Carter Ledge Trail is a 5.4 mile lightly trafficked out and back trail located near Conway, New Hampshire that features beautiful wild flowers and is rated as moderate. The trail offers a number of activity options and is best used from May until September.
birding
hiking
nature trips
trail running
walking
forest
views
wild flowers
Directions from Conway, NH: Travel south on SR 16 about 5 miles passing through the tiny burg of Albany. Enter White Ledge Campground. The trail begins from the campground picnic area.
Really nice hike!
About a mile in from the road I came upon a man black bear with 3-4 cubs. Very cool, but somewhat scary. Once they saw me and ran away I continued my hike.
The first 2 miles or so are pretty mellow hiking through the forest.
The last half mile or so though is actually quite steep with nice views, a little scrambling and lots of very loose rock and dirt.
The very top features bald ledges and 360 views.
Pretty spectacular given the relatively small amount of effort.
So If I were climb this trail again, I would park at the Piper trail parking lot and start the hike there. I would go up the Piper trail until you hit the Nickerson ledge trail go up this trail which will meet the Carter ledge trail in 0.8 miles. The Nickerson ledge trail is actually quite steep in the beginning and levels off after 0.2 miles. Once on the Carter Ledge trail it’s not that difficult until you reach the rock face. You will encounter a steep incline with some rock scree, where I used the trees around me to get up this section. Once there you will have some great views and some moderately difficult rock scrambling but it’s not that difficult just a little steep. I would say the next hardest section would be summiting middle sister where the rock scrambling became much more difficult. Overall I would say that this was a challenging hike with great views. Be sure to take the Piper trail down, it’s easier and after a tough climb you can just jump in your car for a nice ride home.
Certainly a challenge. First mile or so is solidly runnable, then turns to stop and go scrambling, and finally straight scrambling and bouldering. Double tack to single track to almost narrow deer trails. Hard but well worth the effort.
Overgrown so much that enjoying the area is limited, therefore the effort isn't worth it! We found the difficulty (not roots or muddy just rocky and steep without steps in sections) too challenging for the reward. In short, our group of 4 all agreed: skip this one.
We hiked 5/18, clear sky, high was in the eighties.
Deep slushy snow on the day we went. Didn't bring snowshoes so sank in up to the knee every 3rd step. Made for a long and tiring day- had to turn back before the top. Views beautiful along the way.
Harder than expected but fantastic view