in the huts I had a similar experience when a storm caught me above treeline on the Boott Spur Trail. I was carrying my skis back to Lakes so I could take advantage of the late snow in Oakes Gulf. Cowering in between some rocks I could smell the ozone from the lightning. I found for myself why foxholes and the upper slopes of mountains in electrical storms are rare places for atheists.

The storms passed Mizpah during dinner. After Dave Weston, the Hut Naturalist, gave a program on weather I headed down the trail. I was in flowing water to my ankles. Until this night I had never had a headlamp die on me in the backcountry. This night, maybe because of all the moisture, mine ceased working. It made the second half of the Crawford Path a slow walk. By staying in the water I was mostly able to stay on the trail. After 11pm I saw the lights of traffic passing through Crawford Notch. As I drove home along the swollen Saco River the stars were coming out.

J.E. Henry and Zealand Valley

2006-06-19T12:15:00.000-04:00

Tessa Stiven, the Zealand Naturalist, begins the story of the Zealand Valley with J.E. Henry. She explains that: “Despite being one of the biggest timber barons in New Hampshire, and one of its wealthiest men, there is not a single geographic feature in the state that is named after him. In his time he was despised and called ‘a wood butcher’ and ‘a mutilator of nature.’ The creation of the Forest Service and the White Mountain National Forest were in part a reaction to J.E. Henry’s treatment of the Zealand Valley.”

One-hundred years has erased many of the unintended monuments to James Everell Henry. His log-walled lumber camps have rotted, beaver have flooded his log yards, and the CCC scrapped the last of his locomotives. Along the AZ trail giant birches grow in park-like glades. Moose wander down his old railway. But, as Tessa tells the story of the landscape, J.E. Henry still throws a shadow.

He grew up on a rocky farm near Littleton in the 1840’s. When he was 15 a horse kicked his father in the face, destroying an eye. As the oldest son James became responsible for his father’s work, driving four-horse freight wagons 110 miles between Littleton and Portland, ME. There was no time for school. His father and three siblings died of tuberculosis in 1845. James began to make a living and a reputation as a shrewd horse trader. As he started his own family with his wife Eliza he tried his hand at farming potatoes, the oil business in Massachusetts, and growing wheat in Minnesota. Logging was the only venture he ever made money at.

By 1882 he had bought out his two partners and was the sole owner of a new logging operation in the Zealand Valley. Over the next 10 years J.E. had his lumberjacks empty the Zealand Valley of old-growth spruce. As there were no rivers big enough to drive the logs on he had a railroad built. Crews of Italian immigrants living on macaroni and bread chopped out roots, pulled stumps and graded gravel for the railbed. During the winter his woodsmen cut all the spruce bigger than 10” at the stump. Eventually the railroad reached 11 miles from the town of Zealand (near the current USFS campground) to Ethan Pond. His lumber was used in the construction of houses, stores and factories all over New England.

J.E. was no P.R. man. His business motto was “Do unto others as they would do unto you, but do it first” and he was quoted in a Colliers article as saying “I never see the tree yit that didn’t mean a damned sight more to me goin’ under the saw than it did standin’ on a mountain.” Had he been cutting further north, or in a more remote section of woods, he may not have been vilified any more than any of his timber-baron contemporaries. But both the Boston and Maine and the Maine Central railroads had tracks running near the Zealand Valley. These lines brought wealthy summer guests to the grand hotels at Crawford Notch, Twin Mountain, Bretton Woods and Fabyans. They passed by the town of Zealand with its steaming sawmill, immense log piles, and the stained drying laundry of Henry’s laborers.

J.E. never gave anything away. He collected and shipped the manure of his woods horses south to be sold as fertilizer. He charged his men for the equipment they broke. The food in his winter camps was so bad the lumberjacks wrote songs about it. He also decided he could make some extra money during the slow summer season by running sight-seeing trips on the Zealand Railroad.

He began these trips in 1887, one year after a forest fire, started by a spark from one of his locomotives, had burnt 12,000 acres in the Zealand Valley. While the area around Thoreau Falls remained unburnt and picturesque, the train ride in provided tourists with a clear view of the consequences of industrial forestry. In some places the fire had burned so hot that it incinerated the topsoil, leaving white granite exposed like bone.

The fires came at a time when the industry of the northcountry was beginning a shift that continues today. In 1889 the timber industry had revenues of 2 million dollars, while the tourism industry brought in 5 million. After J.E. Henry the American appetite for wood would no longer be supplied by the vacationland of Bostonians and New Yorkers. There were vast uncut forests further west and out of sight.

Tessa herself comes from one of the places that today feeds American paper mills, saw mills and lumber yards. She grew up in Victoria, British Columbia, surrounded by the largest temperate rain forest in North America. Environmentalists call BC the “Brazil of the North” for the clearcutting which happens there. Companies like Weyerhaeuser are the controversial modern counterparts to J.E. Henry.

In his excellent history “J.E. Henry’s Logging Railroads” Bill Gove, a retired forester, offers a defense of his subject. He writes, “Henry was one of those rare individuals who came from a poor family background and through personal drive, dogged determination and clever manipulation built an empire worth millions. The resource was there in front of him; the market was there demanding the product; all he did was put them together.”

