It felt like the minute we left Georgia the trail immediately changed. We had some minor rock climbing and it threw us for a loop. Wait a minute, where’d the endless PUD’s go? Rock climbing, huh? We’d heard that there was bad weather coming but that night was a beautiful evening and we saw a lot of people at the first shelter passed the border. After setting up camp we went to bed early. The next morning we woke to cooler weather and clouds. Someone mentioned talking to their dad and that the weather was coming with rain on the way and snow later on. We just prepared ourselves by layering up and started hiking. With the exception of a few climbs that day, Standing Indian Mountain being the the biggest one and it was such a graded trail that the elevation change wasn’t nearly that bad, the trail seemed to go pretty quickly that day. Walking in snow is definitely much easier than walking in rain and is quite peaceful, too. Once we arrived at Carter Mountain shelter the weather soon deteriorated. I think we at our earliest dinner at 4pm and were in the tent by 5pm. The shelter was full and people ended up sleeping under the shelter that night.
The next morning the ground was covered in snow and our tent poles were frozen together. Getting going and walking down the trail was the best way to warm up. The snow covered rhododendron tunnels were absolutely beautiful.
I had to take a short break on the trail because I felt a migraine coming on; the fuzzies out in my eyes and a slight headache. Luckily we had Excedrin and things were taken care of. The trail the rest of the day was really good, but we had our first rock scrambling climb up Albert Mountain. It ended up not being as difficult or scary as I imagined.
We got to camp too early to hit the sack, but we shivered as the snow kept coming down.
The problem with building fires is that once you move away from them it seems to get even colder!
The weather was better the next day as we went down to the gap that leads you to Franklin, NC. Many people went into town for a resupply but we were planning to wait until the Nantahala Outdoor Center another two days away. I remember passing “Swinging Dick Gap”, which was really “Swinging Lick Gap” but someone had cleverly etched the L into a D. Oh, those silly hikers! We went up Siler Bald and Wayah Bald and intended to stay at a campsite on the backside of Wayah Bald until we were rudely awakened to a foot or two of snow and ice on the north face of the mountain. We ended up pushing into a 14 mile day, our longest thus far.
Between Siler and Wayah Bald.
On top of Wayah Bald we met StumbleWolf and Lightning from the Traveling Circus (before we knew about the TC) and then settled in at the Wayah Bald Shelter. We also met Traipsing Platypus who had set up a tent near ours but we never saw her again after that night until we got to Maine! The trail does mysterious things with hikers!
We had fun playing with Jasper, the dog of another hiker, the next morning. We had some good terrain and the dog would run up to us and then run back to his owner! We hiked with him and his owner off and on until we found out the owner got off the trail somewhere near Erwin. Bummer!
I think many people would be surprised how many times you cross power lines and see cell towers or even just crossing a road, whether paved or dirt. The AT is remote, but not that remote.
Beautiful weather made the climb up to Wesser Bald an awesome adventure.
On top of the Wesser bald is a look out tower. This is our friend Missionary.
It’s always amazing to have a view in order to ponder at what you’ve already walked over and to see what you will be walking over. The talk on the trail was about the snow in the Smokies and while on top of the bald we tried to see if we could make out Clingman’s Dome, the highest point on the trail.
We only did 10 miles that day since we were trying to kill time until we got to Fontana Dam to meet Chris’ mom. We took our time that day and got to camp early as did the majority of everyone else at the Wesser Bald shelter. This is one of the worst placed privies on the trail and you have to kinda lean over to the side so you can prevent yourself from being seen from the shelter!
At the NOC we had to hitch into Bryson City. We considered staying at the hostel there, but once we got down to the gap we realized we’d of been bored and we would have greatly enjoyed being in town instead. So, we hitched a ride and got a hotel room and oh, that was so nice! Our biggest problem was trying to figure out how to get back to the trail but I remembered I knew some people who worked in Cherokee and I was able to get him to take us back to the trail so it all worked out! Thank goodness!
The climb of the NOC is notorious for being a bit difficult. It was a bit trying that’s for sure. We ran into some trail magic from some local folks who had houses down the road but we’d already resupplied and decided against taking extra weight.
Lunch in the trail.
Cheoah Bald was a beautiful site and we met iTrod on top. We camped at a nice gap that night and it was the last nice day for a few days.
