WILDCAT MOUNTAINS

AT Day 120: Saturday,  August 5, 2023

SOBO Mile 1900 – 1883.8

Route 2, Gorham – Wildcat A Mt Campsite 

Distance Hiked – 16.2 miles/26km

Total Distance Hiked: 1960 miles/3154 km 

A: 7425 ft /2265 m D: 3773 ft/1151 m

It was a beautiful start to the day The sun was illuminating the whispey clouds –  pinks and blues and pale white against the blue.  It looked beautiful and so clean after the rain over the last 2 days.  We left the campground about 6 for the 2 mile walk to the trailhead. We we feeling rested and restored an eager to get this much talked about and feared section of the AT underway. Our packs were groaning with 5 days of food. I was not looking forward to the climbs. 

As we started to climb up towards the summit of Mariah Mountain, the first mountain on the way to the Wildcats, the sound of car traffic was replaced by bird song.  The higher we got up the mountain the more the birds sang. The wind blowing through the trees was shaking off yesterday’s rain off the leaves making it feel like it was raining.  No rain is predicted for at least the next two days so hopefully we can get to Mount Washington before the rain returns on Monday.

The climb to the summit of Mariah Mt was a steady rise with a steeper final ascent. The summit was fogged in and we didn’t get any distant views till  later in the day as we passed the summits of North Carter Mountain, Middle Carter Mt and South Carter Mt.  We passed quite a few day hikers on the Carter Mountain Ridge. It was a beautiful sunny day it was good to see people out enjoying the mountains.   We were having a great day and felt like we made great progress  despite our heavy packs.  Talking to a few day hikers we met today we discovered that some aim to tag all of the 48 New Hampshires 4K peaks. On September 11 each year the 4K peaks have the American flag hoisted on the summit. The event is called “Flags on the 48” and creates a quite memorial.

We were making great progress until we reached Carter Notch. On the map it looked like a reasonable descent to a lake but in reality it was a super steep rocky descent.  It took ages to descent to Carter Notch Hut by the lake, where we filled up on water from a faucet. The hut is run by the Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC) and provides  accomodation for paying guests only. From the hut we ascended to the summit of Wildcat A Mt. The one mile climb took us almost an hour. We decided to stop and camp on the summit of Wildcat A.  A cold wind is blowing as I’m finishing this post. Happy to be sheltered and warm.