As I hiked down the Zealand Trail in the morning fog I thought about the history of the valley. Before breakfast I listened to Tessa and Steve practice their morning wake-up song behind the hut. The building is almost swallowed by the forest (photo). The Zealand Trail follows the railbed that spruce logs on railcars once rolled down. The forest is returning. However, somewhere else it is being cut. Patches of Tessa’s home forest will become cardboard boxes, catalogs, pressure-treated porches and bleachers at baseball fields. The market will always demand product, and a company will be there to take a profit. We make the market. And where trees mean more, on the mountain or under the saw, is not a question to be asked only of the logger.

Garfield Ridge, Hutmen, Mothers, and Stitches

2006-06-09T08:59:00.000-04:00

Nathaniel Goodrich, one of the men to cut the Garfield Ridge Trail described the route as “a horrible mess,” “an awful tangle” and “Also there were bugs.” Hiking the ridge trail today is easier than crawling through trackless spruce thickets, but it is still a route with a Puritan character. The hike is hours of toil for two revelatory views of wilderness.

I left Greenleaf around 5:30am and climbed Lafayette. The diapensia are in full bloom on the mountain (photo). From the old foundations of the summit house Galehead looked distant (photo), and I regretted eating only a candy bar for breakfast. The wind was cold and carried a few drops of rain. I kept my pack on and kept walking, down over all the false summits of Lafayette and into the spruce. A few miles later I emerged from the green tunnel onto the top of Garfield. After three weeks of wet weather the Pemigewasset Wilderness is as emerald and unbroken as a rain forest.

I continued on to Galehead and arrived as the crew was cleaning up the breakfast dishes. Selena, the naturalist, was away, and so the hut was in the hands of three boys (photo). Nate Lavey of Dunbarton, NH was looking sleepy after cooking breakfast. James Wrigley, of Lexington, MA was hutmastering, which included aerating the waste in the composting toilets with a pitchfork, and then filling out a food order for the coming week. Dan Cawley, of Conord, NH was getting ready to hike out with a load of trash and the week’s paperwork.

Before 1970 only “hutmen” worked in the huts. Women (“Hutmen F’s” they were dubbed) were only hired in desperation, as during WW II. Now, most summer crews are an even split between hutmen and hutwomen. Nate, James and Dan are the kind of guys who don’t mind not having girls around. Not so they can be crass and lockerroomish, but so they can order Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, Kraft Cheese Singles (in the little plastic wrappers) and hotdogs as their three special foods for the week. Which they took advantage of Selena and Shaila’s absence to do…

While I was at the hut Nate mentioned that he had not called his mother since before Memorial Day. I suspect that any regular readership this web log sees is composed of mothers. Specifically crew mothers who are hoping the posts or the photos will give them some better idea of what their sons and daughters are really up to. As their boss I am equally interested in what they are really up to. Thus far this season I have only caught them doing what they should. Mrs. Lavey, in case Nate has not called, he is well. On my visit he had made some delicious pancakes. He favors wearing an old pair of brown shoes and pants with the legs rolled up. I’ve posted a photo of him beginning his bread dough for the day.

After breakfast at Galehead I hiked down the Gale River Trail. The population of the forest understory has shifted already. The trout lilies have disappeared, flowers, leaves and all. The trillium have also vanished. In their place are lady slippers, in both pink and white (photos). The blue-bead lily is also out (photo) with starburst-yellow flowers that will later become a blue berry.

I got a ride back to Lafayette Place, where I parked the day before. As I arrived the two-way radio began crackling with word of an injured hiker on the Lonesome Lake Trail. I started up the trail, again wishing I had eaten a heartier breakfast. Half a mile up I came upon members of the Lonesome crew bandaging a bleeding hiker. As I got closer I realized the hiker was one of the crew.

In the middle of several packboards and backpacks was Hillary Marlena Gerardi. Despite a name fit for a South American novelist or poet she is from the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont. On her way down from Lonesome with a load of trash she rolled her left ankle and fell. Her right knee smashed down on a sharp rock. “I could see white” she said, “I think that was my patellar tendon.” Dave Kaplan, visiting from Madison, had bandaged up her knee, while Andy Patari ran back to the hut for a litter. Hillary was stoic, but I could see how scared she was that this might end her season at the hut. Later in the summer she has plans to climb Mt. Rainier with a group of Middlebury College students. Sitting on the trail, holding her knee together, she was shivering a bit. Erin Robson, the assistant hutmaster, cut the arms off her sweater to add to the bandaging.

The bleeding slowed, and Hillary is not too much heavier than a packboard with a few turkeys, a case of eggs and some frozen vegetables. With six people carrying the litter she was in the parking lot in less than 10 minutes. A few of her crewmates drove her to the Littleton Hospital ER. The doctor sewed up her knee, and sent her home with an ankle to hip knee immobilizer. After a few days at home she hobbled up to the hut on crutches.

After the litter carry I went back to Pinkham and did paperwork.

Quiet Night

2006-06-07T08:56:00.000-04:00

The huts have always served meals “family-style.” During the early weeks of June this phrase is especially accurate because the groups of guests are family-sized. On Tuesday I stopped at Greenleaf for the night. There were only three guests on the books. With the official start of summer still two weeks away, and many schools still in session, these will be the only slow nights of the season.

