Maine on the Appalachian Trail

Ben & Billy completing their thru hike of the Appalachian Trail - Mount Katahdin

In New Hampshire, I had finalised the date of my flight home. We now had 2 weeks to hike the length of the Trail in Maine and summit Katahdin. This suddenly wasn�t seeming like a lot of time - once our inevitable town breaks were taken into account, we�d have to keep up a pretty solid pace to finish in time. Maine is home to some of the most beautiful sections of the Appalachian Trail, but also some of its toughest. Our first full day�s hiking in the state would have us tackle the Mahoosuc Notch - �the toughest mile� on the entire trail. We�d been hearing horror stories from other hikers about it taking upwards of three hours to negotiate this obstacle course of rocks and boulders. In the event, we were through in an hour that included taking time out for lots of photos of us scrambling through, under, over and between the rocks. The nature of the notch is such that it is likely to take exponentially longer the less mobile one is. Dragging a big pack through wouldn�t be easy - even we had to remove our packs and push them ahead of us for some of the tighter squeezes. We enjoyed our trip through, but can see how three hours fighting through might shift the experience away from the �fun� end of the enjoyment spectrum.

We made good progress across Southern Maine, despite some tough climbing. Our progress was only slowed by some epically proportioned eating at the town of Rangely - any attempt to hike on any great distance would have resulted in some epically proportioned barfing by the side of the trail. This first section of Maine also saw us making our first cook-fires of the trip after misjudging how much fuel we�d need. Camped illegally on the banks of a stream was probably not the place to be drawing attention to ourselves, but we enjoyed cooking over a small fire of dead twigs.

During a relatively restrained breakfast stop in Stratton, we met an old-timer who introduced himself as Mr Shaw, proprietor of Shaw�s Boarding House in Monson. He was quite the character and was very keen to sell us on the idea of staying at his place when we passed through Monson. Our Stratton visit was kept short by the need to push on and reach the Kennebec River before the ferry service stopped at 4.30pm the next day. The walking through this section was fantastic: with sections of trail along the sides of big lakes and then up into the Bigelow range of mountains. Crossing the wide and fast Kennebec River by any means other than the ferry is generally considered dangerous. The ferry is a canoe operated by one woman with a little help from a volunteer passenger when available. Billy took care of the paddling for us and I was left to enjoy the ride and learn a little about ferrying.

Once on the far side of the river, it was time for us to make our second major navigational error of the trip. Unwilling to take a two mile round trip detour at the road crossing to get groceries at the Rivers and Trails Centre, we continued along the trail with the intention of taking a side trail after 1.5 miles that would get us to the same place yet only require a 0.6 mile detour. Unfortunately, we failed to find this side trail, despite our best efforts. We had hiked 2.5 miles before we accepted that we must have missed the trail altogether. Our options at this point didn�t look very appealing. We could back-track 2.5 miles to the road, walk the 2 mile detour to groceries, before hiking the 2.5 mile stretch of trail for the third time. Alternatively, we could tighten our belts and hike on to Monson, thirty miles away, with only a handful of snacks to sustain us (which wouldn�t have even made a dent in the hunger we�d already worked up. Either plan was far from ideal, but would have worked. What would not work was Plan �C� - the product of a combination of frustration, sloth and hunger. Our scheme was to blunder down a randomly selected logging track and pretty much hope it took us out to the main road. We set off and after an hour haplessly wandering in a large circle, arrived back at our starting point. The thirty miles to Monson now seemed distinctly less appealing, but rather more inevitable than previously. Just as we were about to plow on back into the woods for a hungry slog onwards, we were rescued from our situation in the knick of time. Two guys in an SUV were kind enough to stop and give us a ride. They took us out of their way to the Northern Outdoor Centre, which boasted a restaurant, bar, hot tubs and games rooms. For once we didn�t grumble too much as we handed over money ($6.50 apiece) to camp nearby. At least we had access to a (warm) shower block, which was welcome with temperatures back below 40F again.

Next morning, keen to put the previous day�s errors of judgement behind us, we rose early and went to resupply at the Rivers and Trails Centre - run by former ferryman Steve. Despite being in a frantic hurry to get to an important meeting, he was good enough to hold back and let us buy groceries before he closed up shop for the morning. Once we were finished, we headed out in search of the other end of the side trail that had eluded us the previous evening. This didn�t prove to be much easier to find and it took a frustrating hour of thwacking about in the undergrowth before we found the accursed thing. We made up the lost miles and by the next day we had reached the town of Monson - gateway to the 100 Mile Wilderness. This was the beginning of the end for us. The Wilderness was now all that stood in the way between us and Katahdin. We picked up the box of supplies we�d mailed ourselves from Gorham and checked into a room at Shaw�s Boarding House.