It was a pretty cold and rainy day for the climb down and out of Stecoah gap. Luckily we were only doing 9 miles again, short days to stall, and so we took our time at lunch before making it to the campsite for the night.
BRRRR!
The next morning we woke up to an inversion, the clouds were lower than we were. Pretty cool to look down into the valley. For most of the day as we descended into Fontana Dam we were walking in the clouds and visibility was pretty short.
Finally we made it to the Fontana Hilton, one of the nicest shelters on the trail. It was pretty full so we set up our tent. There is a small resort about three or four miles away and once we found out we could call and get a shuttle to the dining room we were stoked! Burgers here we come! I still think that was one of the best burgers we had on the trail.
We took our second zero that day, chilling for most of the morning at the shelter and drying things out.
The second part of the day was spent up at the village general store eating junk food, picking up our maildrop, hanging out and playing putt-putt!
A big group of hikers came in later in the day and we saw some folks we’d met earlier on and new faces. We met Nuthatch and Sea Otter for the first time and were blown away by the amount of miles they were already averaging.
Finally Chris’ mom and step dad showed up and we were off for another zero day!
Shelters we stayed at:
Muskrat Creek Shelter
Carter Gap Shelter
Rock Gap Shelter
Wayah Shelter
Wesser Bald Shelter
Locust Cove Gap
Cody Gap
Fontana Dam Shelter
I’ve decided to go back through and show photos that I never got around to posting, recap some of the sections and discuss in more detail various sections of the trail. Plus, I like reminiscing and I’m a little sad that we’re pushing on two weeks off the trail.
And off we went. I look back now and realize just how overweight we were. Looking at us now someone might not have guessed. We had a few people think that we’d started the trail this way, people imagining that to walk 2,000 miles you must be fit. Not really. Tons of people start off in varying weights and fitness levels. Some quit, some continue. All you need is ambition and the mental toughness to keep going when the going gets tough.
I remember climbing the stairs up Amicalola Falls and thinking to myself that I was insane. It was difficult, I was out of breath and I was hoping above all hopes that the whole 8 miles on the Approach Trail wasn’t going to be like that. It wasn’t, but it wasn’t easy either. We met two guys on the side of the Approach Trail who had ginormous packs. The kind of packs you imagine from A Walk in the Woods. We never saw them again after that day. After awhile the sun went away and it started trying to rain just after we’d finished our lunch. Eventually it started sleeting somewhere just a few miles from Springer. In my head I was just thinking that we were really in for it. I’d read so much about the Smokies and all the snow, I just *knew* that it was going to be horrible the whole way.
Of course it wasn’t horrible! Somehow we made it to the top of Springer. It isn’t as monumental as getting to the top of Katahdin, but it was still exciting since this was the official beginning of the trail.
I don’t even remember if we signed the register, it was too cold!
The ridge runner at the top of Springer near the Springer Mtn Shelter. We hung out at the shelter for a few minutes until we realized we’d be much warmer walking so we kept on going to Stover Creek shelter.
Oh the rhododendrons! How many there were and I didn’t even know what they were! The tunnels that we went through in Georgia and North Carolina were majestic.
Those first few days the trail is so crowded. You skip and jump in front of people all day long, they pass you and you pass them. For awhile it is a bit nerve wracking, this contest of sorts to keep up. Eventually it gets to the point along the trail where you just don’t care, though sometimes I did like to keep a mental “I’m ahead” list of people that we’d passed and were behind us. People who are typically faster hikers than us, but because they took time in town I just liked to know that we were ahead of them.
The further north we got the less we were in National Forests. I personally liked being in National Forests because they weren’t so picky about stealth camping. Some areas in the NE were very picky about where and where not you could camp.
Going up Blood Mountain. We were the only ones who stayed on top of the mountain that night. When we crossed Jarrard Gap there was a fierce wind blowing through, extremely chilly. Many folks went to the Woods Hole shelter just past that, but we kept on going, passed the Slaughter Creek campsite and then on up to Blood Mtn. It was such a surreal experience in all the snow and ice.
Of course then you get to Neel’s Gap and Mountain Crossings and you think you’ve come *so* far when you’ve only gone 30.7 miles. Most people we knew stayed at the hostel. Later on we heard not such great things about the hostel which made me thankful we kept on going and camped on Cowrock.
