Date: 2009-09-04
From: Campsite

To: Rattle River Shelter, NH
Miles today: 17.0
Weather: few clouds

"Before the mountains were born or You gave birth to the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God." Psalm 90:2We waved goodbye to the White Mountains tonight- what a sight! It's still unbelievable to think that we had perfect weather the entire time we hiked. We are camped just 1.5 miles outside of Gorham, NH, only 16 trail miles from the ME border!I woke up this morning to the sound of Berry's voice singing happy birthday. Today I turned 29. After she sang the song we both rolled over and went back to sleep till around 7am, then we eventually got moving and started our day.We knew we were in for it because of yesterdays introduction to the wildcat peaks. We did one wildcat last night...today 4 awaited us. The descent off the wildcats was brutal as well. Many times on the descent we would just throw our poles to the ground and then slide down the rock faces. Finally we made it off the wildcats and down into Carter Notch to the last hut. Rufio, Duckman and team Hiking Poles stayed there last night and were still doing work-for-stay. They were being worked pretty hard. When we arrived they were mostly finished. Team Hiking Poles sang me the birthday song, both the American and Polish version, while bringing out a small cake with a candle in it. That was very nice of them! We all headed out about the same time to tackle our next big climb- 2000ft in 1 mile up to Carter Dome, then on to south, middle and north Carter which were also rocky climbs. It was tough- the whole day has been. On the summit of north Carter we saw Duckman sitting on a large rock reading a book. He actually had gotten turned around and ended up taking another trail to the top-the same thing happened yesterday- he ended up missing all of the Wildcats (lucky!). Anyway, he joined us for the next hour and we had a great conversation. We stopped for a snack and Duckman moved on. The rest of the day Berry and I walked alone up and down the last section of the Whites. Our final challenge, Mt. Moriah, was early in the evening and we didn't know if we would have the energy to continue. Somehow we pulled out of the slump and found more energy to continue and the climb up Moriah wasn't bad at all. On the summits of Moriah we saw our last great view of the mighty Presidentials from the Whites. We had hiked farther than we thought we could make it as we began to descend off Moriah. We scanned for a flat spot to camp and we continued scanning for the next 2 hours- it was too steep and too thick. Eventually we came within close enough distance to the shelter that we decided to go for it.Just before the shelter we saw a tent pitched along side a rushing brook. It was Stickcakes! It was nearly dark and we didn't know that the shelter was right around the corner, so we only stopped for about 10 minutes to visit with them. Apparently they are pretty spent from the last two days, that was a nice thing to have in common.We picked ourselves of the ground, said goodbye to Stickcakes, and started a swift hike in the dark. Within minutes we saw a blazing fire with the silhouettes of Rufio, Duckman and Hiking Poles. It was like being with family again, a perfect way to end our White Mountains experience.Berry and I chose to stay in the shelter with everyone else. We quickly got things in order and sat around the campfire telling stories and eating what was left in our food bags. Now everyone is in their sleeping bags and excited to be in town tomorrow.This was a hard section (the past two days) and we are feeling pretty beat down. We plan to make some changes for ME. Namely, more vitamins and better snacks- we are hoping this will improve our energy supply.