Day 7

Day 7- We all had to recuperate today after the strenuous Mt. Lafayette. We decided to make a trip down to the Lakes Region of the state and then over to Dartmouth College. While we were waiting to leave I noticed an article in the AMC magazine about nitrogen pollution. It says that many of the Boreal and Alpine Zones of the White Mountains are becoming polluted with nitrogen from the burning of fossil fuels in the city. I first thought that this was a good thing because nitrogen is a key nutrient needed by many plants but then the article told me why it is bad. With more nitrogen being in the soil this means more competition between plants which could potentially wipe out some of the more indigenous plants in the zones like Balsam Firs and the Eastern White Pine. This could potentially throw off entire ecosystems and devastate the mountains. Then it was on to the Lakes Region.

We stopped at a small lake along the way and got a quick history lesson from Dr. Arion. Mt. Washington was named after General Washington before he became President and that the capitol moved from New York to Philadelphia until it finally ended up Washington D.C. We then speculated that the lake bed had to primarily eroded granite from the area. Next it was onto Meredith to get something to eat and then across the state to Dr. Arion’s alma mater.

Dartmouth College was a very old yet well kept campus. Arion explained to us that it was the sixth oldest school in the nation just to give a perspective. I was surprised that it had the 4^th largest library only behind Library of Congress, Harvard University, and the Vatican! We weren’t able to learn too much about the college but before it was all said and done we left the college knowing what Dr. Arion looked like with a full head of hair in 1979!