Mt. Adams Via Airline: June 14th 2020

It has been a funny season for hiking thus far.

Plan "A" had us wrapping up all the NH48 except the Bonds, and Owl's head during the very early Spring season. Due to COVID, we didn't even consider traveling to NH (even though it is about 4 minutes away) until June. 

Our other goal for the early season (originally planned, tentatively, to happen late June) was a full Presi with Ellie. 

Anywhoo. Weeks later now, we have postponed our Presi attempt until either:

a: a perfect day where we limit weather variables for maximum safely

OR:

b: next year. the mountains are always there

Because Mrs. Ellington was a little baby last year, we made no complete summits conquests in the Northern Presis. although we did play around Adams, just enough to stick our heads above treeline. 

After a week of the weather looking like crap, we woke up the morning on June 14th to a promising looking day, and off we went to conquer Adams, and to test Ellie's skill in the boulder field. 

It should be mentioned that Eric has beef with Adams. He kind of low-key hates it, and I can't completely argue the point. Every time we have been up there visibility has been zero. The wind has been INSANE. The rocks.... So slippery. So, Eric and Adams had a score to settle. 

We headed up Airline, as we had never done the whole trail and figured it would be a *good* time and a *great* way to tick a trail off the T25 list. Many good choices. 

Anyway. As promised it was, in fact, a decent enough day. And WEIRDLY, no wind. 

Airline was decent. Then rocky. Then kind of dumb. 

You can't judge the ups by the pic

Weirdly though, after this garbage section of trail it gets pretty decent again! Trickery. 

And.... As is the case with many of these silly hills, once you get above treeline it's a bit mind blowing. On airline, you basically teeter in space and can gawk down into the ravine and make wise choices about focusing, not tripping and falling. 

Just looking up for safety

Because I was 100% not focused on picture taking, I neglected to take a single shot of any of us making our way through the boulder field. 

But let me say this. 

It was a dry day. 

There WAS ZERO, and I mean ZERO wind. 

Visibility was as good as it gets. 

And Ellie was amazing. 

And, with GLORY in our hearts. we summited. 

Then (as you can see) we descended the boulders with success, walked over to the Madison hut, and came down Valley Way because it's easier than Airline. 

Success! A great day in the Northern Peaks. As far as T25 trails go, Airline is a piece of cake. (although you can REALLY appreciate how BAD it could be if you took a wrong step....)

We barely saw any people all day, except for a decent sized pack of noisy college aged humans. The weather was amazingly cooperative. It was a great reminder about the technical/fiddly challenges of the northern peaks that you just don't see elsewhere. AND, we were both delighted with how well the puppy handled the tricky terrain. Smart girl (and, because she is only about 45 pounds, her paws didn't even take a beating.)

Stats:
Date: June 14, 2020
Mileage: 8.5
Elevation: 4,447
Time: 5:50 (probably 20+ min of taking in the scenes, etc)
Challenge level: Difficult
Dog Friendly?? Completely, until you get above treeline. If you had issues with your dog on the way to the summit you must be aware that carrying them down could be very difficult. So proceed with caution.