Still one of our best campsites, not only for the beautiful sunset but the quiet solitude.
Another good campsite was at Sassafras Gap, one of the bazillion SG’s there are. The people who named Gaps, Mtns, passes, and other things on the trail were not very imaginative. You’d mention Sassafras Gap on the trail and someone would say “Which one?”
On the day we hiked over Tray Mountain there was still snow on a lot of the mountain. I thought that was a pretty fun climb, whereas other didn’t enjoy it so much. We had a good bit of hiking after that, a nice ‘flat’ stretch where we could cruise, but my mental time still hadn’t gotten calibrated yet and I would always think we’d gone further or faster than we really had. I kept looking for the Swag of the Blue Ridge and when it finally came, miles after I’d expected it, I knew we were close to our campsite.
When it is a town day the trail seems to go incredibly slow. Our first stay in town was at Hiawassee and the Blueberry Patch hostel. We got to the road by lunch but we first had a thousand foot climb over Kelly Knob and like most of the trail once you go down you have to go back up to go down again. The book is famous for leaving out little ups, thinking that you will have a mostly flat section, but instead you go up and down and up and down until you finally reach that spot you thought was going to be flat.
And here we are at Dicks Creek Gap being dropped off by Gary the owner of the Blueberry Patch. I’m glad we left on that sunshine day because the next day brought rain and snow and leaving town would have been a mental impossibility for me! Starting to hike when you are already out in the elements is one thing, but going out when you can be cozy indoors is quite another thing!
Of course we then finally made it to the NC border!
Here are a few people we met in those first few days that we never saw again, but they are still out on the trail! RafiC: We always thought he’d pass us after we left him in Neel’s Gap because he was very fit and did marathons and such, but the only time he passed us was when we took our time off at home and then we passed him when he got off for treating his Lyme. Red Lobster: another girl that I thought would pass us but we never saw her after Neel’s Gap. Klarity: Ditto to above Gearbomb: we heard her for several hundred yards because she had a metal cup clanking on the outside of her pack. Llano: I actually started reading her journal before we left and was surprised to meet her at the Low Gap Shelter after Neel’s Gap.
Shelters we stayed at
Stover Creek Shelter: Good water source, but it was crowded with thru-hikers and a scout group. Camped.
Gooch Mtn Shelter: Again, super duper crowded! Camped.
Blood Mtn Shelter: Not a soul in sight and we camped. Very dirty shelter.
Cowrock Mtn: Take a shower at Neels Gap, eat something and keep hiking to this awesome spot.
Blue Mtn Shelter: Very chilly, not too crowded and we camped.
Sassafras Gap: Water was a bit far but it was well worth it to camp here.
Hiawassee, GA: Blueberry Patch hostel is still one of my favorites for the just plain down-homeness and sweet folks who run the place. Hiawassee is an excellent resupply point.
Stay tuned for the southern NC post! It’s going to take me decades to get this done!
Trail Magic at Katahdin Iron Works Road, 100 Mile Wilderness, Maine
Now that we are several days post hike we’ve had to really think about what we are eating. When you aren’t burning 5,000 calories a day it is impossible to continue eating like you were. Or, you could, but you’d balloon up in no time! So, I thought I’d give a run down of what a typical thru-hiker eats.
Breakfast: Pretty much everyone starts off with oatmeal. It’s warm and easy to make, but it takes time to boil water. In the beginning this is great because you start off later in the morning. Eventually you move on to breakfast bars. Some people start eating cold oatmeal, some drink Carnation instant breakfast, Pop Tarts are popular and I tried those fried fruit pies. Too much sugar for me. Breakfast was mostly a pain in the butt.
Lunch: Lunch can be equally as hard as breakfast. Mostly we stuck to pepperoni, salami and tuna, but sometimes I bought chicken salad packages and ate peanut butter. I went into this thing thinking I would love pb but it didn’t appeal to me at all! Sometimes I had enough of something else that I’d put my pb into a hiker box. We also cooked lunch sometimes. In our mail drops we’d send a pack or two of chicken or tuna and then a mashed potato. This was awesome on days you were extra hungry. Tortilla’s were used most of the time for wraps with the pepperoni and tuna. I bought the flavored tuna packs, sometimes tuna salad packs. We’d grab mayo, mustard and relish from convenience stores or restaurants to flavor it up a bit. I liked to carry crackers, either cracker sandwiches or items like Goldfish or Cheez-its. Then you’d top it off with a candy bar, gummy bears, or some sort of dessert.
