Rainbows, Sunsets, Twitter, and Tours

2014-06-24 16:30:02.000 – Caleb Meute,  Summit Intern

Amazing Sunset

Well, call me a rainbow trout because I am officially hooked on this mountain. Speaking of rainbows, on the way to the base of the mountain before this shift I saw a beautiful one spanning much of the sky. I believe this was letting me know that this week was going to be a good one. To start, we had winds which gusted to near 90 mph. I love weather and the extremes that it has to offer, so naturally, Arielle and I saw this as an opportunity to go for a hike. Oh, by the way, temperatures had dipped down into the lower 30s making the wind chill bitter, per my standards that is. The hike was awesome, but difficult. It didn’t help that my beloved beanie was attempting to blind me by constantly dropping below eye level. Also, my backpack has straps dangling all around it which like to use the wind as an aid in striking my face. I am not necessarily an experienced hiker and I’m sure anyone who reads my comments is now well aware of that. However, I am spending a summer on the summit of Mount Washington, so you better believe I am going to take full advantage of it!

We survived our hike. The following days saw a dome of high pressure work into the area leading to gorgeous weather and incredible sunsets. I think this is what the rainbow was warning me about. Sunday night, Ryan informed us that there was a real nice sunset. Ryan has seen a lot of sunsets up here, so when we hear that, our forks drop and it’s a war against gravity to get to the deck ASAP.

A lot of cool events happened this week. The Auto Road running race is actually a real thing. The amount of respect I have for those athletes is immense. Driving a car up that road has me feeling tired. These men and women ran up the auto road, and the winner did it in less than one hour! Saturday night, the mountain welcomed a really great group of people who belong to the mini cooper club for the annual event ‘Minis on Top’. We had the privilege of showing them around the Observatory. One of my favorite parts of this internship is giving tours. I have met so many people who are fascinated by Mount Washington and the work we do at the Observatory. Today we gave tours to a group of around 50 people from Australia who are on a trip around the country. One of them even gave me a kangaroo pin. #Winning

Onto the topic of hashtags, Mount Washington Observatory is now on Twitter. Follow us @MWObservatory!

Caleb Meute,  Summit Intern