Eric Pedersen is the Hutmaster at Greenleaf. I call him Mr. Pedersen because when he interviewed for a crew position three years ago he arrived in a tie and blazer. He served the guests while Christina Arrison (known as Cricket) ran the kitchen. Geoff Graham washed the occasional dish.

After dinner the three guests and all the crew went to Maia Pinsky’s evening program on bogs. Eagle Lake, just below the hut, is actually a bog. Its water is acidic and low in nutrients. Some plants, like the sundews and pitcher plants, have turned to carnivory. They trap and eat bugs. They live like grouchy Yukon hermits, eating whatever comes to their doorstep.

In the evening Geoff and Cricket sang Irish folk songs (photo), and everyone went to bed early.

History through Botany

2006-06-06T13:57:00.000-04:00

Halfway between the summit of Mt. Washington and the Lakes-of-the-Clouds is a stretch of felsenmeer. Felsenmeer is an old onomatopoeic German word for “rock sea.” It is more economical of breath than “unstable boulder field” (important while hiking), and more poetic than “jumbly bunch of rocks.”

During a trip to Lakes on Monday I stood in the middle of this plain of broken rock, watching the clouds open and close like curtains across the view to the west. Under my feet I could hear water running. Under this felsenmeer are the headwaters of the Ammonoosuc River. The water flowing under your feet and under these unbalanced boulders will also flow past small towns (Sugar Hill Station, Lisbon, Cold River), sawmill towns from the log-drive days (Bellows Falls, Turners Falls, Holyoke) and concrete cities (Springfield, Hartford). Along the coast between New Haven and New London it will roll past Poverty Island and Saybrook Point, out into Long Island Sound.

Standing above treeline in the Whites is like looking at fossilized bones in a museum, or the depressions worn into the stone stairs of a old cathedral. For a second you can almost grasp how much time extends behind you. Then a gust of wind hits you, the clouds come down, and you move on.

As Nancy Slack and Alison Bell note in their Field Guide to the New England Alpine Summits (just republished this year by the AMC), the alpine zone really is a museum. After the Laurentian Ice Sheet retreated much of New England would have looked like this alpine tundra. Sedges and shrubs clung to the rocky till while katabatic winds blasted down from the retreating glaciers. These plants grew as far south as Georgia. 13,000 years later you need to drive 500 miles north to Labrador to see these arctic plants at sea level. Or you can hike the Presidential and Franconia ridges. If you are a Mainer you can head to Katahdin. If you are in Vermont you can climb Camel’s Hump, or cross Lake Champlain to the High Peaks of the Adirondacks. Each of these small islands are outdoor exhibitions of what the Eastern landscape looked like when the global average temperature was only a few degrees Celsius cooler.

The first hikers on Mt. Washington came to name the alpine plants. While Darby Field climbed it in 1642, no one regularly walked high on the mountain until naming plants in Latin became a popular pursuit for Boston scientists. Carl Linnaeus’s system for naming organisms started a race to discover and classify new plants. In the early 1920’s the tundra of the Presidentials was the Wild West of American taxonomy.

The names of the botanists are as well-known to any hiker as the names of the presidents. Boott, Bigelow, Oakes and Tuckerman. Jacob Bigelow’s life was big enough that Googling him 127 years after his death brings up enough websites filled with accomplishments to make one feel distinctly lazy. A member of the Linnaean Society he taught science at Harvard. This included the “useful arts,” which he decided would be better named “technology.” He wrote a three-volume guide on medical botany and developed a new printing process for the illustrations. Jacob thought the deceased should have a pleasant place to repose, so he founded the Mt. Auburn Cemetery. This cemetery is often cited as the first landscaped public space in America, and the blueprint for all subsequent garden cemeteries. Bigelow is buried there, along with other famous Americans from Fannie Farmer to both Oliver Wendell Holmeses.

Many of the plants he and the other botanists came to name are in full bloom. Rhododendron lapponicum (Lapland rosebay), diapensia lapponica (Diapensia) and loiseleuria procumbens (Alpine azalea) are all blooming on the slopes of Mt. Washington. As the rosebay’s latin name indicates, it is rhododendron, albeit a small one. Like an SUV compared to a hatchback, the smaller plants require less energy to run. Look at the AMC’s Mountain Watch website, or pick up a copy of the Slack and Bell field guide at one of the huts to learn more.

Go soon. The communities of diapensia, Lapland rosebay and alpine azalea are most beautiful during the next two weeks. Also, global warming can be an abstract concept while shivering in a cold fog above treeline. However, these plant communities will not survive a significant increase in yearly average temperature. Go now.

Neither Rain, Nor Boots

2006-06-03T17:27:00.000-04:00

Today it rained hard in the Whites. It was also a packday for the crews. Each Wednesday and Saturday everyone but the cook ties a load of trash and recycling onto their packboards and heads down the hill. At their packhouse they meet a truck from the storehouse and exchange their trash and paperwork for new paperwork and fresh supplies. In these boxes among other things: cheese for lasagna, bacon for breakfast, and clean towels for the kitchen. The packboards weigh 10-15 pounds, and the packloads anywhere from 30 to 100.

