Thoreau writes in his journal:
I got up about half an hour before my party and enjoyed a good view, though it was hazy, but by the time the rest arrived a cloud invested us all, a cool driving mist, which wet you considerably, as you squatted behind a rock . . .
About 8.15 A.M., being still in a dense fog, we started directly for Tuckerman’s Ravine . . .
But following down the edge of the stream, the source of the Ellis River, which was quite a brook within a stone’s throw of its head, we soon found it very bad walking in the scrubby fir and spruce, and therefore, when we had gone about two thirds the way to the lake, decided to camp in the midst of the dwarf firs, clearing away a space with our hatchets . . .