Dinner: Our dinners consisted of a lot of Mountain House/Alpine Aire or the like dehydrated meals. We had bought a bunch before we left for our mail drops and this was an excellent supplement along the way. Towards the later half of the trail we’d sometimes just buy them in outfitters because with two people it was the same cost as buying a Lipton/Knorr side and two packages of meat. Lipton/Knorr sides were very common. Once we bought some Thai noodles and some sauce and made that. Mac and cheese is popular as is ramen noodles. Ramen is probably the most popular hiker dinner there is. People made it all sorts of ways, and the latest popular way was to add peanut butter to it. We went until the very last day of the trip to buy a package of ramen. We had a few in the hiker box on occasion, but we kinda prided ourselves on not buying ramen. You will see all sorts of combinations of hiker food: Noodles with little packages of the dried sauces in the spice aisle, mac and cheese with Spam, pieces of sausage in ramen….on and on and on. One of the best things we did was send dried tomatoes to ourselves. They were nice surprises and additions to our meals. Further north we found some in stores and we’d buy them along the way.
Snacks: Aside from bars like Larabars, Luna, Powerbars, etc., we ate a lot of candy bars for snacks, gummy bears, Oreo’s, crackers, Little Debbie snacks. Anything junk food you can insert here. And oh, it was so nice!
The photo above includes a Whoopie Pie. We discovered these in Andover, ME at a general store. They packing a whopping 800 calories and an ungodly amount of fat and sugar, so they are a PERFECT hiker food! Merf and Chris would joke that after I ate one that I’d have my afterburners on because I’d be so far ahead of them I’d keep slowing down to wait for ‘em. Yesterday we were driving along a road on the coast when we saw a hand made sign for pies and whoopies. We turned down the road and into someones drive and out came a pre-teen girl who showed us to a covered porch with a fridge full of whoopie pies. I refrained, but Chris got a pb one and mom got a coconut one. I had a nibble…and they were so divine!
Too bad you can’t eat a whoopie every day.
I’m actually craving a green monster and can’t wait to start cooking! One of my hiker friends (though we only met twice!) has a cooking blog, so check our Eat What You Love and entice her to post more!
The alarm went off. Was the sky clear? Yes, the stars were out. We reached over and twisted our NeoAir tubes to deflate them, stretching in our sleeping bags and yawning. It was too early. After fumbling for our headlamps we started moving about, getting dressed, rolling up the air mattresses and stuffing our bags into their compression sacks.
Sitting on the side of the tent platform at The Birches, Blue Rooster came by and said he was getting ready. Cubbie & Dilly Dally were in the other shelter getting their items together. We ate a few granola bars for the early morning breakfast and quickly put everything together in our packs.
We were off on an adventure. Or the final adventure to a long adventure.
Inside the front porch of the ranger station we found someone sleeping. Sorry, but we had to switch our some gear, ditching anything heavy we didn’t need for the final five miles. No use for a sleeping bag, Keen sandals, cooking gear. Throw it into the trash bag to leave behind. Without the extra weight we felt light and airy, able to bounce around. Just some water, food, rain gear and extra clothing.
We crossed Katahdin stream, through the campground and were off. It was 2am. I lead the way up the Hunt Trail, the name of the trail that the AT follows up Mount Katahdin, this Greatest Mountain that the local Indian tribes call Maine’s tallest peak. I’m the slowest one so it’s easier to keep everyone behind the slowest person.
Lights are on full blast, to scope out the roots and rocks that we might stumble upon. We cross over a bridge, see the privy that is located a mile up the trail. That was a quick mile. We finally start climbing, lots of nicely placed rock stairs by the Maine Appalachian Trail Club, then up some big rocks. Finally we come to a spot where water is flowing on the trail, trying to side step the puddles in the dark, careful to keep our shoes dry. We pull ourselves up by using some trees, our hands, other rocks, to keep moving upwards and onto rocks that pose tricks for us to continue. Eventually the confiers become smaller; we are nearing tree line.
