FOT48 2015 Wildcat D

[JustJoe]

#48408 |

This was my ninth year as a peak coordinator for FOT48. However, it was the first year
I wasn’t capable of hiking a 4K. As I do ever year, I try and pick a peak Matt needs for his
NH48 since he’s been helping me every year since 2010. Of the 3 peaks the have non-hiker access,
he needed Wildcat D so that was the choice.

Name teem this year would include my 2 youngest sons and their girlfriends, who be doing the
gondola with me. Even with the gondola, there was much to carry to the summit. 😉 The 3
others were Matt and Mark who’ve been doing this with for years now. And Peter Tingley,
who got shut out on Lafayette. Great guy, nice to meet you Peter.

I met the hikers at Pinkham at 8:30 to drive them to the WRT trail-head. I them had some time to
kill since the gondola at Wildcat didn’t open until 10:00 AM. And my sons would not be arriving til
10-10:30.

I did this for us but really for the possibility of some through hikers. I had my large back-packing
stove, 30 hot dogs and buns, the fix-ins, 3 large cans of potato stix, 1 box of Hostess Twinkies and 1 cupcakes.
Along with that the rest of the gear for the flag as I only gave the 2 10′ poles to the guys
hiking. I wanted to fly a 5 X 8 flag this year so I brought my fathers burial flag along with the 2
(us and remembrance) I always have. So even though I was taking the lift, I definitely needed help
getting all that up to the tower. My so

My sons were there by 10:20 and we were on the way up by 10:30. We got all the stuff up to the
tower and the guys with poles were not far behind us. Had old glory up about 11:40. It was a great
day but there wasn’t much of a breeze at all where we were. Dads flag is the heavy cotton style and
twice as heavy as a nylon of the same size. Just wouldn’t fly. 🙁 We ended up switching to the
4 X 6 nylon.

We had around 20 visitors I’d say. Some hikers, some by the lift. Some took advantage of the free
hot dogs, some not. There was 2 happy dogs who had a dog. 8) But what I wanted was some
through hikers. And about 1:00, 2 showed up. Extremely happy with the free lunch they got.
Sent them off with an extra can of P-Stix and pastry’s.

Great day over all. I’d looked at the weather on NOAA on all the peaks I knew someone would be on
seeing mostly sunny. Finally got around to Wildcat D and saw increasing clouds. 👿 Sure enough,
that’s what we had. We could see with binoculars the flags on Adams, Madison, and Moriah.

Took the flags down promptly at 2. Sent the hikers off as soon as we had the poles free. they chose
to descend Polecat. The rest of us packed everything up, made our to the gondola, and took the
ride down. With all the time it took packing, getting to, then riding the very spaced out gondolas, we
were not down all that much sooner than the guys hiking. We all enjoyed a beverage 8) , in the lot.
My sons headed to motels they were staying in and I drove the guys back to the Pinkham VS.

A Great day and great job by all.

Some pix of the day.

My usual stop at Chocorua lake didn’t yield much because early morning fog.

Intervale overlook.

Team Wildcat D. Back row-Peter, Jesse, Jeff, Heather, Kristen. Front row-Myself, Matt, Mark

After the flag switch.

The through hikers.

The view.

Click Pik 4 Pix

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