Saturday October 10th 2009 - No One Here Gets Out Alive

We drove to Mt Washington today - the highest mountain in the eastern USA. We stopped en route in Ashland, NH. It turned out to be a picturesque old 19th century mill town, with a restored railway station, but on an in-use railway line. We parked the car across from a local eating place. Bryce, still unsure of crossing roads in the US where the ingrained "look to the right, look to the left, look to the right again" was literally life threatening, nervously made it to the other side. We had an inexpensive diner style brunch in a very homely, family run business. It was an excellent meal and a genuine, small town American experience.
We arrived at the foot of Mt Washington, at the Cog Railway station. The mountain was obscured by fog. In fact, visibility at base camp was about 30 yards. After the de rigueur visit to the souvenir shop, we queued for the train in freezing weather. After a few minutes we heard the train descending well before it emerged from the fog. Since my last visit 2 years ago, diesels have replaced some of the steam trains. Prior to that it was exclusively steam. As the train slowly passed our queue, icicles were seen to be hanging from the solitary carriage. Most of the passengers alighting were shivering including a group of Amish people of all ages. What a sight that was! They were dressed in simple clothing, mostly black and grey, presumably in an early 1800s style - truly wonderful to see.
We were second on the train and chose seats at the back near the engine. These diesels were obviously custom built and appeared to be engineered to an older, heavily constructed steam engine standard, complete with hydraulic bogies that could tilt the engine back to level during the steep ascent. The ascent was slow, maybe 10 mph at most. Bryce and I clowned around standing upright on the sloping floor, but at an obvious and amusing angle to the rest of the carriage. At the top the wind was blowing a gale (80 mph) and the wooden carriage was severely buffeted and moved alarmingly. The roof, of thin wood plank construction, flapped like a tent. For a fleeting moment, the specter of mild panic made itself known. It occurred to me that if a certain chain of events occurred, it would be quite impossible to survive given our lack of appropriate clothing. But survive we did. Moving from the train required braving the gale and making it safely inside the sole building, without slipping on the icy footpath. A trip to the summit marker, only 30 meters away was out of the question. Visibility was virtually nil. A group of hikers were sheltering inside and drying their pants and socks on the heater. Fortunately Bryce was able to view the surrounding country side from a 180 degree photo inside the museum. Many structures have been built here over the years, but most only survived 20 years or so. The current one is concrete and not in danger of being damaged any time soon.
We descended into sunshine and spectacular views across the Mt Washington valley. A steam train passed as we sat at a mid-point siding. It was a spectacular sight, but obscured at Bryce's only photo opportunity. As we were told, it takes a ton of coal to make the ascent. We had a somewhat surly cog railway guide in our carriage, preoccupied with telling errant passengers to return to their seats and sit down. At one point he was asked a question by a German (I think) tourist, but simply said he could understand them and that was that.
Once off the train, Bryce went again to the tourist shop and I informed him of my dilemma with respect to the car. Upon arrival here I'd smelt something burning near the rear wheels, so now considered that a car trip into Canada was out of the question. I'd stewed over this for some time, before deciding that the best course of action was to go to Burlington, VT and hire a car. With Bryce's navigational skills, we headed in that direction. We saw our first evidence of working farms, many with red barns of the Vermont postcard variety. As it got dark we entered Montpellier, VT, the state capital. I made about a dozen phone calls from Bryce's internet list and finally was told that no accommodation was available in the vicinity. It was the height of "leafer peeper" season and a long weekend to boot, so it wasn't surprising. As Bryce said in his blog, we headed to Boston dreading Gail's smug "I told you so". Ignoring her advice earlier in the day, we'd decided not to book accommodation.