With a turn around a rock, the wind howls, the stars are bright and it is pitch black outside of five head lamps on the trail. It becomes a bit scary, finding that we have to manuvere our way up large boulders, several having rebar placed in the perfect position to pull ourselves up or place a foot. The white blazes are well marked every few feet, though in a few sections we get confused; is it that way or this way? Of course we have to go down to go up, this is the Appalachian Trail after all, so yes, it is that way, down through the trees and into some protection from the wind, at least for a few minutes.
Soon we are completely above tree line, following white blazes over large boulders. Still leading, I pull myself up rocks that look intimidating, squeeze through sections that I can barely fit through. The wind is still blowing and it is getting pretty cold. I have my warm wool hat on to keep my ears from stinging. We’re all talking, looking around us. We can see the outline of some thunderheads to the northeast. We’re all hoping they don’t blow our direction. We see the lights from Millenocket in the distance, and further away, is it Bangor? Finally everyone gets too cold and starts putting extra layers on and we take a few minutes break. Is that the peak we see up there? Probably not, there are always false summits.
I spot the white spray paint on a rock that says 2 miles. We have two miles to summit. Continuing our way up to the summit we are all hoping is the summit, we eventually see a sign. Could it be? Is it the sign? We joke that it is probably a fake sign, and sure enough it is just a small sign advising people to stay on the trail to avoid damaging the alpine vegetation. By this time we’ve reached the tableland, the flatter section of the top. We keep walking along, bouncing off rocks on the path when we finally see a sign for Thoreau spring and the mark for the 1 mile to the summit. Which way is the summit? It’s probably the part that is covered in the clouds, a light fog drifting over it. Damn, we all hope it blows away.
The sky is becoming light in the east. We’re getting faster, more excited, but we still have to go up the mountain more. By the time we start climbing more MATC stairs the fog has drifted away, the sky is brighter and our head lamps are turned off.
And then it was there. The Sign. The one we dream off the minute we left Springer Mountain, Georgia. The sign we all walk to. We stop 100′ away, maybe more, so Cubbie & Dilly Dally can take a photo of us walking up the last bit of the Appalachian Trail. And then we keep walking.
And we’re there. On the summit the with the sign. We’re relived, stoked, excited, in awe of the awesome beauty of the sunrise that is unfolding before us. Our summit was just after 5am. Three hours to the top. None of us can believe it was three hours, it didn’t feel like it, nor did it feel like four thousand vertical feet of elevation gain in five miles. It is such a beautiful site. And words just can’t explain the feeling of being there.
Only five of us at the top for the sunrise summit. No crowds, no day hikers. Just five thru-hikers who have busted through 2,179 miles to be there. We stayed for two hours, eating M&M’s and other food, taking photo after photo, nearly getting dragged off the mountain by a kite and losing said kite (that story later), the other three smoking cigs that were left up there by someone else, probably a thru-hiker, discussing the intense insaneness of the Knife’s Edge, talking about our favorite parts of the trip….
We left down at 7am. It was a completely different hike on the way down since we hadn’t seen what we’d come up. Going down is much harder than coming up, scooting down rocks, easing your way around, trying not to fall. I was amazed at what we’d climbed up at night and couldn’t believe how narrow some of the areas had been. Adrenaline had been our power that pushed us up the mountain. We were down by 10am, passing hoards of other tourists, most in amazement that we’d left so early, many congratulating us on our accomplishment and some asking if they were half way or even near the top (sorry…not quite).
And it was done. We had thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail.
I have to blog about the rest of Maine that I haven’t covered and then I plan on doing a retrospective of each state with photos that haven’t been shown here, when I get home. If you have any questions about the trail, hiking, whatever, ask away and I’ll answer them soon!
What’s next for us??? Hanging around Maine for a few days, heading to Texas and after that we’re not sure. Looking for jobs and trying to find a place to live, but doing a lot of fun side trips and getting into photography again will be on the agenda, too. Thanks for reading and I hope you stay around! Oh yeah, it was a Class I day and we were #’s 103 & 104 at the park.
Since last leaving y’all we were in Rangeley, Maine. Now we have advanced forward to Monson, Maine, our last town stop on the entire trail. Everyone seems to be a little bit sad about this last town stop, reminiscing in the log books. It does seem surreal that we won’t be continuing our walk north towards a far off destination.
