Dan Szczesny's Excellent Adventure on Mount Washington

space 1 1 — **SPACE**: It’s like being in space, the undercast, looking down, the sliver moon laughs, my inability to speak to this view leaves my tongue as numb as my hands. I brace against the howl, unwilling to abandon the rime.

The column includes snippets from Dan Szczesny’s upcoming book on Mount Washington, “The White Mountain” (available Spring 2018). Become a donor or sponsor to The White Mountain Campaign: email Dan at danszczesny@gmail.com or learn more at Hobblebush Press.

For one glorious week – full of sun, wind, rain, snow, sleet and wonder – I lived in the highest place in New England, atop Mt. Washington at the Mount Washington Observatory. I researched, interviewed weather observers and hikers, spent afternoons in the sun or the ice and I took notes for my upcoming book, The White Mountain. Here are some of my notes from my first day there, with accompanying photos.

**UNDERCAST:** The undercast grinds like horizontal water falls, pours over the ridge; breaking down into the Great Gulf, into the valley – clouds flow, turned by the deep sunset into pink and blue sheets of cotton candy. My eyes blur in the wind, or in the adulation.

dan2 — **HOLY PLACE**: This place, this holy place of steel and chains, of canned goods with dust on the lids, of scientists and madmen, of wind that can crush you in its embrace and you can’t breath from joy, and the trail signs cast shadows on the ice like a crucifix on a cloud.

dan3 — **SELFIE**: I’m no cook, but I wobble through chicken Parms and mixed veggies, I’m no mountaineer but I hike/fall down to an outcropping to bring back the ice and sun, I’m no poet but I can wax on and on about the sky. But I can see magnificent lines and history and the lineage of a selfie in a bread box.

dan4 800x600 — **FIRST DAY**: Storms ahead my friends, but tonight… tonight was a gift. I have never been on this mountain this late, witness to every ray of light against the ice and it is glorious. So on Day 1, goodnight from 6,288 and sleep well, thus ends my broadcast day.

This column brought to you jointly by ManchesterInkLink.com and InDepthNH.org

Manchester author/journalist Dan Szczesny writes a new column, ‘365 Days of Mountain Mischief,’ which includes snippets from his upcoming book on Mount Washington, ‘The White Mountain.’ (Available Spring 2018) Become a donor or sponsor to The White Mountain Campaign: email Dan at danszczesny@gmail.com or check out his author page on Hobblebush.com.

Dan Szczesny’s Excellent Adventure on Mount Washington

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Carol Robidoux