I drove over to the Madison packhouse to deliver some necessities that didn’t make the airlift. On Route 2 I had to keep the wipers on high. The tractor trailers headed east threw walls of water across the yellow lines. At the packhouse Beth Weick, Nate Blauss, Karen Thorpe, Catherine Klem and Taylor Burt were untying soggy loads of cardboard and trash. Beth is the Hutmaster and a former competitive figure skater. She is short and tough. Nate hiked the AT last year and began working at Lakes after his hike ended. He does not like overheated feet, so he hikes in sandals. All 2,174 miles of the AT, and all his packing in the huts (photo). Taylor is the Assistant Hutmaster and just returned from a trip to the Antarctic. Karen is the hut naturalist, a Mainer and a marathon runner. Catherine is new crew, and once rode from Crawford Notch to Hanover on her bike while carrying a whitewater kayak on her head. Left to cook at the hut was Dave Kaplan, who just graduated from Cornell with a degree in mechanical engineering. Before working in the huts Dave used to spend his summers doing high-level research with lasers at MIT. He also has helped design race cars and off-road trucks which drive themselves.

I handed over a 10-gallon cookpot, a box of kitchen knives, and 2 mattresses. The eight pillows, two trash cans and 10 plates needed are still on order. The crew was shivering as they tied the boxes on the boards. “We won’t be cold on the way up” Beth said. Then they hoisted on their packboards and walked into the rain.

Lonesome Again

2006-06-02T18:23:00.000-04:00

Today a visit to Lonesome gave me the chance to ride my motorcycle across the Kancamaugus Highway. The clouds were low and dark, but the rain never came. In Franconia Notch the sun was shining on the Cannon cliffs.

Up at Lonesome the Hutmaster Erica Marcus was training a new cook. Justin Rowe was cooking for 5 guests, including a 2-year-old (photo). The new food storage space and crew room is a huge improvement. Angel and Chris (see prev. post) are to be highly commended for their work. The crew has made themselves quickly at home. The room is scattered with boots, hiking clothes, backpacks, and books. The new windows have a view of the lakeshore and the Franconia ridge. This room should make a comfortable year-round home for the summer crews and winter caretakers.

Two Ships

2006-06-02T07:55:00.000-04:00

Yesterday from the summit of Mt. Washington we could see but not hear the helicopters circling the Lakes of the Clouds Hut. I had never seen a hut airlift from above before, and the whirling striped blades of the ships made them look like hovering dragonflies. With the windows of good weather closing the helicopter company put two pilots and helicopters on the Lakes airlift.

Caitlin, Ana and a high school senior from Maine named Anthony (he was doing a day of job shadowing with me) ran down the mile and a half of rock to the hut to help. When we arrived the two helicopters had just dropped two nets, 1,600 pounds of food, outside the crew door of the hut. Brian Quarrier, a first-year crewman from New Hampshire was at the nets, tossing 60-lb boxes of canned tomatoes through the open door. Inside the hut the Lakes crew formed a fireline up to attic and was passing boxes in a frenzy as if the nets were a pet shelter on fire and the boxes were paraplegic cats. Here I also saw something I had never seen. The weather at Lakes was as warm as it ever gets, in the low 60’s, and the crew was sweating right through their heavy double-kneed canvas Carhartt work pants. Shivering at Lakes is common, sweating is not.

The rest of us soon overheated too. With two ships flying there was just barely enough time to clear the landing zone before another net came in. Adding to the challenge Lakes received further renovation this spring. Thanks to a generous donor the hut has new mattresses, new blankets, and new pillows. Each bunk now also has a small shelf and multiple hooks.

However, all the bedding arrived in the midst of the food. One helicopter began dropping mattresses on the far side of the hut, while the other continued dropping food at the crew door. Now half the crew worked to move 110 mattresses inside, and bulky 70-pound boxes of wool blankets. The boxes of pillows felt like containers of air by comparison.

This continued for 3 hours. On each trip back down to the valley the helicopters lifted out construction material, human waste, and cardboard. A bit after noon one helicopter landed and picked up the CC top crew. They disappeared into clouds to the west, headed for Zealand.

The Lakes crew sat down to a quick lunch. The following day their first guests would arrive, and the hut was still a long way from ready. There was still a day’s worth of work organizing and cleaning the hut. The hut store had to be organized and hundreds of t-shirts counted and folded. The bunkrooms were waiting to be assembled and swept.

As Caitlin and I hiked back to the summit we thought about our own seasons spent opening Lakes. Each year has its own particular challenges. My first season the hut was still buried under snow and we could walk onto the roof where the front door was. We spent two days shoveling out the windows and doors. Caitlin once spent three days with her crew and putty knives chiseling off varnish from all the hut walls. It had been applied in the fall and started flaking off in the winter. These are the experiences that form the hut crews for the bigger challenges in the summer to come.

2006 Crew Photos

2006-05-30T18:08:00.000-04:00

For posterity, photos of the 2006 summer hut crews (Carter to follow)...

Spring Training

2006-05-28T10:34:00.000-04:00

Unlike major league baseball teams the hut crews do not head to Florida for spring training. Instead they converge at the AMC’s Camp Dodge, just north of Pinkham. Depending on the temperature the air there is often either opaque with snow, or black flies. This year we had some of both.

