Whiteface: Because It's There

In 1923 British mountaineer George Mallory was asked why he wanted to climb Mount Everest, "Because it's there," he replied. Good ol' George died on Everest later the next year and his body wasn't found until 1999.

Now Kitima and I don't confuse what the Tibetans call Qomolangma with a summit of 29,029 feet with the height of Whiteface (what the Tibetans might call Palevisage) at 4,867 feet but we were going to top with our road bikes nonetheless.

On the way up we stopped by to take my mom out to lunch and then hit the Lowville Cheese Co-op for provisions. Our summit attempt would be fueled by "Grandma's Donuts" (Kitima one; author two) complete with an ingredients list that contained mashed potatoes. Below Kitima and her bovine friend.


The route is eight miles long at an 8% grade and climbs 3,500 vertical feet. To put that in perspective that would be .00000028 miles towards the moon.

We started around six o'clock about an hour after the summit road closed to car traffic. We reached the toll gates three miles into our climb. It indicated a summit temperature of 42 with winds over 25 mph.

"That's got to be Celsius," I said looking through my rose-colored glasses.

The ride was peaceful on the ascent. Only an occasional grunt was heard going into the stiff headwind. Before the ride we thought we might want long sleeves, "Nothing we can do about it now," Kitima said.

Took this while I was riding, excuse the lack of focus.

The summit loomed in the background. Every mile we'd get a "Rough Road next three miles."

"That's a lot farther than three miles," Kitima said pointing at the summit in the background.

This was the penultimate switchback. Lake Placid in the background.

A rocky set of steps leads to the true summit.

We take a few short minutes to savor the summit. The winds really whipped up so we descended. The road was rough, dark and steep. I stayed on the brakes not wanting to endo into a pothole at 30+ mph. I overheated the brakes and promptly flatted. Luckily I heard it.

Since the day was getting colder and darker I told Kitima to go on ahead and either drive up to meet me after the repair or I'd catch up. I fixed the flat fast and took a good 20 lbs. of PSI out of my tires so I wouldn't get another one. It worked wonderfully.

I shivered all the way down. I couldn't keep my teeth from chattering and I bit my tongue. To avoid biting it again I thrust my tongue towards the back of my bottom teeth and descended with my mouth open. My fingers were numb and my neck muscles seized up. I finally made it down to the car where Kitima had just finished loading her bike. The car was on and the heat was cranked and she told me all about her frigid descent.

It took us a while to warm up. She was still cold after a long, hot shower and a bowl of soup at the Brown Dog Cafe. We feasted on a Bison Ribeye like Vikings although I think Leif Ericson would have suffered the descent with less whining or would have at least packed a cycling jersey or arm warmers.