New Northeast 131

***This page is a description of this peakbagging project, including both an explanation of the list itself as well as a bit of the story behind how it went and some nice photos!!! If you want to see an enumeration of all of the peaks done as part of this project, check out this page here!!!***

After working a summer at a mountain lodge in New Hampshire and getting burned out, I wasn't able to finish the 131 in my original timeframe, which was frustrating but ultimately not too big of an issue, as I have every intention of returning to the east one of these days to finish up loose ends there and in the Southern Appalachians. I had a clear plan of what I wanted to do next: I wanted to spend a few months in New Mexico and Texas climbing as many P2ks as I could, and then using any extra time I had to knock out ultras in Arizona, Nevada, and California. I was primed: I had spent nearly a year working and saving up money to do this as part of a larger move out west where I planned to put down roots in the PNW. It was with this excitement that I started my roadtrip out west, which saw me climbing eight state high points along with numerous other state prominence and isolation points. Finally, I got to Santa Fe and was stoked to get the list started

However, fate had another plan for me. Right before I started the roadtrip I came down with a sickness that forced me to hang around Vermont for longer than I had originally anticipated. Some of my symptoms got better roadtripping, others worse, and by the time I got to Santa Fe, I knew I needed to give myself at least a few days of rest before starting up any major peaks. However, that's exactly when my symptoms took a turn for the worse. I started getting a cough that made it impossible to breathe for sometimes 10 seconds at a time, which was frightening as well as debilitating. It's unclear if this cough was acute bronchitis or some other long-term symptom, but in the week I spend in Santa Fe seeking whatever medical care I could, it became obvious what was going on: Long Covid. Somehow fate had conspired to place me at my sickest not only at the time that I wanted to push myself the hardest, but at the time where I had the least capacity to rest and recover, as being in a van in New Mexico in August is no way to relax. I was heartbroken that I couldn't climb the peaks I had originally intended to. And the worst part? I couldn't even cry about it because my throat would close up any time I tried to shed tears. I couldn't even cry about it

However, it should be obvious even through a cursory glance at my website that I'm not one to back down from a challenge, and that I'm willing to push myself hard even when my body isn't at one-hundred percent. Hiking in the southwest was simply too hot for me with where my body was, and my partner was moving to Northern Idaho for the fall, so I decided to roadtrip up towards there and climb whatever peaks I could along the way. It started with driving/biking up a few peaks in the southwest before pushing myself up the tallest mountain I had ever climbed: Delano in Utah. Somehow, I managed to slog up the steep trail, stopping every 20 feet to cough my guts out. I made it up, and then made it down. Curiously, my cough didn't get any better or worse the more I hiked, but the chronic fatigue and the wanting to be close to a road in case my health went south limited me to shorter hikes - but I *could* still hike. I tried to climb a few peaks in the Great Basin, but some unexpected logistical issues with my van made the going-into-super-remote-areas-in-the-desert thing not the best idea. So I ended up in the Blue Mountains of Oregon, where I was able to bike and hike up another four P2ks. Similarly, I was able to knock out another four on the drive up toward Moscow Idaho, where I was able to meet up with my partner toward the end of the month

After resting in Moscow for a few days, I started back up again, climbing another five P2ks and five P1ks in about two weeks. As I'm writing this initial description of my project, I have my eyes set on additional P2ks north of Spokane which I hope to do before the end of the month, when I move to the Cascades to work at a ski area for the fall. Maybe I'll climb an ultra, maybe I'll drive up more peaks, maybe I'll do nothing, who knows! I'm taking this one step at a time!

As for this list, which I have creatively named the "Long Covid List", it is meant to be butchered and repackaged into future projects of mine. I just don't see how hills in Rhode Island could ever be on the same list as 10,000fters in the Southwest using any reasonable criteria. As time goes on and I climb more geographically-concentrated lists, the peaks from this list will slowly be removed and placed on those lists until the only thing left is a few scant references to that time where I would have to take cough breaks during my hike and keep a puke bag handy at all times. This page and it's associated pages will remain though, to serve as a demonstration of what I'm capable of. Because let's be honest: I'm functionally physically disabled right now to the point that I can't even walk for fifteen minutes without almost collapsing due to coughing - even if I feel totally fine afterward. The fact that I was able to climb *any* mountains during this time, including ones that are non-trivial hikes, is a genuine accomplishment and something I'll boast about for the rest of my life whenever I get the chance

Hopefully this acute bronchitis will whither away before the end of the season, but if not, it looks likely that I'll hit around 30 P2ks by the end of the season, which is a significant number considering it's more P2ks than both the 115 and 202, and the same number as the 131. Ironically, this list has the potential for me climbing the largest number of P2ks of all of my projects during the time period where I have the least physical capacity to climb any! What a twist of fate