Wednesday, August 13, 2014

The 100 mile wilderness

I have been rushed over the last several days. The whole getting sick thing kinda messed up my schedule. Got into Monson too late to resupply, so I had to spend the night there. It's kind of traditional to zero there, as leaving there is the beginning of the 100 Mile Wilderness (cue dramatic music). But I didn't have time, so after spending the night at the Lakeshore hostel, I resupplied in the morning at Pete's Place, ate breakfast there and talked to the locals for a while. I like Maniacs. They are good people. The owners were telling me about their attempt to cross the United States by horse power several years ago. Very fascinating people. 

I also saw a lot of people I hadn't seen in quite a while. Sunbear was there, who I'd caught up with, and so were Cheeseburger, Baggie, Treefrog, and Squirrel (the male one), who had all flip flopped and were now heading south. 

Got a late start to the trail, about 11:30. Not auspicious since I was planning on really pushing the pace. The "recommended" time frame for the wilderness was 10 days. I was trying for four. The first day I got 16 miles. 

The next wasn't much better, slightly more than 20. But then I was getting over the steeper mountains, supposedly. So I figured I'd make up more time the next day. I didn't. The terrain in the wilderness was much rougher than I expected. Twenty miles on the 3rd day, but I did catch Sisyfus and Ketchup, so that was cool to see them again. After rolling into a shelter right at dark, I talked with Iron Will and figured I'd get up early the next morning. 

As in I started hiking at 0430. I had twenty miles in by around noon. I was crushing. But then I came across a mountain where I had cell phone signal. A very rare thing for an AT&T customer in Maine, so I called my wife and talked with her for a long time. Long enough to completely stiffen up. The rest of the day went much more slowly, and of course then I hit Little Bowman Mt. I think that was the name. The path had become beautiful, a gorgeous smooth walk in the woods, but the trail had been rerouted in 2010, and not in a good way. It was just a horrible, horrible section of trail. Anyway, it finally ended, but I had a long way to go still. 

I walked until after midnight, quite pleasantly actually. The super moon or blood moon or whatever it's called was out, and it lit up the sky rather prettily. At 38.6 miles (my biggest day of the trail), I came to the Rainbow Ledges, wide swathes of open rock with a view of Katahdin. Even illuminated solely by moonlight they were beautiful. And flat spots are sometimes hard to find, so I rolled out my poncho and quilt and went to sleep there, to the music of coyotes and what I assume were moose bugling. 

In the morning I ate my last pop tarts, and then picked some blueberries from the bushes surrounding the ledges, and then moved off to finish the last few miles of the Wilderness. Abol campground is more or less the end, and I reached it less than 48 hours after leaving Monson, so I count that as a win.  They also have a small camp store and restaraunt there. Chef was there waiting for the restaraunt to open, and Hyperboe and Sassafras joined us later. I considered trying to get a ride into Millinocket, but decided I didn't need to since I was going to be camping at the base of Katahdin that night. 

The food was good, but the walk took a while. Easy lovely hiking, smooth trail, along a river with several waterfalls. But I was tired. So I walked slow. Sixteen more miles, ten of which were after Abol heading to the Birches, the shelters/tent sites reserved for thru-hikers. 

The end was nigh. But I didn't really think about it much. I had a plane flight home scheduled for Wednesday and it was then Monday, with an intention to summit on Tuesday. So I was mostly worried about the deadline. 

At the Birches was a pretty good group. Chef, Hyperbole and Sassafras were of course there, but Peppa, her dad (Wayman), and Flossie and Grey Squirrel, were there. I hadn't seen any of them in quite a while, Flossie and Grey Squirrel since Elusive's picnic in Maryland. Tatianna, Lyons, Alpine Pirate, and Johnny Utah were all also planning on summiting Tuesday also, but they were staying in Millinocket. Oh, and I forgot to mention that Dino left me a note in the last shelter before the Birches, documenting my apparent new nickname. 

Lady Moose started calling me Sparkle Toes. I have no idea why, but she stayed with it. This obviously didn't really bother me (I say obvious because I was named by a little girl), but apparently that became the way any of the ladies in that particular group would refer to me. So Dino drew me as a pony with very sparkly "toes."  

Sunbear, me, and Squirrel. 

I don't have to listen to you!

There was a lot of bizarre things left in the Wilderness, including these boots in very good shape. With the exception of a backpack, I could have acquired all of my backpacking gear from abandoned equipment in this stretch. 

Some pretty places. 

More loveliness. 

Pretty pond. 

Me before acquiring toes. 








3 comments:

  1. Congratulations on your journey!! Proud of you for completing.

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  2. This is from Aunt Marty

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  3. Congratulations that was great. I'm glad you make it I never thought otherwise. I really enjoyed sharing the journey with you via your blog page thanks for sharing it with us.

    ReplyDelete