Roadtrip 2011

I can’t count on AT&T for anything. They can’t get a cell signal into my house. They can’t keep one away while on vacation. I checked the coverage map on their website before leaving. It said: no coverage north of the notch. It lied. The kids are regularly getting four and five bars everywhere. Dagnabbit. Rather than be frustrated with each other, we’ve come to a compromise: no phones at mealtime or during an activity, no headphones in the shotgun seat. It’s a start. Of course, the iPhone battery will provide a natural consequence to over use because I’m holding fast to my no-car-charger policy.

New England Weather is many things, predictable is not one of them. That’s why a forecast for clear skies atop Mount Washington led me to shuffle the schedule and make our drive up the Auto Road a day early.

The drive started out nicely enough, but my anxiety about the road rose with the altitude. I was driving a vehicle with which I wasn’t entirely familiar on a narrowing road without guardrails cut into the side of a mountain. The narrator on the audio tour we were given at the start of our ascent wasn’t helping with stories of how the road was made and tales of people losing their lives on the mountain. I finally had to turn it off.

At the 4-Mile marker, we were still only halfway up and approaching tree-line. My sweaty palms were now firmly glued to the wheel at 10-and-2 just like they teach in Driver’s Ed.

What came around the corner ahead was worse: the pavement ended. The road became a dirt trail most of the remaining distance of our trek. Everyone fell silent as we all held our breath until reaching the summit parking lot.

A gasp and collective sigh of relief escaped from everyone as I pulled into a parking space with this view. After a moment of stillness, doors flew open and everyone scampered the final yards to the top of the top of Mount Washington.

Having achieved our goal, the kids scattered to explore. As I saw hikers arriving from the trail, I chuckled. I once scoffed at seeing tourists in shorts with cameras after first reaching this mountaintop on foot 36 years ago. Now, I’m one of them.

No matter how you get there, the view from atop Mount Washington is second to none.

We were kicking around the idea of seeing a movie when the inn-keeper shared great news: Lancaster now has a drive-in movie theater. This is actually their fourth summer. Maybe so, but it’s a first for the monkey troop.

Before radio, I dreamed of being a world class photojournalist. The Coos County Democrat was happy to make use of my youthful ambitions. It’s still here and I still get it by subscription all the way in Houston. The kids were intrigued not only by what I did, but how I made it happen; ride the bus after school to Lancaster instead of Whitefield and hitch-hike home after turning in my pictures. As I watched the wheels turning in their heads, I realized sharing all the things I did as a kid might not be such a good idea after all.

I wondered how much it might have changed. The answer: not much. We will explore more before leaving.