100 To Go - Sept 21

100 miles to go to reach Mt Katahdin. This is so close I can't stand it, so exciting.

Not so exciting is the anxiety over how much food to carry into the Hundred Mile Wilderness. In order to lessen the load a little we slack packed to a logging road the first 14 miles of the 100, so we only need to figure food for 86 instead of 100. Another factor is there is a hostel 30 miles from the other end of this 100 miles (some wilderness this is if a hostel is in there). Well, sort of a hostel. When we get to a certain side trail we plan on hiking .2 miles to a lake where we will call the hostel and the guy drives his boat across the lake, picks us up and drives us in the boat to the other side of the lake to White House Landing Camp. More on this after we get there.

Back to the food. I have no idea how rough the terrain is to estimate hiking miles per day. I also have no idea what kind of food we can buy at White House Landing. Oh well, I decided we will leave Monson with 5 days of food and hope we don't end up like the Donner Party.

The further north we hike in Maine the more beautiful it is. Breathtaking. Water Everywhere. Best Wife saw a moose. Of course I didn't, I was in the privy. She thought the beast was going to run her off the trail, but he went the other way. At least the 100 miles to go sign was made of moose dung. What else should we do with it?

The couple with us in a picture are The Travelling Foxes. Before they hiked, they logged 15,000 miles on bicycles. Note the bandage on his hand. He fell and sliced his hand on sharp rocks, 12 stitches, two internal to keep a tendon in place. Yikes.

Can't Go Over It, Can't Go Under It - Sept 18

Been taking full advantage of slack packing opportunities. Hiked into Caratunk, Maine to pick up a resupply package sent to us from our daughter (thru hike 2012). After a big run around finding it (I had forgotten I told Mackenzie to send it to a hostel instead of the PO) we took a room at the Sterling Inn to shower and get our food organized. 

The next morning the nice folks at Sterling Inn drove us 14 miles north so we could slack pack south back to the Inn. Very good for the knees to hike only carrying lunch and Gatorade. 

On the side, the innkeeper at the Sterling Inn is quite the talker. At breakfast there were six of us hikers eating while he talked and talked about, among other things, the color of granite chosen in the place and that most granite in Maine is used for headstones. I was with two others getting more food when one of them said that the guy had not taken a breath for four or five minutes. The other hiker in his Scottish accent said, actually, it is quite remarkable. 

The 10th picture down and the last two pictures show water challenges on the trail. Best Wife is walking around a pond on a beaver dam. 

Then, a new beaver dam has caused water to back up onto the trail, and lastly, Best Wife has removed her hiking shoes and slipped on her Crocs to ford a river. Fun times. 

We also slack packed into Monson. That was a fun one as we were tenting about 14 miles from Monson and had plans to stay at Shaws Hostel there the next night. I called Shaws and asked if they could drive to a logging road 14 miles south of Monson. Sure, we pick up hikers there all the time. I explained to Poet that I didn't want him to pick us up, but wanted him to pick up our gear, take it to Shaws so we could hike to Shaws with only lunch and water. He said he had not done that before be would try it. The next morning at 7:15 a pickup truck showed up and grabbed our gear. We then slack packed 14 miles to Shaws in Monson where our gear was waiting for us. This is the best way to slack pack because we waste no time driving. Only our gear does the driving. 

When we hike tomorrow we will begin the hundred mile wilderness. Here we go. 

In the 11th picture down we thoroughly enjoyed the two Barq's Root Beers left by some kind soul in a cooler on the trail. Soooooo tasty. 












































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Ferry - Sept 17

Been hiking by indescribable scenery these days. Maine is the best. Ponds, lakes, rivers, sunsets, sunrises... they are all so so good.

The Kennebec River is all the talk up and down the trail. Some say it is dangerous to ford because the power company up river releases water from time to time which could sweep a person downstream if they were half way across when a slug of water hit them. To solve the problem the Appalachian Trail Conservancy pays a guy to ferry hikers across the river in a canoe.

In the last three pictures the ferry is taking us across with my help paddling up front. When we got there nobody else was around. We had heard the day before there were 15 hikers waiting in line for there turn.

In Caratunk tonight for a resupply, shower and washing clothes.

Had amazing pulled pork with root beer this morning.

Multiple U-Turners? - Sept 15

Could it be there are multiple U-Turners on the AT? Didn't meet Ice Axe but the story goes that he had just finished a short climb, maybe half a mile or so, stopped on top for lunch and then started back down the other side. Trouble was he couldn't figure out which way he had come up so he didn't know which side to go down. He checked out both trails going down either side of the hill but could find no identifying clues to know which trail was northbound and which was southbound.

Ice Axe finally made his best guess and started down the hill. Of course when he made his way to the bottom he came across a road or a sign or a footbridge, something that he had definitely seen before and knew he had not chosen wisely. I'm sure he was spittin' nails with every step back up that hill. Glad I have a good sense of direction.

Part of my daily routine is to always have a good plan in place to resupply food before we run out. This means every time we are in town buying food I have to know how many miles we are going to hike to the next town and how many days we will need to hike those miles to be able to estimate how many meals we need to buy. If we buy too much food we will be carrying unnecessary weight. Not enough food we starve to death.

When we left Gorham, NH my food bag was so big the lid on the top of my pack couldn't cover some of the bag. As we left town that morning, all the hikers were laughing at me for carrying so much food. One guy said my pack looked like it was giving birth to a food bag. Real funny.

We will be in Monson, Maine in two days. North of Monson is about 100 miles of wilderness, no towns. There is no way we would carry 8 days of food to make it across this 100 mile stretch. Way too heavy. Instead I'm going to check into a guy who has figured out a way to take whatever food you give him, he packages it in some kind of animal proof container (maybe a five gallon bucket) and drops it off at where a logging road crosses the trail. If I trust this guys plan we will carry four days of food and give him the other four days of food to deliver it ahead where we will hopefully find it. Always an adventure.

In the 11th picture, Best Wife and Pappy 12 were eating lunch on a 30 foot sandy beach on East Carry Pond. The entire pond was surrounded by rock except for this stretch of sand. As we started eating this family approached in a canoe from way across the pond.

They joined us on the beach and when they found out we had been hiking for five months they gave us four clementines. Four clementines may not sound like a big deal, but to us they were manna from heaven. Thank you Sperrys for the gift.