Not to be Thwarted

Hikers who happened to be on Mount Washington's Ammanoosuc Ravine Trail one humid Sunday last August were startled to see 15 members of the Dartmouth Outing Club's Cabin & Trail looking for Washington Lake. The DOC climbers were, in turn, carrying a 50-pound aluminum canoe four miles and 3,588 feet to the mountain's 6,288-foot summit.

Dartmouth students first portaged a canoe to the highest point in the Northeast as an offbeat celebration of the nation's bicentennial. In the years since, the five-hour climb has become an intermittent tradition, usually involving the same dented craft.

This year's ascent was the clubs seventh. The trip was unusual in that it followed by only a year the arduous 2002 trek that required climbers to tote a 70-pound plastic canoe with wooden thwarts. Climbers attempted to pad the hard edges with life jackets, and two peopie shared the weight on wider portions of the rocky path.

Says DOC president Joe Hanlon '05, "One object of the climb is to put a 'This car climbed Mount Washington' sticker on the canoe. Lore has it a trip is scheduled whenever the sticker starts to wear off. This year a member suggested we go, so we went."

A certain technique is required: "You have to keep your back straight, with your arms outstretched holding onto one thwart ahead of you and letting another thwart rest on your neck," says Hanlon. Bruised vertebrae and aching arms are part of the experience.

There is no Washington Lake, but the canoeists of'02 and '03, like veterans of previous hikes, did get wet. At 5,012 feet, about a mile from the summit, they took turns circumnavigating the small pools known as Lakes of the Clouds.

Again this year, someone from the nearby Appalachian Mountain Club hut asked where the group was from. "Dartmouth!" came the reply. The hut worker chuckled. "I figured," he said.

QUOTE/UNQUOTE "The ultimacy of religious beliefs for individuals can be protected only when no religious belief is given public privilege." DARTMOUTH CHAPLAIN RICHARD R. CROCKER, IN AN AUGUST 25 LETTER TO THE NEW YORK TIMES