(HOST) Commentator Willem Lange has been hiking again with a television crew, with slightly bloody results.
(LANGE) I had just congratulated myself on completing several miles of rough trail without falling once. Less than a minute later, "Poom!" Down I went. It was an easy, sort of sideways fall, but a birch tree in the bank intercepted the right side of my head on my way down.
The good news was the trunk missed my spectacles. The bad news was that that Jonathon, a Public Television videographer, and I were filming a story about the notch for an outdoor program. We still had a few so-called head shots to do, and it’s distracting to listen to a head spouting information when it’s also dripping blood. So we pretended to be shooting John Barrymore, who liked to be filmed in profile from his good side.
There can’t be too many rougher routes through the woods of New England than the 3 1/2-mile trail into Carter Notch. You’ve got to wonder why anybody would have ventured up here in the first place. Probably a scout for a logging company. The trail was cut later for access to a now long-gone fire tower, and follows a left-hand slope into the increasingly tight jaws of a granite nutcracker That whole hillside, under its cover, is what’s called a talus slope – a huge ramp of rocks in semi-repose that are slowly moving downhill. It’s a lot like the base of the Cannon Mountain cliffs in Franconia Notch.
After three miles or so, the trail – just as the guidebook had predicted – narrowed and steepened, and very soon we were at the height of land. No doubt about it; none of the usual swamps or beaver dams; and open, grassy vistas; just a steep trail descending the far side one hundred vertical feet to a glistening little tarn. Carter Notch hut was very close by now.
The Appalachian Mountain Club’s Carter Notch hut was built in its present location in 1914, and has a great view down the Wildcat Valley. It was built of stone – naturally – though how they carried all the mortar in here I can only imagine. It’s quite a pleasant establishment, with a kitchen and dining room for forty, two bunkhouses, and a wash house. Along with two other AMC huts, Zealand Falls and Lonesome Lake, it remains open all winter, with a caretaker, for self-service stays by skiers and snowshoers. I suspect that very few skiers brave this trail. Those snowshoers who make it will enjoy a spectacular view of the Ramparts, a tortured pile of boulders the size of bread trucks that have split from the surrounding cliffs and plunged to rest almost beside the cabin.
It is best, before coming to Carter Notch for the night (and especially during a heavy rain or snow storm), not to read Nathaniel Hawthorne’s "The Ambitious Guest." You might spend a bad night, thinking about those restless rocks in the Rampart and listening for a rumble far overhead.
This is Willem Lange up in the White Mountains, and believe it or not, this is work!