NY to MA. The Empire strikes back at the Commonwealth

[BlackBart]

If you look closely you can see the switchback up over Petersburg pass, the road that connects NY to MA at the summit.

wait....you have 'summits" in NY / MA...??


My son has found the highest point in Illinois. It's not a mountain, it's a "prominence".......600 feet.

[matthew1]

If you look closely you can see the switchback up over Petersburg pass, the road that connects NY to MA at the summit.

wait....you have 'summits" in NY / MA...??

I'm on board this train.

[BlackBart]

Matt and I sometimes drive over a hill or a bump, but there's no feeling of "summiting!"


(..unless you're on a bicycle.... then 100' counts as a triumph!)

[matthew1]

I got hypoxia at the top of Mt. Evans a couple years ago. Something I wouldn't have been caught dead having in my 20s.

[BlackBart]

We learned to ski at A-Basin. Parking lot was at 10,500. My dad was a geologist, and I'd help him haul the big backpack full of rock samples from the middle of nowhere as a teenager. He'd hike slow slow chug chug up those mountains....12,000, 13,000 feet.... I was bored , I wanted to move faster, run up to the next saddle, throw rocks! Then my head would go BANG BANG BANG...and I'd maybe start to black out (whee!).

It's only much later that I appreciated his steady chug chug pace up those hills. I'd blow a gasket at those altitudes now!

[BlackBart]

Now maybe (?) I'm not being fair. Mt Marcy in NY is 5344'. That's a climb.

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[volvolugnut]

We learned to ski at A-Basin. Parking lot was at 10,500. My dad was a geologist, and I'd help him haul the big backpack full of rock samples from the middle of nowhere as a teenager. He'd hike slow slow chug chug up those mountains....12,000, 13,000 feet.... I was bored , I wanted to move faster, run up to the next saddle, throw rocks! Then my head would go BANG BANG BANG...and I'd maybe start to black out (whee!).

It's only much later that I appreciated his steady chug chug pace up those hills. I'd blow a gasket at those altitudes now!

In the late 70's I skied several times at A-Basin. It was cool (cold even!) to ski above the tree line there. I did not have altitude
problems then coming from about 1100 feet in Kansas. Today I doubt I could ski anywhere.
volvolugnut

[matthew1]

A Basin is a fun place. Very "locals" place. Fun in the parking lot, fun on the runs etc. Me and friends used to snowboard down from the top of the pass, the Continental Divide. You could go down toward A Basin if I recall correctly, but we always went down the other side and shoot out of the woods onto Loveland's green trails, whooping and hollering and scaring the beginners.

[BlackBart]

Was the phrase "cowabunga" ever used?

That would be a fun road trip. I miss that place. So fun to be up above timberline.

For others, that big bowl in the distance is Arapaho Basin....

There it is on the left with some snow on it.

lovelandpass2.jpg (27.16 KiB) Viewed 2103 times

I think about my dad, taking us over this pass with a 60s RWD Ford wagon with probably two Firestone Town & Country snow tires on the back.....

DSCF6764.jpg (375.96 KiB) Viewed 2103 times

[abscate]

We lose a couple people each year on Marcy. It’s really dense woods and the weather can turn on you suddenly.

I just drove past white water junction between VT and NH. In 1996 , a Learjet on short final did a go around, pilots got confused and crashed 7 miles fro, the airport. It took 3 years to find the wreckage.