By Marty Basch

The threatening front turned the Presidential and Pliny Ranges into a menacing gang of thugs ready to pounce upon the unsuspected.

Darkened clouds rolled over us, the hidden trap doors in their flat bottoms ready to open, as we descended from 4,530-foot North Carter's wooded ridge. Thunder roared across the mountains and hard sheets of rain cruelly fell. If timing is everything, the weather gods were sadistically spot on, drenching us on a steep, rocky, ledgy pitch, instantly creating mud splashes, mini-waterfalls and slippery footing.

And a shock.

Smokin’

As Jan Duprey placed her foot on beloved spongy brown terra firma, she was startled, finding a huddled cannabis-scented hiker under an overhang waiting out the storm.

The White Mountains hold many hiking surprises, and a nearly 18-mile two-day trek along the Carter-Moriah Range forming the northeast wall of Pinkham Notch found us stumbling upon slick rock, meeting north- and south-bound bearded Appalachian Trail thru-hikers, gazing at stellar vistas reminding us of the vast wilderness found across northern New Hampshire and realizing just because peaks might be called insignificant in guidebooks, they're not.

The plan was simple: Hike the four miles up the moderate Nineteen-Mile Brook Trail to majestically rugged and boulder-strewn Carter Notch for a night at the Appalachian Mountain Club's Carter Notch Hut and do about a 13.5-mile full-day trek along the Carter-Moriah Trail (the AT), using the Carter Dome Trail to bypass glorious Mount Hight and save maybe a third of a mile to climb stony 4,832-foot Carter Dome, the wooded tops of 4,430-foot South and 4,610-foot Middle Carters and the incredible ledges of 4,049-foot Mount Moriah. Along the way we'd cross over the yawn-and-hum peaks - not - of 4,584-foot Mount Lethe, North Carter and petite 2,194-foot Mount Surprise with its slippery when wet blueberry-loaded ledges. We spotted two cars at the Nineteen-Mile Brook trailhead and Gorham's limited-parking Bangor Street gateway.

The straight-forward Carter Notch hike leads to a stunning jagged pass by tiny Carter Lakes, sandwiched by the high cliffs of the Carters and Wildcats. The hut provided welcome sustenance and shelter, particularly during a hail storm. The shooting stars at night were wondrous, felling hikers friendly. Seeing hiking children sans video games provided hope for the human race, while spotting the small helicopter pad atop one of the bunkhouses for re-supply snubbed the romance of the packboard.

Go

With scattered thunderstorms forecast for the next day, we decided to leave early under mostly sunny skies for the grueling first mile to Carter Dome's flat, scrubby top with wild limited outlooks.

The roller coaster ridge hike is largely wooded. Bypassing Hight, we descended into one of many cols. Through Zeta Pass, we continued upward to South Carter, the summit marked with a hand-scrawled sign, and then along a relatively uneventful mile-plus to the cairn-marked, forested top of Middle Carter.

The increasingly foreboding skies first brought a cloudy curtain to cloak the commanding Wild River valley vistas to the east and Presidentials to the northeast that we saw while navigating the nubby Mount Leathe.

North Carter was bathed in gray as the rain burst forth, perhaps for half an hour, turning a fine hike into a wet slog, slowing us down as we thankfully advanced below treeline.

The weather turned positive for the upward advance on amazing Moriah, with its copious open ledges and panorama. The mountain is one of the finest in the White Mountains with views to the Presidentials, Carters, Vermont, the Percys, Maine's Old Speck and its wilderness. But by the time we reached the summit, we were back in raingear and a disappointing gray backdrop.

Rain

The final 4½-mile trudge down Moriah in rain and sun was tedious. We initially took care with every step down steep rock and over slick Mount Surprise, pausing to pick blueberries as a reward for our doubled efforts. We were slow, readily passed by a pair of friendly uncle and teenage nephew hikers who stayed at the hut and easily started an hour after us.

Thankfully, the rocky route left us for rather benign logging roads and the first of our two vehicles. In a short drive we were reunited with a tote bag containing dry clothes and welcome wet wash cloths in plastic bags, and a cooler with cold cooked chicken, cookies and ice water, never better as a trailhead alfresco White Mountain post-hike meal.