We left Rangeley and got to the first shelter two miles out for lunch to find that our friends Moose & Tetherball had finally caught up to us and passed us. Drat! Merf’s friend Inferno had done the same. We climbed up Saddleback mountain and had a beautiful view. Supposedly you can see both Mount Washington and Katahdin from the summit but it was a bit hazy and we could only glimpse what we thought was Katahdin. The next day we had a pretty easy day and had only planned 14 miles but tossed around the idea of doing 17 or so until we came to a stream at mile 13 and Chris decided he wanted to fish so we took two hours and sat around before walking up to the Crocker Cirque campsite.
The following morning we left Merf at the road to Stratton. She has a later finish date and so she wanted to take a nearo and stay in town and we continued on and summited both the West Peak and Avery Peak of the Bigelows and camped down in a notch between those and Little Bigelow. It was a quiet campsite and I thought a nice place to stop. It was another 17 mile day. woo for higher mileage days! The next morning we went up Little Bigelow and found out that our friends Moose, Tetherball, Cubbie and Dilly Dally were only five miles ahead of us and we were fairly certain we were going to catch them that night at Pierce Pond. Sure enough at lunch we ran into them at a shelter! We hadn’t seen M&T since New York when they were slowing down to do some zero’s with family. We did 22 miles into Pierce Pond shelter. The reason to push was so that we could get a super awesome breakfast at Harrison’s Pierce Pond camps about .2 off the trail. The owner walks over in the evening, or you can call him, and tell him if you want sausage and eggs with your 12 pancake breakfast. The next morning you walk over and sit down in his dining area sipping coffee, watching the hummingbirds at the feeders and just chill out. He goes all out, powdered sugar, maple syrup….oh it was really, really awesome.
Our next big “thing” was to cross the fabled Kennebec River. It’s the only ATC sanctioned moving white blaze on the trail. At least one person has died trying to ford the river and many get swept down stream or lose their packs, so for 20+ years during certain times of the day, a paid canoeist will come and shuttle you across the river. We picked up a package in Caratunk and kept on going yesterday and ended at 18 miles. We did 22 miles today to get into Monson and will take the morning off and head out somewhere into the 100 mile wilderness tomorrow.
It’s so insane. We are almost done. Last night we were flipping through our photos on our camera. We switched our card out when we went home in Pearisburg so we only have from Pearisburg until now, but it was hilarious to see my brilliantly pink hair, and so many other photos that you all haven’t seen yet. There will be many more stories to tell.
So far in the animal count, no moose yet. Everyone says we will see them in the 100 but who knows. Everyone also jokes that the only moose they will see will be the ones on the road out of Baxter State Park! hah! We saw two grouse this morning, a ruffed and a spruce. I saw three garter snakes today, too.
what can I say? The journey is almost done. we have plane tickets for the 17th and my mom is coming on the 12th to pick us up/hang out with us in Maine for a few days. Since we were concerned about the whole summit thing we were leery about getting something too close, but I am excited to have some time to tool around Maine. I want to do a trail magic day, go to Arcadia National Park, eat a lobster dinner, and hang out in Bangor some. A mini-vacation.
So….sometime next week I’ll be back with summit photos! Until then keep thinking “Class I day….Class I day”. Class I day is like having the as perfect a day as possible on Katahdin.
We officially walked to Maine! It was very exciting to see this sign! The book said that the state line was this yellow paint spot but I wasn’t expecting to see a sign since the majority of our previous state lines didn’t have anything. There is a sticker that I see frequently at outfitters, one I will have to get, that says “Yes, I walked here from Georgia”. Yes, folks, I walked here from Georgia. Can you believe that? That saying comes because when you run into someone, usually a person who isn’t familiar with the trail, they are always incredulous that you’ve walked that far. Sometimes I think it is insane. The southern half of the trail seems foreign and long ago. Not 4.5 months ago.
Upon leaving Gorham we had a fairly nice 12 miles to the Gentian Pond shelter that offered a beautiful view of the White Mountains. But after that our nice trail was gone and New Hampshire tried to tighten it’s grips on us and then tossed us to Maine, which immediately put a choke hold on us, too. You see, we leave the White Mountains and enter the Mahoosuc Range. The key letters are Suc(k), because they truly do suck. Beautiful, but sucky. The photo above is on a false top of one of the Gooseye Mtns where we had lunch.
