Bridge at the beginning of Jewell, Guys, you're going the wrong way :) (Photo taken at the end of the day)
Summit Weather 20-F Winds 5mph-variable
Our group today would be seasoned hikers Jeb, Karen, Bob, Dave, Bill, Stanley and myself. Actually Bill and I had planned to do Mt Roberts in the Ossipee range but when Bob suggested Jefferson, we jumped at it. We parked at the busy hiker lot below Base lodge. Folks were gearing up for the day either for a climb or for a ski. We walked up the paved road to the building at 2,700' and crossed over the wooden bridge complete with snow rail!
Jewell climbs up quickly, the trail was a hard pack, with many postholes punched deep. I wore snowshoes, Bob led the way wearing his microspikes, Bill, Karen, Dave and Jeb followed in snowshoes over the cement-like hard scrabble snow. Stanley the wonder dog of course had his usual 4-W drive with built in crampons. We each found our pace, Bill and Stanley as usual were up near the top.Jeb and Karen made up our caboose today. They had climbed all the Carter peaks the day before, so they expected their pace to be a little slower. This was only my second time on the trails this winter. Well, being a dad to a 3-1/2 year old doesn't lend much time to winter hiking. It's all good, and I felt good despite my lack of trail time. We got to the first outlook pretty quickly and just kept on trucking.
Side-hills on Clay- Hardpack crust
Pretty soon we broke out at tree-line to utterly clear and deep blue skies. There was no wind as forecasted and we all felt lucky to be out and up high on this day. We just climbed up and up, our group found it's pace along the switchback trail. We could see the Gulfside trail and somewhere nearby, began our bushwhack along the side of Mount Clay. Views were great but some haze in the distance probably kept it to a mere 75 miles or so. Not bad!
We loved our bushwhack and it was a great route. There was one tricky section where my snowshoe slipped and I quickly stopped and put on my 12-Pt crampons. This was not a great place to take a fall! Bob, Dave and Bill with Stanley had also stopped just ahead on the Gulfside Trail. Jeb and Karen showed up, Jeb said his crampon had metal fatigue and was broken. He had taken a fall just about where I had. Bob gave him one of his crampons in his pack. He had microspikes on and had felt compfortable along the sidehills.
We descended into Sphinx Col from the slopes of Clay. Karen had switched to Microspikes and found the descent a bit treacherous. She'd forgotten her crampons today. For me, it was a nice break from the uphill slog we'd had so far and the weather just continued to be perfect. Conditions underfoot were hard-crust and some ice
We began climbing Jefferson and it looked intimidating as it towered over us. At one point, some of us de-packed. I grabbed some snacks, my coat and camera and headed up. Dave and Bill with Stanley were well ahead and on their climb. I climbed much quicker without my pack and began to catch Bill, Stan and Dave. I snapped a picture just before they both made the summit. Jeb waved at us from the "Plateau."
< --BILL AND STANLEY, ALMOST THERE!
I was really enjoying my climb and just taking in the sights. Mount Washington looked huge and dominant as usual. I reached the summit just before 1pm and began taking some pictures. Winds were very light and the temp was probably 20-F. I took the usual summit shots and relaxed a bit. I'd been starving the whole way up despite a sandwhich, a coke and some gorp.
DAVE ON THE SUMMIT!-->
This was Dave's first winter summit of Mt Jefferson, there could be no better day to be up here. Bill and Jeb had finished their winter 4K last year up here. Stanley the wonder dog had missed it that day last year so he also marked it as his first official Jefferson winter climb. I imagine he was thinking more about food at that point rather than an official peak. Bob would soon join us and celebrate his first winter ascent as well. There were smiles all around
Jeb and Karen joined us up there as well as a couple of guys. We'd run into quite a bunch of people hiking the ridge on this day. The summit wasn't too crowded though and we enjoyed ourselves. I looked up at the climb back out of Spinx, we'd cut some of that elevation gain off today with our bushwhack back.
<--BOB ON THE SUMMIT!
Sometime around 1:15 we all started to pack up and head on down. Most of us were in crampons. Karen had switched back over to her Tubbs Alpine Flex which felt safer than Microspikes. My crampons acted up a bit but traction-wise, they were excellent. We were all happy and maybe a bit tired. Somewhere along the descent, Jeb proposed a climb of Washington. I was tempted, winter's official end was 7:41, would we make it back down in time?
We heard reports of very icy conditions going down Crawford and then down Ammo so if we were to add Mt Washington, we'd have to descend via Jewell. I had my doubts and I think we made a good decision not to do it on this day. I'll admit, it was migthy tempting.
We had a great hike down, we enjoyed the sidehill traverse and all too soon, had ducked back into the stubby conifer. I kept my crampons on, there was little danger of causing postholes, it was cold enough to easily stay on the hard sidewalk..
Heading Down
At our last outlook, we waited for Jeb and Karen. Our earlier friends, the Gray Jays returned and I took time to feed them some raisins and nuts. They were fat and friendly. Soon we were headed down to the brook and then that last climb and descent before the parking lot. Jeb and Karen soon joined us, they'd had a pretty amazing 4-summit weekend with the Carters on Saturday and Jefferson today.
Bill and Stanley on the summit Click Here
GREAT DAY! THANKS EVERYONE!!