During Spring Training Caitlin Gray (Huts Field Supervisor), Nancy Ritger (Senior Naturalist), Anastasia Roy (Backcountry Education Assistant) and I work like sausage makers to stuff as much information into the crews as possible. These five days are the only time the hut crews are all gathered together in one place, rather than in 8 huts across 50 miles of trail. It is our one chance to lay out our expectations of how the huts should run, and what traditions of high-mountain hospitality are most important. Among the topics covered at this year’s training: chicken pot pies, Bicknell’s Thrush, climate change, sexual harassment prevention, Mountain Watch, Appalachian Trail thru-hikers, composting kitchen waste, composting human waste, inventory at the hut store, the 15-year Forest Plan, and baking bread. That is a much-abbreviated list.

We spent most of the week up at Mizpah. On Tuesday the trail was still covered with slush and snow. I hiked up with the naturalists, Nancy and Ana. As we gained elevation we went backwards in time. The hobblebush in bloom and the leafy birch at 1500 ft. were both barely budding by 3000 ft.

At the hut I met a six-year old hiker named Autumn who was from Tallahassee, FL. When I asked her if she had seen snow before she shook her head. “Never in my life” she said with a small southern accent. She and her dad built a snowman outside the hut, then headed back down to Crawford Notch before dark (photo).

Tuesday night and Wednesday were damp days in the hut, and the helicopter could not fly. Up in the attic in the Executive Suite where Ana, Nancy, Caitlin and I slept it was raining inside. The warm air from the kitchen and all the warm bodies continually condensed on the cool ceiling and dripped onto the bunks. As we went through different training topics the assembled crews ate 16 pounds of peanut M&M’s and drank gallons of hot tea and cocoa. The kitchen was filled with steam from the cook stoves and dish sinks of hot water (photo).

The crews didn’t seem to mind. The hutmasters, assistant hutmasters and returning crews taught the rookies how to perform BFD’s (the morning blanket-folding skits) in which an egg-beater becomes a pistol in the hands of a Cog Railway-hijacking desperado (photo).
There was an afternoon of culinary school where new crews learned the basics of making 8 loaves of bread, chocolate cake for 60, and 7 gallons of soup. In the evening 2 scientists from the Mount Washington Observatory came to talk to the crews about White Mountain weather, air pollution, and climate change.

On Thursday we woke up to sun streaming through the skylights. We were able to go outside for the first time, hang out wet clothes, and absorb some warmth. Dennis of CC called on the radio and let us know the helicopter would be landing after lunch. We spent the morning doing a mock search and rescue (photos), then prepared the hut storage areas to receive 16,000 lbs. of food.

The ship landed in the small field in front of the hut and dropped off 3 top crew, along with some empty nets for outloads. For the next 2 1/2 hours the crews stood in a fireline from the door of the hut, up three flights of stairs, to the attic. The Mizpah crew stood at the end of the line unpacking cans and stowing dry goods in the mouseproof storage (photo). As always, the pilot Carl set net after net exactly out side the front door (photo).

After all the heavy lifting we were hungry for ham, which was served at dinner with all the hut fixings (soup, salad, bread, and dessert). During dessert Jeremy Eggleton, a member of the Old Hutman’s Association spoke to the crews. He worked in the huts in the early 1990’s, then spent 4 years in Africa with the Peace Corps. He is now in law school at Boston College, and spent last summer in Sierra Leone helping to reestablish the country’s judicial system. He spoke eloquently about how a season in the huts stands out even in a life full of other adventures.

Many of the huts have photos of past crews hanging in their bunkroom hallways. At Lakes a crew from the ‘60’s stands on an iceberg in the upper lake, at Greenleaf a crew from the ‘50’s contained three men and two ducks. Looking at these past crews as they were when young I think of the movie “Dead Poets Society.” In the scene I remember best John Keating walks his prep students past dusty trophy cases and fading photographs, all while whispering “Carpe diem… carpe diem…” As the training comes to a close I hope the crews understand how much work will be asked of them this summer. I also hope they will love that work, do it well, and remember it fondly.

Carpe diem.

Winter and Hut Crews Return

2006-05-23T14:07:00.000-04:00

Hello readers,

I returned from France to find that winter has reclaimed the higher ridges of the Whites. The summit of Mt. Washington has seen almost a foot of snow in the past few days and sub-zero windchills. Crossing the Atlantic yesterday the water was obscured by storm clouds all the way from the French coast to Cape Cod.

All this unsettled and stormy weather grounded the supply airlift. This means that today the hut crews will get to practice packing, as we carry canned tomatoes, 50lb. bags of flour, sugar and other non-perishables uphill along with all the fresh food. However, this is the time of the year in which hut crews are unstoppable locomotives of energy. They've just been released from weeks of final papers, exams and lectures. They will chug uphill with whatever is put in their pack, be it a turkey and a case of baked beans, or twenty pounds of bacon and six dozen eggs.

Such constructive energy is good to see. Many of the guests at the wedding I attended live in the Middle East and work as war correspondents and photographers (Ghaith Abdul-Ahad's remarkable writing and photographs can be seen here) in Iraq, Lebanon and Syria. Listening to their stories of tanks, machine-gun fights and kidnappings in the night gave me a renewed thankfulness for the peace we enjoy in the mountains.

I hope that all the New Englanders dry out this week, you can expect new postings over the weekend.

