Middle Sister, Carter Ledge Trail

Stats
Date: October 12, 2018
Miles: 10.6 over all miles, 1.6 redlining miles
Weather: Overcast, breezy, temps in low 50s to high 40s
Trails: Middle Sister Trail — Carter Ledge Trail

Nancy and I decide that high winds and cold temps don’t bode well for doing a Terrifying 25 trail in the Presidentials. Instead we decide to do a trail on the Chocorua tab and get the .6 section of Middle Sister we missed and hike 1-mile of the Carter Ledge Trail. We’re also hoping to get the short Middle Sister Cutoff.

The Carter Ledge Trail starts in the White Ledges Campground that is closed so we park outside the gate and walk in. We hike a mile up the trail to its junction with Middle Sister and keep going on the Carter Ledge Trail for another mile to pick up the rest of that trail for redlining.  After a short climb, we come to a plateau and enjoy a short ramble through pines and beech trees dropping carpets of wet red and yellow leaves for us to walk on. We are out and back in short order and turn left on the Middle Sister Trail.

I stopped drinking alcohol (again) on September 22, and without diving too deeply, feel that I’m plowing through the process of ending that addiction pretty well. But Nancy notices my edge immediately upon greeting me in the Village Kitchen parking lot. Instead of giving her a hug, I say something stupid about whether she has brought the USB drive with the pictures. She asks me what’s going on and when I pause to reflect, I remember other expressions of stress and anxiety from last week. I guess I’m not sailing through the process of stopping drinking as easily as I thought. I appreciate Nancy’s questions and support once I explain what’s been going on. It helps to have someone I trust be the one to rip the Band-Aid off a wound I don’t know is there.

We start climbing the Middle Sister Trail in earnest now and it traverses the side of Chocorua for over a mile, with easy grades up and down, beautiful color in the leaves, amazing mushrooms finishing their short lives, occasional sounds of a squirrel chittering from afar. Just Nancy and I alone in the woods. I feel freer having talked and though I haven’t exercised much lately, feel strong enough to lead a good pace.

Eventually the trail takes a slow turn up the mountain and becomes a steep, wet, leaf-covered, rocky mess. We carefully pick our way up, trying to avoid puddles camouflaged by a layer of leaves and watching every step on the slick rock. I strip down to a short-sleeved shirt and roll up my pants for the climb. Nancy, too, sheds a layer.

When we reach the ridge, there is a disconcerting temperature dip as the wind picks up and there is less foliage to block it. We put a layer back on and plow ahead. For some reason, I expect the ridge line to be more gradual, but the ups and downs are long and steep. As we continue, I become more anxious about the slick rocks and leaves that await us on the descent. The anxiety about going down increases as the ridge line footing becomes slicker and more treacherous. We finally reach the intersection of Middle Sister and the Carter Ledge Trail. This is a decision point.

I express my concern about continuing on, the exposure and slick rock – we still have another 2 miles to go on the ridge in order to pick up the Middle Sister Cutoff we need for redlining. Is it worth it? I feel my legs and they’re pooped already. Adding two miles to our day, might make the slippery descent into a dangerous proposition. I don’t want to turn around, but it’s overcast, much colder than expected, and the wind is whipping.

It’s been a long time since I’ve hiked in wind like this. It’s getting to me. After agreeing to turn around, Nancy changes her wet clothes to dry ones. She takes pictures of the minimal view, wishing out loud that the sun would come out. We eat our lunch, mine a store-bought sandwich that doesn’t taste good. Once we clean up, we head back down.

The first scramble is a nasty one, wet, slippery and without an safe way down. Anxiety bursts from me and I almost start to cry. I’m furious that it’s so hard, that I’m making it hard, that my body isn’t flexible enough to easily sit and slide down the rock. I end up with a sopping wet seat and gloves when I finally make it down. I feel like a wimp. There are a few other difficult (difficult for me, in my head, but maybe not hard in reality) spots, but I make it through. As the going gets easier, I let some anxiety go. It whooshes out of me like a long-held breath. Each section of the descent that we get down without slipping is another notch of tension that loosens in my gut. I’ve become very frightened of slipping and falling. Too many falls this year – 2 particularly bad ones – and the fear lingers.

When we reach the section of the trail that traverses the mountain, the sun begins to come out. We’ve already passed the good view spots and are back in sun-dappled forest. We sit and eat the last bits of lunch. Nancy asks if we can stop near Chocorua Lake on the drive back to her car so she can take some pictures. Of course!

I am well and truly tired, after 3,000 feet of elevation gain, by the time we reach the car. Good tired, the kind that spreads through my body and I fly on the endorphins hiking brings me.