And then you come to a little thing called the Mahoosuc Notch. It’s legend and lore. Every thru-hiker knows about it. It looms in the back of your head because it is called the toughest mile on the trail. It’s really 1.1 miles and ended up being 90% fun, 10% pain in the ass. What it is is a big pile of boulders that you have to scramble on, under, around and sometimes it takes an hour for fast people, but it took us 1 hour and 45 minutes.
Half the time you have to scoot down a rock and hope to land safely. We started at about 4:15 and thought it’d take an hour, but we came out the other side at 6pm and had intended to continue another 2.5 miles to a campsite/shelter and go up the Mahoosuc Arm. The Mahoosuc Arm doesn’t get talked about as much, but it is straight up a slick rock slab for about a mile and a half. It’s 90% pain in the ass and 10% fun. When we came out the end of the notch we found our friends Cubbie and Dilly Dally with camp set up and we all decided to pitch our tents there and cover the Arm the next morning. Good idea. It would have been after 8pm before we got into camp.
After Grafton Notch the trail seemed to get easier. Well, easier than it had been. We had a good two miles or so of trail until we climbed up to Baldpate Mtns where there we scrambled up open rock just as a rain shower came through and we leaned into tropical storm force winds. Beautiful but windy! Somehow the next day we ended up being able to do 10 miles before lunch! WOOO! Oh, that felt so nice. We planned to camp near a road after hearing from Southbounders that a good campsite was there and once we got to the road it was nearly 4 pm. Awesome! Early camp! But, you see, we left Gorham with six days of food and carrying six days of food is really, really heavy so we all skimped on snacks. Luckily we weren’t too far from the town of Andover so four of us split a shuttle to and from town and ate dinner at a general store/diner and got more snacks and came back and set up camp! Ahhhh, full bellies!
Yesterday was pretty nice. We had beautiful weather all day long and climbed up Old Blue Mtn and over the Bemis range. We made 17 miles by 5pm! Our first 17 since before the Whites! I think we’ll have a few more slower days until right after Stratton because we have to go up Saddleback Range, Sugarloaf, Crocker Mtns and the Bigelows but we hear after the Bigelows everything gets much easier and I think we can start pumping out some miles. It’s kinda hard to estimate the date now, but in about two weeks we’ll be done. I would guess by Monson we’ll know for sure…and Monson is really only about a week away!
We have a mail drop in Caratunk and our next time in town will be Monson so you won’t hear from us until then and then after that will be Abol Bridge which is 15 miles from Katahdin, so potentially only one more post here and then we’ll summit! It’s getting exciting!!!
Oh, the title of the post is because last night I heard loons for the first time and this morning saw them on Sabbath Day pond. Excellent!
Oh and Maine broke my left hiking pole. Thank you Maine. Leki is going to ship replacement parts to Monson, thank goodness, but until then I am being called “one pole”, which plays off of “one paw” our nickname for Leo. He sometimes lays with just one paw out, lounging like a lion.
The Whites
-noun
1)a mountain range in N New Hampshire, part of the Appalachian Mountains. Highest peak, Mt. Washington, 6293 ft. (1918 m).
2)Ass kicker
3)Vermont + Pennsylvania combined. Mud + rocks.
4)Mileage reducer
5)Beautiful
6)Exhausting
7)Crowded
Ahhhh….we’re done with the Whites!!! THANK YOU GOD! Ok…so I’m a touch dramatic, but wow, what a wipe out, tiring experience. After doing Moosilauke (which wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be) and getting slowed down on the north side of Kinsman Notch we had to re-think our mental game in terms of mileage. Goodbye 15+ mile days. We couldn’t even think it. When you look at the book it seems ‘easy’ and doable. Sure, that 17 or 19 mile stretch doesn’t look so bad, until you are faced with hand over hand rock climbing and making your way down wet rocks, rocks covered in roots and sliding down surfaces because figuring out a way down any other way just doesn’t seem possible.