Spring Break

2006-05-14T19:32:00.000-04:00

Hello Readers,

I’ve only been at this a week, but I afraid there will be a break in the posts. One of my best friends from college is getting married in the French Alps this week, and I am the wedding photographer. When I return Caitlin and I will be up at Mizpah for 4 days training the summer hut crews. It will be Memorial Day weekend before I’m able to send more news of the huts. When I do return it will be with news of the new crews. Thanks for reading.

Flowers Like Fish

2006-05-14T19:29:00.000-04:00

Hello Readers,

Generally the last 1.6 miles of the Gale River Trail feel to me like a treadmill. During the mid-summer the canopy has closed in, its hard to hike faster than the mosquitoes, and it's hot. However, hiking on the trail in May is like strolling through a garden. The ephemeral wildflowers that grow on the forest floor are blooming. Painted trillium are everywhere, alone, and in pairs and threes (photo). The understory of hobblebush are covered with white blossoms which bob in the wind (photo). My favorite may be the shy trout lily, whose leaves are speckled like the skin of the fish, and whose flower turns its face to the ground (photo).

Once the overstory of beach, birch, maple, and ash closes over the trout lily will disappear underground. For the rest of the growing season the plant will put its energies into spreading by shoots from its main root system. Along the Gale River Trail you’ll see colonies of interconnected trout lilies. Many will be juveniles with only one leaf. Once a plant has two leaves it will begin to flower. It takes seven years for a plant to reach maturity from a seed. In the photo I’ve included you can see that the flower looks like it has six petals. The brownish ones are actually called sepals, and are the structure that protected the budding petals.

It is forecast to rain all week, but rainy days are often one of the best times to look at (and photograph) flowers. Take a walk in the woods and see what you find.

Galehead

2006-05-14T19:25:00.000-04:00

Last fall the Hutmaster at Galehead was a fellow from Goffstown, NH named Dan St. Jean. This summer he will be the Hutmaster at Lakes of the Clouds. In the fall he will start law school at NYU. One does not become the Lakes Hutmaster, or a law student at NYU without a record of excellent work. As Caitlin and I worked to clean Galehead we were reassured that we chose the right man to run the Hut System’s largest hut this summer. Everything was clean, in it’s place, boxed, bagged, and labeled. Bags with sharp objects in them were labeled “Warning! Sharp!”

I suspect the labels were made by the Assistant Hutmaster, Ashley Coltin. Ashley moved to Portland, Oregon this winter, which allegedly has a high density of unemployed college graduates. Around Christmas I received a call from a manager at Filene’s Basement in a suburb of Portland. She wanted to know if Ashley could “make it” in a “fast-paced retail environment.” As a hutwoman who had worked a summer at Madison, been a hutmaster at Greenleaf, and done a terrific job closing Galehead I told the manager that Ashley could probably run the entire store. A few weeks ago I was glad to hear that Ashley found a great full-time job in Portland which will suit her abilities.

By this point the Ream Team is a finely oiled machine. After commuting the 8 miles down from Greenleaf and up to Galehead we were able to get the attic clean, the library stocked, and the kitchen set up. The camaraderie and comedy this hard work creates is perhaps the best part of the week, and of working on a hut crew.

In the evening as we ate dinner without a tv or radio we’d tell stories. Caitlin talked about getting altitude sickness while camping in a field of angry bulls on the side of a Mexican volcano. Lynne told hilarious stories of trying to maintain and explain her vegan diet while studying in China. Maia talked about living in Colorado for the winter and skiing into the 10th Mountain Division Huts. Anastasia acted out what happened when she met a grizzly mother and her cubs in a willow thicket in the Alaskan bush. Liza’s boyfriend is hiking the Appalachian Trail this summer, and she talked about hiking in the Smokies with him. Selena told a painfully funny story about being a teenager. When she was in junior high she moved from Maine to Massachusetts and the popular girls were mean to her. One of them got an L.L. Bean windbreaker that Selena liked. Her mom overheard her admire it and ordered one for her. When she showed up at the bus stop in it all the mean girls tossed their hair-sprayed bangs at her and said “What? So you think you can be cool just by copying Lisa?” and turned away.

Time has a compressed quality during the week of cleaning in May. The long hours of daylight and the long days of work make the week seem like a month. I get to know the personalities of the cleaning crew better than people I see everyday in the valley. It is satisfying to watch the “This hut is operated for the public” sign (photo) go up at Galehead and to know how much scrubbing, sweeping and cleaning came before it. My thanks to this year’s croo for all their hard work.

Greenleaf

2006-05-14T19:13:00.000-04:00

Greenleaf is Hillary Step of the week. After some last minute cleaning we said good-bye to Dave (he stayed on to caretake) and headed down the Crawford Path (only the Mizpah Cut-Off still harbors snow). In the Notch we loaded our remaining fresh supplies (vegetables, cheese, sausage) from the Mizpah packhouse into the AMC van. We drove over to Lafayette Place and re-packed our packs with food and our now-dirty clothes. The hike up the Old Bridle Path does often feel as if it would be better completed astride a sure-footed horse. This is especially true at “The Agonies” the three bumps that precede the hut. However, with M&M’s and the promise of a good sunset driving us on we were at the hut by 3pm, and cleaning by 4.

