Our trip to Lake Placid took 7 ½ hours from Toronto on a sunny but cool and breezy day. We arrived at Adirondack Loj in the High Peaks Wilderness Area at about 2:30 in the afternoon where we were warned that we might need crampons if we were heading for the peaks. Well, we didn't have crampons – could this be foreshadowing the success or failure of our summit attempt? The hike to our camping area at Marcy Dam (2360’) took about one hour. The fully hydrated stew for Friday’s dinner didn’t make the hike any easier – luckily for me I had no room for it in my pack and Chris did! We couldn't’t find a lean-to that was unoccupied so we set up camp in the same campsite as last fall’s trip (albeit in much drier conditions). There was a light rain in the morning with the temperature around 5 degrees Celsius. The tops of surrounding mountains were cloud
covered.
The conditions weren't ideal for hiking but we confidently marched on towards
Algonquin Peak anyway. We got wetter and wetter as we hiked through Avalanche
Pass, around Avalanche Lake (over a series of ladders, catwalks and boulders),
and then to Lake Colden. We began the ascent of Algonquin Peak (from 2860’)
knowing that the conditions were not favourable to a successful climb. At 3820’
the disappointing but safe decision was made to turn around. The rocks were
icy and slush covered and very slippery and would only become worse as the temperature
dropped and the angle of ascent increased. Darryl shared an interesting rule-of-thumb
with us: the temperature drops 1 deg. C every 300’ of ascent. At 3820’
we were 1460’ from our base camp. Therefore we would have lost about 5
deg. C due to altitude gain which would make the temperature about 0 degrees.
Well, that certainly explained the snow, slush and ice! Rather than risk an
injury we headed back down. Back at Lake Colden we were cold and wet and felt
we needed to find some temporary shelter in order to eat and warm up some. We
found an occupied lean-to on the far side of Colden Lake and asked if we could
share the space for a while and were thankfully welcomed. When our guests noticed
that our cold hands had trouble even removing the bread tab from the loaf of
bread they started a stove to allow us to warm our hands and told us their bear
story. Apparently a bear had pulled their food bag down from a tree the night
before and had eaten everything but what was in a small bear-proof container.
They showed us plenty of evidence to support the story. Now that we were a bit
warmer and refueled we headed back towards Marcy Dam and actually made better
time than expected. I guess when your cold and wet you tend to pass on the sightseeing
and concentrate on just getting to where you’re going. Back at Marcy Dam
with a delicious pasta dinner cooking and dry clothes on we felt much better.
And although it had been a failed summit attempt, I think we all enjoyed the
adventure and talked happily about trying again next year.