My annual pilgrimage to the White Mountains

[unixken]

Each October, I vacation in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. Although the colors this year are subdued due to the dry conditions this summer, it's still a glorious place to come, to enjoy the mountains, and the cool crisp October air. The weather is likely to be cloudy most of the week, and temps have been in the single-digits at the summit (though they've been in the 50's in the valley), so I don't know that I'll get my hoped-for kilted photo at the top of Mount Washington this year.

However, I did get out and about to some of my usual haunts, and had a couple wonderful encounters with some tourists in the area, who asked for photos. At the top of Cathedral Ledge (a granite cliff face popular with free climbers and ropers), I was first approached by a pair of nice ladies from Taiwan. One of them spoke very little English, and although I was happy to pose for photos with them, I felt the language barrier was too much to ask that they also take shots with my own camera. Not long after, as I was returning to my vehicle, I was again approached, this time by a couple from England. We chatted about many things, from Haggis, to the port wine casks used to age whiskey, to the story of my Sgian Dubh, and the particulars of my kilt. The woman asked her husband to take a photo of she and I. I asked the gentleman to take a similar shot with my own camera.

This first photo is my first attempt to stitch several shots together into a panoramic view from the top of Cathedral Ledge.



Here's the photo of the English woman and myself, that her husband was kind enough to take.



Hopefully, by Thursday, the weather will have improved as cloud cover dissipates some, and more photo ops materialize. Then it's off to the Boston area Friday evening, for a visit with my brother, before returning to Ohio on Sunday.

[David Thorpe]

Nice shots, Ken. The beard looks good on you!

[unixken]

Thank you, David. The view from Cathedral Ledge is facing east, with Maine just on the other side of the mountain ridge. The Ledge itself is a 500 foot vertical bluff, overlooking the Saco River Valley, at North Conway, NH. The beard is a winter thing... on in October, off in the spring. It's getting quite white these days.

[tulloch]

White Mountains - our treasure in the Northeast. Beautiful place. Thanks.

[sailortats]

That picture from the ledge has made me very homesick. I graduated from Kennett High in Conway and lived in Glen, a section of Bartlett just outside of North Conway. Dad had a TV Sales and Service store in No. Conway. I spent many a day on Cathedral and White Horse Ledges. Is the white horse still visible? There used to be excellent low bush blueberry picking at the foot of Cathedral Ledge before all of the vacation homes took over the area. We always considered the 12th of October as the height of the leaf peeking season. Sorry to hear that it is not so great this year.

Send more pics please

[Angstrom]

Not the Whites, but still NH...

Mt. Kearsarge, looking northeast.



Mt. Kearsarge, looking northwest.


Squam Lake from West Rattlesnake.




Paddling on the Pemi.







I just started hiking in a kilt -- no photos of that yet.

[JSFMACLJR]

How interesting, Ken! My younger son has just finished four days of hiking and camping in the Franconia Ridge area. He reports about 5 inches of snow one morning in the higher elevations, and very cold temps above the tree line.

Thanks for sharing.

[unixken]

My younger son has just finished four days of hiking and camping in the Franconia Gap area. He reports about 5 inches of snow one morning in the higher elevations, and very cold temps above the tree line.

Yes, it's been single-digits at the summits of the Presidential Range. Cool (high 40's to low 50's), with drizzle and fog, in the valleys. Hoping the rain holds out around sunset (or at least doesn't get any worse), as I'd like to do some moose-spotting along Rt 302 this evening, before dinner. If the weather breaks at all tomorrow, I'll be hunting down the various pumpkin displays around town, visiting several of the area's covered bridges, and perhaps stopping by the Lower Falls of the Swift River, along the Kancamagus Highway. If it were gauranteed to be nice, I'd be thinking the Crawford Notch train out of North Conway, and the Mt. Washington Auto Road (I was so hoping for a kilted shot at the summit!)

[cessna152towser]

Great pics, brings back happy memories of my holiday (vacation) in the White Mountains in 2010 which also included the New Hampshire Games. Here's a rather fuzzy shot from the summit of Mount Washington, taken on 16th September 2010.
On Top of the World by cessna152towser

[creagdhubh]

Wonderful photos, thanks for sharing. I have never been up to the New England area and would love to go someday, especially during the autumn months.

Cheers,