Sitting right at treeline Greenleaf spends a good deal of the winter in a freezing, wind-driven fog. It is often the most mildewy hut, and this year was no exception. In the kitchen the black carpet was even growing on the floor. The stairs to the Greenleaf attic are more of a ladder, and the heavy kitchen pots and boxes of library books are stored upstairs for the winter. Passing these back down is a challenge, and Anastasia nearly became a cautionary tale for librarians when a moldy 70-lb box of books ripped in my hands and caught her in the chest. Fortunately, though she weighs only slightly more than the books Lynne was able to catch Ana from behind.

After this mishap I noticed the water heater's pilot had gone out. In the midst of trying to relight it I engulfed my entire head in flame. Seeing a ball of flame leap out at me was most surprising and it substantially pruned my left eyebrow, eyelashes and the hair on my left arm.

In the midst of all this excitement several former hutmasters and crew from past Greenleaf summers arrived. During their dinner introductions the hut crews often describe their future plans. However, as they move on every few summers the guests are left to wonder what has become of them.

Here is a brief update on the four of them. Alexandra “Biscuit” Bisset (photo, with Emmy) was the Hutmaster at Greenleaf in 2001. She worked at many other huts and her blond braids are familiar to perennial hut guests. After her hut career Biscuit went to pastry school at the French Culinary Institute in NYC. For the past six months she has been living in The Hague, Netherlands and working as a pastry chef. From personal experience I can tell you that she makes incredible things with butter, flour and sugar, including madeleine’s, tarts, cakes and petit fours.

Emmy McQuaid was the Hutmaster in 2003. She and her friend Naomi George (Greenleaf ’01) spent 10 months last year traveling around the world. In the fall they are both starting the post-baccalaureate pre-medical program at Bryn Mawr. Naomi currently works as a secretary at the Partner’s in Health office in Boston, and hopes to follow Paul Farmer’s work practicing medicine in developing countries.

Jess Milne was the Greenleaf Hutmaster in 2004. After the summer she moved to Houston, Texas and spent a year and a half working for a non-profit organization. This winter she returned to the Whites to caretake at the Zealand Falls hut. This spring she has been working for CC renovating the bunkrooms at Lakes of the Clouds, and opening Greenleaf.

Last summer’s Hutmaster Liza Knowles came back from traveling in South America to work on the Ream Team and caretake Greenleaf during May. With the Greenleaf Hutmasters from 2001, 2003, 2004 and 2005 all in the kitchen we had a big feast and fine sunset (photo).

In the morning we made fresh donuts (known as “D’s” in the huts). Then our guests departed and we redoubled our cleaning efforts. At each hut we swab the floors as if we were very clean pirates. Bandanas are put on, pants rolled up, and gallons of soapy water are sloshed across the floor. Maia and Selena manned the giant squeegee and wet/dry vacuum (luxuries the pirates did not have), while Lynne and Liza worked the deck brushes (photo). After getting the last dirty water with a clean, hot mop the floor is truly clean enough to eat off of.

We finished the last work as the sun was setting (photo). To the southwest storm clouds were coming in (photo), but the ridges and foothills of the Green Mountains in Vermont folded into the horizon in blues and purples (photo).

Mizpah

2006-05-14T18:55:00.000-04:00

For skiers, snowshoers, and plow drivers this past snowless winter was miserable. However, for mold in huts it was great. When Caitlin Gray, the Huts Field Supervisor, opened the door to the Mizpah attic she found exactly how great. A menagerie of mold covered the plywood shelves and ceiling with black, white and gray fuzz. The window had condensation on it. This accumulation was the result of a winter in which the temperature fluctuated between –30F and +50F in as little as 24 hours. If you’ve ever watched someone with glasses walk into a warm room on a cold day you can extrapolate what happens when an entire frozen building warms quickly. With shutters on the windows the mold had the perfect environment to spread like a living shag carpet.

CC (see previous post) precedes the Ream Team by a day or two to take all the shutters off, connect the propane and get the water flowing. They have also moved boxes from the initial airlift (which contains food for the caretaker and hut merchandise for the store) into the kitchen. Walking into a hut which has not seen daylight since October can be daunting. The airlift boxes are piled up, and the kitchen is empty. Dust covers everything. After winters like this past one with many freeze-thaw-freeze cycles there is mildew on every wooden surface. The mice have had the run of the place, and left their marks everywhere. The building has not yet warmed up from the winter, and you can see your breath.

This is where the peanut M&M’s are crucial. The first step of cleaning any hut is to find the peanut M&M’s in the pile of food boxes. After the hike up through the mud, slush and snow of the spring trails instant blood sugar is a necessity. After a hot drink, some dry clothes and 2 pounds of M&M’s, the cleaning can begin.

It took Caitlin and Lynne a few hours to remove the mold forest from the attic and prepare it for food storage. Bleachy water is the WMD for mold. While they worked in the attic the rest of the crew cleaned the refrigerators and freezers, swept and bleached the bunkrooms, unpacked the library, and cleaned the bathrooms. By the time it got dark the hut was beginning to look habitable.

The following day brought warm sun, a good breeze, and a pine marten to the front door. One of the best parts of being in the huts early is that the local wildlife are not yet expecting humans. This marten was a saucy fellow who watched us watching him from the dining room, then ran over and stood at the front door as if expecting to be let in. In past springs we were visited by Stumpy, a red fox missing a front leg who was often seen around Mizpah and Zealand.

