Ever pass a trailhead and tell yourself something like, “One day, we’ll have to go do that hike?”
Maybe that takes a week, a month, a year, a decade or a score?
Closer to a score, I think, for my wife, Jan, and I to do the moderate 4.4-mile White Ledge Loop.
The hike leaves the 28-site White Ledge Campground in Albany, N.H., off busy N.H. Route 16 about five miles south of Conway and the intersection with the Kancamagus Highway. I’ve often passed it and wondered, “What’s in there?”
Well, now we know.
Frankly, it was easy to pass up. There are so many other hikes to do, especially when you are focused on those lists for 4,000-footers and the myriad other hiking opportunities in the White Mountains region.
There is a pleasure found in following lists, as you are on something like automatic pilot.
Jan hasn’t officially stated it’s time to tackle another list. Therefore, these days we hike because we simply enjoy it.
So we recently found ourselves in that campground to do the trek to White Ledge which, at 2,010 feet, features fine but limited views.
When the White Mountain National Forest campground is closed for the season, it’s possible to hike to the ledge year-round by just walking around the gate — there is limited parking in the offseason— and adding a few hundred footsteps to the journey.
A couple of trails leave from the campground. There’s the Carter Ledge Trail to Chocorua and the White Ledge Trail, which serves up views of Chocorua’s rocky spire.
On a cloudy day with temperatures in the lows 70s, we got a late-morning start to the counterclockwise circuit that goes to the ledge — a separated east spur of Chocorua.
Initial steps were on the paved campground road and entered the forest beyond a tent site with an inviting hemlock grove. Through the hardwoods we went, crossing a small brook and then enjoying the relative flats of an old road going by stone walls.
But the pathway stiffened, and up we went. All those stone walls indicated the area was once a place for homes and farms. Glacial erratics were part of the scenery as we ascended to the stony height of land west of a small forested knob called Round Top, at 1,490 feet.
Relief was found as the trail descended a couple of hundred feet. But we climbed up again to the open ledges among the evergreens.
Cairns marked the way. Blueberry bushes abounded. When we stopped for nourishment, we would look behind us to familiar mountains like South Moat and Kearsarge North, with its handsome fire tower. Further on, we would gaze upon the entire Moat Range and over to North’s Conway’s Green Hills Preserve and its trio of peaks, anchored by the popular and 2,369-foot Black Cap.
After another twist in the trail, the view, framed by growing trees, took in 4,000-footers such as Carrigain and Willey.
The ledge’s summit was easy to find, a large “VIEW” and arrow scrawled on a rock leading to an eastern vantage point into Maine and its mountains.
However, it was on the descent, steep at times, that afforded some of the prime looks across the land. As we marveled at more cairns across a rocky outcropping, we rounded a corner and stood in awe under the crown of Mount Chocorua. The broad mountain stood high above the growing spruce, looking regal as it held court in the vast forest.
After descending a bit more, a spur trail caught my eye, as did the open sky that beckoned through the trees. Both Jan and I followed it and were led to an amazing look across the rippling hills and mountains pockmarked by four bodies of water, dropped in there like little jewels. Nearly 70-acre Iona Lake in Albany, 164-acred Whiitton Pond on the Albany-Madison line, Madison’s nearly 1,000-acre Silver Lake and 3,000-plus-acre Ossipee Lake spread out in a line on the horizon.
As we continued heading down, we heard again the drone of motors going along Route 16. Soon enough, we listened to a flowing stream as we entered a lush hemlock ravine. We twice crossed the waters, complete with little cascades and in a few minutes closed the loop on a pleasant excursion that’s there for the taking.
Marty Basch can be reached at marty.basch@gmail.com.