By Marty Basch

"You're almost there," the woman above my head is saying. She's with her hiking partner and they are exactly where I want to be. Up there. On that ledge with a breathtaking Ossipee Range horizon, one step closer to the Mount Whiteface summit.

I catch my breath because the hike is now a steep, challenging ledge climb where the next root is my new best friend and I hang on until making the next nervous lunge.

With a T-shirt caked with sweat, I humbly join the couple  smart enough to be on the trail at 6:30 a.m. before Mother Nature turns up her hot, hazy and humid oven to bake.

"Don't worry," she tells me. "That was me on the way up."

Alone on the throne

The smiling man and woman hike down and I gingerly move to a rock, claim it as my throne, vow never to leave and wonder why I'm on  this 4,020-foot peak along a prominent ridge line in the White Mountain National Forest's 35,800 acre Sandwich Range Wilderness.

After the heart-pounding in my ears abates, I remember. I'm hiking New Hampshire's 48 four-thousand footers. That's why. I'm supposed to regale in the joys of the spruce-fir forest, watch the squirrels watching me and not step on any slithering garter snake crossing the trail.

In my daze I'm whisked back to the beginning of this eight-plus mile hike on the deceitfully deliciously sounding Blueberry Ridge Trail maintained by the zealous Wonalancet Out Door Club. The trek starts with a wonderful woods walk from Wonalancet into the wilderness; from genteel country homes with mowed fields and forest-hidden cabins to a punishing and rewarding trail with stone steps to heaven.

I remember seeing the great cliffs of Whiteface from below, its stately face not looking all that menacing. Silly man! In no time I'm hiking the century old path on some easy flattish ledges through blueberries.

Berry good, but then...

Life's berry good until about three miles into the hike when it turns into a climb on those dastardly ledges. In one spot there are a series of parallel holes drilled into the slick rock. Maybe a ladder or stairs were once there. But not in the 1984 designated wilderness and I hang out with my root friends for a while and confide in them that there really are days when an air conditioned office cubicle is a heckuva lot more welcoming than doing a hands and knees rock scramble while flying insects circle you're head laughing.

Soon I meet the couple and claim the throne.

I'm on my throne when a thin, tattooed hiker appears. The hiker looks strong and agile. He's doing the four-thousand footers too. He started in May and has done something like 12 already and wants to do 20 before August when his daughter is supposed to be born. That's cool.

I'm inspired to press on. I catch up to him only because he pauses to drink in more views. The haze mutes the horizon. But Lake Winnipesaukee, Mount Chocorua and more are all out there. We meet again on more stunning ledges before hooking up with the Rollins Trail and that's when the trail dips down and I see Osceloa and Tripyramid by Waterville Valley. Darn. Going down. I've had enough of this. Youth rambles on to climb Mount Passaconaway and I head back to those ledges to  open the guidebook which slaps me with this:  the true summit with no view is about a quarter mile away.

Hike on dude

I've come this far. So I trudge some more to no view and return to those ledges to wolf down two breaded chicken cutlets. I realize it's time for some backside sliding down the ledges. Only the roots hear me curse.

It's after passing by those drilled holes that I hear real voices below. There are three hikers. I don't want to startle them so I call out something like, "Coming down."

Then one of them says to me, "Are we almost there?"

I tell them yeah and answer that question a few more times down the trail. It's asked a lot.

Ha-ha

I'm home after scarfing down two frosty cans of diet soda bought at a blissfully air conditioned Tamworth store and take off my shorts. They're ripped, torn by Whiteface's sharp ledge teeth. I hear the mountain laughing.