By late afternoon on the second day the kitchen was assembled, the floors scrubbed and the bunkrooms ready for guests. While a nap in the sun was equally appealing we all took advantage of the good weather and ran up onto the ridge (photo). We hiked over to Eisenhower to see if we could find any diapensia in flower. On Pierce we saw a few mats with buds, but no white flowers yet. This time of year the mats of this plant are more maroon than green (photo). This is due to the presence of a pigment called anthocyanin. This is pigment is a strong antioxidant and helps prevent damage to the leaves from UV radiation. The dark color helps the plant absorb heat during the cold alpine spring. Anthocyanin is the same compound that turns fall leaves and apples red. In a reversal of autumn, as the last snow melts on the ridgetops the maroon mats of diapensia will turn green.

The Ream Team

2006-05-14T18:52:00.000-04:00

Hello Readers,

Each spring as the snow melts in the mountains a crew of hutmen and hutwomen head up to the huts to clean them. This team is known as the Ream Team. It is like the A-Team, but without Mr. T, and in New Hampshire instead of Los Angeles. However, like the A-Team the Ream Team regularly does the impossible. In less than 36 hours they turn a hut in disarray into a hut ready for hospitality. Over 6 days they move from Mizpah, to Greenleaf, to Galehead. This year’s team was made up of (name, home state and college):

Dave Anderson, New Hampshire, UNH
Maia Pinsky, Maine, Carleton
Liza Knowles, New York, Colgate
Lynne Zummo, Connecticut, Middlebury
Selena Humphreys, Maine, UConn
Anastasia Roy, New Hampshire, Oberlin
Mike Kautz, Maine, Middlebury
Caitlin Gray, New Hampshire, Lafayette

The following is an outline, by hut, of opening three huts in 6 days.

The AMC CC

2006-05-06T18:50:00.000-04:00

Hello Readers-

With the exception of its name, the AMC is not as acronym-laden as, say, the US Military. However, for economy of speech we do have a few. One is "CC." Around Pinkham and the Huts the Club's full-time construction crew is known as CC. For instance, when the wind generator at a hut breaks the crew will say "We need CC" and members are described as "working on CC." People are recruited to join the crew from other departments after proving themselves capable of hard work and in possession of above average common sense.

Yesterday I hiked up to the Lonesome Lake hut to check out one of CC's latest projects. This southernmost hut was once run as a hot dog stand by the state. The current project is the latest of many revisions to the old building. In this case CC is enlarging the food storage space, known as the "mouseproof," and re-paneling and enlarging the crew room. The old crew quarters were the smallest in the hut system, and the six hut crew had to share a space about the size of a minivan. It is not an exaggeration to say that in the morning they had to stagger rolling out of their bunks to avoid squashing eachother.

As you can see in the photos CC pushed the wall of the hut out over what was the front porch, and built a new and improved porch in front of that. They roofed the porch with a translucent roofing material to allow more light into the crew quarters. As the project progresses they'll add benches in front of the porch, and in a future season possibly wrap the porch around the dining room of the building.

All this work has been accomplished in less than a month. CC works long days, and they work fast. In these photos you see Chris Rice and Angel Avila working. They are good examples of typical CC. During the '90's Chris was one of the best telemark ski racers in the world. He spent summers working on CC and winters racing in the US and Europe. When he began racing he and Dennis McIntosh (the CC foreman) made their own gates out of plastic water pipe recycled from hut building projects.

Angel "Airman" Avila spent 4 years in the Air Force (thus her nickname) before thru-hiking the AT. On her hike she did a work-for-stay at Mizpah hut, and returned to work at Galehead last summer. Growing up she competed in international martial arts competitions and in the Air Force she was an ace markswoman. There are those of us at Pinkham who are not unconvinced that she may be a spy of sorts.

As I write this I'm stuffing my pack and testing my headlamp before hiking up to Mizpah Springs hut in the dark. For the next week I'll be travelling between there, Greenleaf, and Galehead with a cleaning crew. We'll sweep up the winter dust, air out the bunkrooms, and fluff the pillows before the first self-service guests arrive next Friday.

When I return I'll post a full update of the week, with photos and trail conditions.

Regards,
Mike

p.s. The Lonesome Lake Trail is clear of snow and ice all the way to the lakeshore. At that point the trail enters the shade under spruce trees and gets a bit snowy. This is likely the story across the Whites right now: dry trails where the sun has warmed the ground, and pockets of deep snow in the shade...

Spring in the Whites

2006-05-04T18:57:00.000-04:00

Hello Readers,

This week up here in the Northcountry the trees are leafing out. After a colorless, snowless winter the birches, oaks, ash, and maples are edging up the mountainsides in mobs. Late in the day the leaves are green and translucent like grapes.

It makes sense to begin a notebook of a season in the AMC's High Mountain Huts now. Like everything else in the Whites the huts come to life in the spring. On this webpage I plan to bring you the stories, photos, trail conditions, and characters of a season in the hut system. As an institution the huts are like an iceberg, and a great deal of their substance is not immediately visible. During the summer I'll try to share some of this substance, history and culture. I hope you'll enjoy the posts, and look forward to your comments.

Regards,

Mike Kautz
Huts Manager

Welcome!

2006-04-27T13:09:00.000-04:00

Welcome! This summer, join Mike Kautz, AMC Huts Manager, for a running account of sights, sounds and events at the AMC's White Mountain Huts. Enjoy!