Shaw�s - another great Trail institution - is unlike anywhere I have ever stayed. Old man Shaw ran the place with his wife and son, and the feel of the place was like a cross between a hotel, hostel and a B&B. Our accommodation was far from modern, with a 12" black and white TV set and a shared bathroom, but it suited us well enough. There was a communal room downstairs and the other guests were all hikers. The big highlights of the experience are the meals - as old-fashioned as the rooms and all the better for it. It�s real country fare, served family-style at a big table in the kitchen. Dinner was a mass of ham, potatoes and vegetables - all excellent and all you could eat. Breakfast service began at a bleary 5.45am and was possibly even better than dinner. The ordering system is refreshingly no-nonsense: you pick a number and that�s how many eggs, sausage, bacon, ham, french toast and portions of hash browns you got. If you didn�t get enough, just order again. I loved it, but it wasn�t for the faint-of-heart - I can imagine some quailing at the prospect of anything quite so hearty, quite so early. After breakfast, Keith Shaw Junior ran us back up to the trail - much as we had enjoyed our stay, it was exciting to be heading out for the final stretch.

The 100 Mile Wilderness is not quite as wild as its name implies. It�s true that you won�t come across paved roads or habitation - if you stick to the trail - but there are plenty of logging roads and we saw and heard vehicles. The area is very popular with section hikers and the stretch is only half a day further than we�d normally plan for between resupply, so their wasn�t any great sense of isolation. I�m not sure we really cared though, as by now we were counting down the miles to Katahdin. Summitting White Cap Mountain at the end of the second day sparked a mini-celebration - with the exception of Katahdin, this was the last significant climb of the trip - considering the seemingly endless stretches of mountains that had been ahead of us for the last few months, this was a big deal.

All that lay in our way now was fifty miles of walking on the flat...and some bees. A group of students from Colby were tenting near the shelter that night and they warned us that there was a bee problem some 1.5 miles north on the trail. The next day we were prepared to don our rain gear before we got near where the bees were to be. Our informant proved to be right about the bees, but very wrong about the 1.5 miles. Less than a mile from the shelter, I saw Billy leap in the air, heard him shout something unintelligible and set off at a sprint down the trail. I was confused for a few seconds - until I felt several sharp jabs of pain, and found myself doing much the same as Billy had done. We never saw or heard our attackers, but they left a lasting impression on us, or at least on our legs and rears.

The remaining miles were dispatched without further drama, but with mounting excitement - especially when Katahdin hoved impressively into view. After four days of hiking through the Wilderness, we made it out to the store at Abol Bridge and paused to stuff ourselves with Pop Tarts. Once at the campground, we hitched our final ride and checked into a motel in Milinocket to await the arrival of Billy�s parents and Nicky. We killed time through our usual routine of parking ourselves in a fast food restaurant (MacDonald�s in this case) and ordering several meals worth of food. Tempting as it was, we both managed to restrain ourselves from ordering the Maine-specific MacLobster sandwich - this was probably a wise decision.

Our reunion with Billy�s family was a happy one and we spent another day in Milinocket before heading on back to the trail for the final 5.2 mile ascent. For this we were accompanied by Nicky and Billy�s father. It was game of them to join us, as it�s a tough climb. There was no great rush to get up though and we lucked out with the weather - blue skies and sunshine the whole way up. At the summit, we celebrated with homemade brownies (courtesy of Billy�s mother), posed for photos and enjoyed the view. It was an odd feeling to finally finish - the elation was mixed with disappointment. For five months we had focussed everything we had on achieving this one goal - and now that we�d reached it we had to turn around, hike back the way we�d come and try to face reality again.


Photos of the Maine section of the Appalachian Trail:

2000 mile marker	Abol Bridge	Avery Peak	Barren Slide

Cooking	East Peak of Baldpate Mountain	Goose Eye Mountain	Mount Katahdin

Kennebec River	Last Blaze	Saddleback Mountain	Long Road Home

Moxie Bald Mountain	North & South Horn	Rock overhang

Saddleback Mountain	Saddleback Mountain	Baldpate Mountain	Totem Pole

Walking in the Wilderness	White Cap Mountain	100 Mile Wilderness