Presidential Traverse: Part Deux

Trip Details
Date: August 21st, 2016
Total Distance: 23.15 mi (via Trimble Outdoors Navigator Pro on iPhone 4S)
Total Time: 11 hours 19 minutes
Total Elevation: 8289 ft gained
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BishopX and I are debating attempting the Pemi Loop this year. I said we should do a Presidential Traverse first to see how he liked endurance hikes and to also see how my knee was feeling before heading out on an over 30 mile hike. The Presidential Traverse is a long, knee pounding, and soul crushing endurance hike. Last year I pulled off a complete Presidential Range Traverse, but after finishing I felt that continuing on to Jackson and Webster provided little additional value to the trip especially Webster. The sun was already setting by the time I got there and the view was not as enjoyable as a good sunny day is on that peak. So we set out on the classic Presidential Traverse, which also had us skipping Clay and Franklin.

I arrived at the Crawford Connector Trailhead parking lot around 2345 the night before, paid my fee and then tried to catch a few hours of shuteye prior to the early morning start. BishopX met me at 0515 the next morning. After driving all morning, we left his car and I drove us to the Great Gulf Trailhead parking lot. We had decided that we wanted to add some additional punishment to our traverse. We chose the Madison Gulf Trail for our ascent. This trail is listed on the Terrifying Twenty-Five trails in the White Mountains. The trail is very gradual until you read the headwall where it gets steep fast, but you make a quick ascent to the ridge. Besides one open ledge and a part where the trail merges with a stream, it is not too bad if you do not mind rock scrambling.


Even the mountains have had a dry year. The Peabody River is low.

The trail is trying to get interesting...
Sylvan Cascade
BishopX doing his best Spider-Man impression. This was the one ledge where that would justify its existence on the Terrifying Twenty-Five. Handholds were plenty, though.
A landslide off the side of Mt. Adams.
Yup...the trail goes straight up this.

Once we got on the ridge we made our way over to Madison Springs Hut and then continued on to the summit of Mt. Madison.


Madison Springs Hut

Summit Pin
I attempted an artsy photo on each summit with a summit pin. This one did not really work as it looks like I lifted the camera too far up and missed the summit pin completely. Anyway, that is Mt. Adams on the right and as usual Mt. Washington in the clouds on the left.
Looking north.
Looking towards Berlin, NH.

It was quite windy on the summit, but you could get some relief behind the rocks on the northern side of the summit. After some trail mix cookies I made, we headed back down to Madison Springs Hut where they were giving leftover pancakes away for free. Score! I love pancakes! We changed our shirts to something with long-sleeves as the wind was not dying down and then headed out. Next up was Mt. Adams.

That is more like it. Mt. Washington is still in the clouds.
Mt. Clay and Mt. Jefferson
The Auto Road with Wildcat Mountain Ski Area in the background.
We finally got on the Gulfside Trail, which would take us to Mt. Washington after the slight detour to Mt. Jefferson.

We are getting closer to those clouds...
Looking back at Mt. Adams.

Braving the wind we started to make our way off Mt. Jefferson. Things got interesting quickly. The wind was strong enough to lift my contacts partway out of my eye to the point that I had to walk for a bit with that eyelid closed to keep the contact from flying out. Once off the summit and back on the Gulfside Trail we were shielded from the wind to some extent. We had already decided to skip Mt. Clay. I was curious what the trail was like going around it. It is not as steep, but the knee pounding rocks do not go away. In future attempts at this traverse I think I will just go up and over Mt. Clay as it feels more direct. We then got cutoff by the Cog Railway.


Mt. Washington was its usual pain in the butt that it is. With the summit in the clouds, winds whipping up to 50 mph, and temperatures feeling like it was winter one may think tourists would have stayed home for the day. Nope. The summit was relatively crowded and the cafeteria was even worse. We walked around the summit area (no reason to waste time with the line at the sign), skipped the cafeteria due to the long line, and ate some lunch in the hikers room in the basement.



I was optimistic that the winds would die down on the other side of Mt. Washington, but that was completely wrong. The winds actually picked up and were likely gusting up to 60 mph. Once again my contact was almost lifted off my eye. We put our heads down and made our way to the Lake of the Clouds Hut.


We took the short trail up to the summit of Mt. Monroe.

Looking towards Mt. Washington.
Mt. Clay and Mt. Jefferson in the distance.
Looking towards the Cog Railway base station.
Looking towards the southern end of the range.
The wind did not let up and actually was gusting at such high speeds at times made it hard to move forward and as the Crawford Path stayed near the edge of the ridge you had to walk with your body tilted to keep it from throwing you off the trail. It was nasty and slowed us down quite a bit. For a third time I almost lost a contact. This was crazy. I had never had this happen before. Nevertheless, the show must go on and we continued towards Mt. Eisenhower.

Looking north.
Mt. Eisenhower summit cairn.
Looking south. One to go!
The wind kicked up again, but once we were back on the Crawford Path the trail starts to go more into the scrub and the wind was no longer a problem. The temperature and humidity were also increasing. This part of the trail has the best footing. The Gulfside Trail has horrible footing the entire length and the Crawford Path is not much better until this section where it starts to level off. Before we knew it we were on the rather dull summit of Mt. Pierce.

The multiple summit markers on Mt. Pierce.

Summit cairn.
Number two is in the books. Now to get off this mountain.
BishopX wanted to hit all the 4000 footers so he continued on to Mt. Jackson. I wanted to take the Crawford Path down since I had never traveled it before and was hoping to scope it out for future trips with Boomer. I have some real problems with the fact that they call this trail a recreation trail, but when I think of a recreation trail I expect a well groomed trail. This trail is a normal White Mountain hiking trail. Footing is okay, but not great so you still have to pay attention to where you are stepping most of the time.


Some old junk on Gibbs Brook.




A cascade on Gibbs Brook.

Overall, I was in better shape at the end of this traverse. The blisters on the inside of my big toes returned so I have to figure that out still. Starting out with the Madison Gulf Trail was a poor choice, and skipping Mt. Clay I think almost makes it more annoying. In future attempts I would go up-and-over Mt. Clay and take a standard trail (probably Valley Way) up to the ridge and Madison Spring Hut. I still see little reason to continue on to Mt. Jackson and Mt. Webster, but those two are better off done on your own where you can get a good view on Mt. Webster and actually appreciate it. They are designed for a loop hike perfectly.

The mileage is approximately off by just over a mile. Trimble Outdoors is retiring their software and service so I will have to find a new tracker shortly.

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