In many parts our average speed was 1.5 miles an hour. This is depressing from going 2.5-3 (even more at times) mph in other areas. And even thinking that anything else was hard previously is laughable. Sure, it might have been hard because it was hot or I was in a bad mood or it just took a little longer, but we did some big climbs with some seemingly nasty stuff and still managed 17+ miles a day, even did some over 20′s and had no problem. Our biggest day in the Whites was from Lakes of the Clouds hut, just below Mt. Washington, up and over the Presidential Range and down into Pinkham Notch, which was 15 miles and that beat us up pretty bad.
We did Moosilauke early in the morning and it wasn’t a bad climb at all. Took some time, but we made it up and we all hung out up top for about an hour. It was cloudy at first but they blew by us quickly and Chris and Merf attempted to make a kite out of her tarp; it failed.
My big thing about this mountain was the coming down the other side. We’d heard so much about the descent that I was insanely nervous and absolutely didn’t want it to rain. Of course it wasn’t nearly as bad I as I thought, but I can see how in the rain it would be worse. There are wood blocks mounted to slabs of rock so you can get down, rebar to grab on to and a stream flowing right next to the trail.
At Franconia Notch we met up with blog reader Patrice and her husband who live in the area and they were kind enough to bring us trail magic and drive us somewhere to eat. They were also super nice enough to let two other hikers tag along to get some resupply! Thank you so much and it was awesome to meet you! They are going southbound next summer so I will be sure to announce it all so you can follow her, too. Oh, and it was crazy, the pub/restaurant we ate at in North Woodstock , we ran into Lion King, whom we originally met coming down from the ridge past Thomas Knob shelter in Virginia. He’d just broken his poles! He even remembered us!
we found some pitcher plants on a boreal bog near South Kinsman! Very neat!
The big thing about the Whites is that you have to pay to tent or stay at the huts. It’s really, really, annoying. But…you can stealth camp. We lucked out and the first tent site we name dropped an AMC ridgerunner from CT to the caretaker and he let us in for free! Score! The next two nights we stealthed and this photo is from the spot on Mt. Webster. It was really cold up there with the wind, but it was a very awesome spot.
By far the best part was being above tree-line. Also, the scariest part. We’d just left Mizpah hut and were heading to Lakes of the Clouds hut when we got up top and saw a storm front was blowing in. Lightning was in the distance and though it isn’t totally kosher to set up a tent in the alpine zone, we threw it up in a little alcove and rode out what turned out to be a wimpy little storm. It stayed chilly and windy the rest of the way up. That is Washington in the background.
We got up at 5:30am the morning we summited Washington and it was perfectly clear! This was what I was hoping for all along! SCORE! We were on the summit probably 45 minutes after leaving and tinkered around for awhile at the top. Then it was down trail towards the other Presidentials.
Overall the toughest parts of the Whites were coming down into notches (gap’s…valley’s) and leaving them. Generally. We had an awesome 2.5mph stretch from Zealand Hut to Crawford Notch, but flat trail was few and far between. The worst climbs by far were South Kinsman and the Wildcat’s.
We made it through most of the weather except for yesterday when we got a really nasty thunderstorm while on top of the Carter range. At one point we were above treeline and the lightning and thunder got closer and we tried to book it as fast as we can, but of course 2 miles from camp and coming down North Carter (which had steep rocks and rocks you have to slide down or precariously try to walk across) the bottom fell out and we ended up getting soaked and walked in the Appalachian River instead.
Anyway, we are in Gorham resupplying and trying to dry out. We’ll be in Maine on Saturday. The next week will probably continue to be tough but we’ve heard that the second section of Maine is much easier and we can pick up our miles again.
Still can’t say when exactly we’ll be done, but I’ll just estimate 3ish weeks! Insane! And relieved. I am ready for not moving my body at all for an entire day.
Oh, not sure when the next computer time will be so I will probably be doing the call my brother and let him post thing.
PS: HAPPY EARLY BIRTHDAY TO MOM! She’s going to be…shhhh…50!! You can think of her on the 27th.
Some kind of purple fringe orchid near Griffith Pond on Vermont.
Another orchid.
Another?
Maple syrup tubes!
Ok, this doesn’t smell like wildflowers, but it was a really cool privy at Thistle Hill shelter. Finally, a privy that isn’t a dungeon! The ones in the south are usually open at the top so you can actually breathe!
Until then keep thinking “Class I day….Class I day”. 
Class I day is like having the as perfect a day as possible on Katahdin. 
