November | 2020 | Mark McPeak

November, 2020

I’ve been working through another group of mountains: New Hampshire’s “52 With A View.” Obviously, they are all supposed to have interesting summits. And, so far, they do!

Compared to my “4000-footer” series, these posts will be briefer: sharing a couple of photos and a brief description of each climb, and a few miscellaneous thoughts on current events. I’ve also been sharing some music I’ve composed and recorded during the present pandemic.

So far I’ve been writing on the theme of feeding the wrong wolf: thoughts that come to mind when I think about our society in light of current events.

This post is very out of sequence: my last post described my climb up Stairs Mountain (3,463ft), in June of 2020, my 8th of the 52. And this post relates to my winter ascent of Mt Webster (3,910ft) in November of 2020 – number 35.

Why the gap, skipping forward several months and 27 hikes? Because I’ve just recorded a video describing the climb up Mt Webster, and want to share it!

So here is a visual description of my winter climb up Mt Webster:

Here’s the route described in that video:

I had planned to climb Mt Jackson, cut across to Mt Webster on the Webster Cliff Trail, and then descend. That’s not how it worked out, as you have seen in the video…

But here’s the view from the top of Webster:

I’ve used the Native American story of the two wolves in the first few posts in this series: we have two wolves inside us – one that is good and does no harm, and the other that is full of anger and hatred. And the wolf that prevails is the one that we choose to feed. I’ve argued that our society has decided to feed the wrong wolf, and thus we are paying the price now having chosen to build a society with too much anger and hatred.

But here is some good news: the proportion of our population that feels that our country spends too much on assistance to other countries is going down, fast:

For the first time in many years, a majority of people in this country do not feel that we invest too much in foreign assistance.

A hopeful sign that, in some respect, the right wolf is getting stronger, and compassion and empathy are gaining some ground.

Stay tuned!

Here are links to other posts in this series:

All posts in this “52 With A View” series will be collected here.

There are three other collections of posts on this blog:

— I’ve been writing and recording a series of songs, with the general theme of the COVID-19 pandemic. As each is finished, you’ll find it here. Hope you enjoy them!

— Check out my “Everest Base Camp” series: four friends and I hiked from Lukla to the Everest Base Camp in November, 2019. It was incredible, spectacular, and very challenging.

— And don’t forget to visit my “New Hampshire 4000-Footer” series, for reflections on a career in international development and social justice, along with descriptions of climbing the 48 highest peaks in our state!

November, 2020

I’ve been working through another group of mountains: New Hampshire’s “52 With A View.” Obviously, they are all supposed to have interesting summits. And, so far, they do!

(In fact, as I write this post I’ve climbed 35 of these mountains, so I’ve fallen behind writing them up. But now the climbing season is coming to a close, so perhaps over the coming winter I’ll catch up!)

So far I’ve been writing on the theme of feeding the wrong wolf: thoughts that come to mind when I think about our society in light of current events.

I climbed Stairs Mountain (3,463ft), in the Crawford Notch area of the White Mountains, on a beautiful, buggy, day in mid-June 2020. I had climbed Mt Crawford earlier that day, aiming to climb three of the 52-With-A-View summits on one hike – Crawford and Stairs, plus Resolution. My plan was to stay that night at the Dry River Campground, and then rendezvous with Eric to do some more climbing in Crawford Notch the next day. In retrospect, that was a bit ambitious…

From Mt Crawford I continued on Davis Path, reaching the junction with Mt Parker Trail at 1:30pm:

It was a beautiful, sunny and clear White-Mountains afternoon. After one short wrong turn – at the junction with Stairs Col Trail, and involving some unfortunate loss, and regain, of altitude – I reached the fantastic views at the top of Stairs Mountain just before 2:30pm.

From there, here’s the Presidential Range is in the middle distance:

Now I would retrace my steps to the junction with Mt Parker Trail, and hike across to Mt Resolution before heading down. So far it had been a fantastic day, with spectacular views north towards the Presidential Range, but I was getting a bit tired. And there was still one more summit to go that day!

Jean has been posting videos on YouTube this year, showing Durham’s old reservoir across different seasons. I wrote and recorded short compositions for her last two – mid-Autumn Reflections and mid-November Reflections. They may be welcome in these anxious times…

Here are the two audio files:

And here are the two videos:

These could be your moments of zen!

Here are links to the other posts in the “52-With-A-View” series:

All posts in this “52 With A View” series will be collected here.

There are three other collections of posts on this blog:

— I’ve been writing and recording a series of songs, with the general theme of the COVID-19 pandemic. As each is finished, you’ll find it here. Hope you enjoy them!

— Check out my “Everest Base Camp” series: four friends and I hiked from Lukla to the Everest Base Camp in November, 2019. It was incredible, spectacular, and very challenging.

Mark McPeak

"Peace is not the absence of conflict. Peace is the ability to cope with conflict" – Gandhi

Monthly Archives: November 2020

Mt Webster (35) – A Hopeful Sign?

Stairs Mountain (8) – Two Quiet Interludes