I had a few goals and I accomplished them all. I wanted to finish the 4000 footers in under 6 months and by the end of winter. This hike accomplished both of those goals. The past weeks of cold and extreme wind tried to stop me, but a great weather day came up and I took the day off from work to make it happen. The third goal was to finish them alive and in one piece. The 48 4000 footers have many places for disaster to happen. This I think is also an attraction, the danger. Not everyone could do this.
Yesterday Dan was nice enough to help me drop off my truck at Wildcat Mountain, then drop me off on Route 16 at the Camp Dodge Rd. Actually, we dropped the car off first, used the truck to get to Camp Dodge Rd as we were unsure the state of that road, and then he drove back to Wildcat to swap vehicles. As it turned out, Camp Dodge Rd was closed off with a gate, but did have just enough room to pull off of the highway there, and although it was plowed occasionally, we were glad we took the truck with its high clearance and 4WD.
The weather was gorgeous. A clear sunny day and blue skies. The temps soon had me with no jacket on and no mittens or gloves either. I took the Imp Connector to South Imp trail starting at 10:15 am and did see a man coming down this trail, as I was about 1/2 way up it. This trail was beautiful. Gorgeous views of the presidentials, never too steep but enough so I knew I was climbing, earning my peaks. Most of the ridge trail from Carter to Carter was thoroughly enjoyable with intermittent amazing views to both sides, the Prezzies to the west and Maine (Caribou Wilderness?) on the east. The sun made the exposed rocks glisten. I love ridge trails the best. I felt like I was getting an easy ride to my 48s until the ascent to Carter Dome. I chose not to do Mt Hight. (Gotta leave some peaks for later, right?) First, it was .1 mile shorter and I figured less elevation would be good, but it turned out to be a sidehill. Very uncomfortable with unstable down support with steep drops and my snowshoes were constantly building up big snowballs which were uncomfortable with worse footing and annoying so this part was slow going. Did I forget to say that I wore snowshoes this whole hike?
That sidehill was soon forgotten when I saw the chasm I had to get down from Carter Dome. The snow was deep and sticky-slick, with lots of post holes, and many times I fell and slid down. Rocks were sticking up and the cliff was on the left side for most of this .3 miles. This entire descent was a mile but I think only the last .3 was the crazy part. I tried grabbing trees to slow my descent but on one I had to let go as I felt my arm would break. It is still in pain today from this event. I used some postholes as brakes but this was dangerous as it could be leg breaking. This part was long! Even Doggo Chuck cried for a second when he postholed. He was very nervous about me and he is usually up ahead of me scoping the trail out for my safety but he stayed with me for this part because he saw that I was having a hard time and that I was many times out of control, careening down the trail, trying not to break anything or go off a cliff. The views were amazing though. Oh, and at the bottom, I realized I had lost my empty water bottle. The one Torre had given us for Christmas that had an attached water bowl for my Chuckles. I was unable to give poor Chuck any water until we got back to the car.
At the bottom of this hill was a small frozen lake with a bailout option. I seriously considered it. I have never considered bailing before. But it was 3.2 miles to the highway and then some amount of miles back to Wildcat, so, as treacherous as the up might be to Wildcat A (I had yet to see it) and as traumatized as I was from coming down from Carter Dome, it was only about 2.5 miles to the top of Wildcat D so I took that route. Also, 2 women hikers are currently missing in the area so maybe there's a bad guy out there. He will have a harder time finding me out in the woods. I have not seen another person since a mile or so in, and he was the only one I had seen!
So I began the up. Luckily it was getting cooler and darker in the shade of Wildcat so the snow was not balling under my feet. The sun had set in the valley but it was mostly super steep sidehills that had only very narrow footholds. In places, I had to walk sideways with my toes the only thing on slippery snow that was giving away down the hill. Up for .7 and super steep. I just had to keep going and not fall down the cliffs. Once up on Wildcat A, I realized I was safe and the rest of the hike was pretty normal, just under 2 miles to my final peak. I was actually telling myself over and over that I was OK and the hard part was done.
I arrived on the top of Wildcat D at about 7:15. Chuck got there a bit earlier. There was some kind of structure there, with solar panels and a porch, but I still could not see the slopes so we continued south on the trail a bit more until we saw the slopes and the ski patrol hut. Chuck loves open fields and there was not a soul around. The ski slopes had been closed for over 3 hours at this point. We headed back towards the north towards Polecat trail/slope. Under a sliver of a moon, with a headlamp, we walked and sledded down. We felt like we definitely took the long winding way down. We passed a young couple hiking up with skis. They were surprised but charmed to meet Chuck. We finally made it to the bottom only to wander around looking for the parking lot. What I would not give to see my truck. We did finally find it, and it was the only vehicle in the parking lot at 8:00pm. I never thought this hike would take me 10 hours! Dan had reparked it there so I did not know exactly where it would be although we discussed where it would be roughly. First row as close as he could get to the slopes. We took the 1-3/4 hour drive, no phone service for some reason until I hit my home WiFi. I was not so sore from this hike, other than my arms, especially my right arm, from trying to grab trees while hurtling downhill out of control. This was the most technically difficult hike we have done I think.
Oh bed, sweet bed. I could not believe I had made it back to my bed, successfully. Peace and success! During the hike, the book I was listening to (Bookmarked for Death, by Lorna Barrett, pure entertainment but local NH entertainment) had a lot of pastries and cakes described so I thought I would have some ice cream when I got home but I was too tired to eat, and I had felt nauseous towards the end of this hike and the Bonds, so I just had a couple oranges and yogurt and went to bed. Chuck was happily snoozing in bed although as usual, he sleeps hard as soon as he gets in the back seat of the truck after each hike.
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