Archive for August, 2010

This weekend will go down in history as the first weekend I have ever spent with a girl where we did not argue, fight, breakup or hurt each other. Granted, getting to this weekend was a challenge, and almost cost us our relationship not once, but twice. But when the plans were finally laid in, and we met up, it became magic.

Our weekend was supposed to consist of an overnight stay in Manchester, NH, then a day trip to Boston, MA. However, we quickly realized that a trip to Boston with all our activities would cost a huge amount of money. So we passed on that idea for this weekend and plan to revisit it again in the future. Our “Plan B” consisted of keeping the overnight in Manchester, then traveling to the Mt. Washington Auto Road.

Saturday night, we met at Bayside Bowl, then drove together to Manchester to arrive at our hotel. After a romantic evening, we slept comfortably and woke up early the next morning had breakfast, and prepared for our journey North. We checked out of our hotel and traveled I-93 North through Concord to Mount Washington. It was a long drive, taking over 2 hours, but it was enjoyable.

We reached the Auto Road and started our climb, I have never been up Mt. Washington before, let alone traveled the Auto Road. It was a new experience, and I was driving, not only was I driving the road for the first time, I was driving a new car! Deserei’s car is a 2003 Mercury Grand Marquis. Now, I used to have an old Grand Marquis so I’m used to the wide stance, but holy cow, it was tricky getting up top. The road in places is not quite wide enough for two vehicles to pass side by side, and most of the road has very sharp and deep drainage cuts at the edge of the pavement. This means that if you accidentally get too far over to road’s edge, you will either slide off the road and onto your side, or proceed to rollover down the mountainside, the latter of those most likely ending up being fatal. During the climb we stopped at many turnouts to take pictures and let the car’s engine rest, overheating is apparently a concern as the auto road has strategically placed water barrels for radiators at key points along the road. I took many photos which I will be posting to facebook and I’ll post a couple here.

The summit was over 6000 feet in the sky, upon arrival, we parked, and got out. The air temperature at the base where we entered was 71F, at the summit it was 55F and dropping, and the wind was sustained at 25mph. We visited the Tip-Top House, an old boarding building used by travelers in the old days. We also visited the Summit Observatory Building where I had my photo taken on the roof. I had my Amateur Radio HT with me and made a contact on the Falmouth repeater (W1QUI) from the summit, my signal was reported to be strong and clear at 5 watts. The station I worked was off the coast of Maine in the Saco area. I wanted to try to scan for other stations while I was up there, but the temperature and winds were becoming painfully cold so we quickly retreated back down to the summit area and quickly walked around outside the Yankee Microwave building, and the remains of the old WMTW-TV and WHOM-FM transmitter sites. I know that WMTW-TV relocated their primary transmitter and antenna to Baldwin, Maine, however I’m not sure about WHOM-FM. It appears they (WHOM) may still use the summit as their primary and backup facility, however, I did not see a blockhouse, other than the existing Yankee Microwave building. For those of you that don’t know, in early 2003, a fire broke out in the Yankee Power Building at the summit. The power building and attached former transmitter facility for WMTW-TV were totally destroyed, as was the backup antenna for WHOM-FM. I believe the Armstrong tower, and WHOM’s primary antenna were both partially damaged as well. In any case, the fire completely knocked out power for the entire summit. Because all electrical power is generated on the summit, because of the lack of power, the summit was evacuated. (During this period of the year, the only occupants were the Weather Observatory Staff). A new power building has been built, and the summit is operational again. There are still numerous broadcast facilities at the summit and even a short visit would make that very obvious. One thing I did not see on the peak was a cell phone tower. Reception was spotty at best up there.

The trip down the road took slightly less time with a little help from gravity, and we reached the base safely where we then traveled home and spent our last few hours together in Old Orchard Beach playing mini-golf.

Deserei, you are spectacular, unlike any girl I’ve ever met. Hopefully this budding relationship will only get stronger and we will both remain happy in it together.

Thank you for a perfect weekend!

-JC

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