There’s no question about why they’re on these mountaintops. More than a hundred hikers will cross this peak today, and most of them will pause here to eat a little lunch, have a drink, and toss a few treats to the chippie scurrying around their feet. He pops out without notice from various cracks and crevices and cruises the rock slabs. He never pauses to chew, but dashes off to his cache with the crumbs and nuts and M&Ms stowed in his cheeks. That must mean he plans to spend the winter here. Tonight, whatever the weather, he’ll be snoozing comfortably in a hole somewhere in these ledges, while we higher forms of life retreat to our bunks in the hut below. I’ll toast his health before supper and envy him his view of the sunset, the meteors, and the moonrise.

This has been a hiking week, most of it vicarious. Our older daughter flew East from the State of Washington to do a little New England hiking for a change. She’d spend a week on the Long Trail in Vermont and then join me for three days’ hiking to the Appalachian Mountain Club huts in the White Mountains. On a sunny Wednesday morning I dropped her off at the foot of Camels Hump, expecting to meet her a week later at the West Hartford crossing of the Appalachian Trail. Her pack seemed dauntingly heavy to me – tent, sleeping bag, stove and gas cartridges, food, maps, cooking pot, rain gear – but she obviously knew what she was doing, so I wasn’t worried.

She, as well as the other two kids, got her start during the 60s on the little peaks of the eastern Adirondacks – Poke-o-Moonshine, Little Crow, the Brothers. The few photos I still have of them in those days show happy smiles, but nothing approaching what I’d call delight; so when none of them, after reaching the age of discretion, teased to keep going, I didn’t push it. The same with canoeing. We all spent a month paddling the Allagash and hiking through Baxter Park when the baby was only two; but that was the end of it. After they left home, I climbed and paddled alone or with old friends, instead.

To my surprise, I began to hear about epic week-long hikes my older daughter was taking in the Cascades and along the dramatic, driftwood-strewn beaches of Washington. Then this spring came the news of her plans to tackle the hills of her childhood.

I thought of her all that Wednesday – How was she doing with that pack? Was there room in whatever shelter she needed? Were the water sources running all right? Sunday morning I turned on the computer to check my mail and got: On romance mountain headed to gillispie. All fine. G Not bad; 50 miles in four days, and “all fine” sounded good to me. By Monday evening she’d made 25 more miles and turned east onto the Appalachian Trail: Here at Gifford State Park. It’s quite a wonderful park. There are cabins to rent if you’re down this way. Long day tomorrow, see u on W. G (I was learning something about the miracle of texting and the contemporary use of abbreviations; you get only so many characters per message.)

In any case, that night, (as the Bible describes it) the rains came, and the floods descended, and beat upon the tent – and it leaked. Dad- change of plans. Tent leak. Will take bus to WhRiJct and meet you in norwich. There is, of course, no longer bus service over Route 4, so we got her on her cell phone, and Mother went to pick her up.

Now, all dried out and relieved of that onerous load, she’s walking slowly behind me on the White Mountain trails and concealing beautifully the impatience she must feel at my halting, plodding pace. The cumulative effect of my multiple prostheses and fractures appears to have caught up with me. I’m seriously considering skipping dessert tonight and getting back to the gym next Monday morning. And tomorrow, instead of going on to Galehead Hut on a trail described as “the most tiring trail in the White Mountains...full of little bumps...and the trail goes over every one of them...,” we’ll descend to Franconia Notch and climb up the other side to Lonesome Lake, a total of only a little over four miles. There’s a chipmunk there, too, as I recall, who from time to time edges nervously over the threshold of the dining room door.

But for now we’ll just enjoy this magnificent, memory-laden mountain. Franconia Ridge stretches away southward from the summit. Not far along it is the spot where a good friend and Outward Bound instructor was killed by lightning 26 years ago this month. Even closer is the spot where Guy Waterman committed suicide in February of 2000 by intentionally freezing to death. And just beneath our feet is the derelict foundation of the old Summit House, where long-ago guests of a hotel in the valley could spend the night after riding up the Bridle Path. Somebody has whimsically built a dozen or so very neat little inuksuit all around the top of the walls. Their spiritual implications are doubtless inscrutable to most hikers.

Haunted by memories, warmed by sun, cooled by a breeze...something moves by my feet. It’s the little striped god of the mountaintop, wondering if we’ve brought anything for him.