The end of the trail!

Hey folks!

Well, it’s finally happened; the trail is finished, and I am back home in Wisconsin. It’s been a busy time since I last updated y’all at the Kennebec River in central Maine. So, how did everything go? I’ll fill you. In with everything here!

Moving on from the Kennebec, a lot of us expected the trail to become pretty easy for the remainder, at least until we hit Mount Katahdin at the end. After all, the elevation profiles we were hiking into were nothing like the Whites in New Hampshire; they were practically flat in comparison! Well, it turns out that terrain has a huge say in that, too. I swear, Maine is the rockiest, rootiest, occasionally muddiest part of the trail! What’s more, Maine is pretty darn rugged, and therefore has you fording a lot of bridgeless rivers, leaving your feet in a near perpetual state of wet. What’s even more, as the leaves fell, they would often cover up all those rocks and roots, making each step a “will-I-won’t-I-trip” sort of gamble. Even through these “flat” sections of trail, I was still averaging only just about 2-2.5 mph.

Despite some difficult trail conditions in Maine, I could not have asked for a more beautiful time to hike through the last state on the Appalachian Trail. I’m from Wisconsin, and we have beautiful fall colors, too, but I’m here to say that Maine beat out the Midwest by a bit. If you’re looking to go to Maine, autumn is a fine time!

Before getting to the end of the trail, one must first pass through the 100 Mile Wilderness. The 100 Mile is a – you guessed it – 100 mile stretch of trail from Monson, ME to Baxter State Park that contains relatively few intersections with civilized society. There are a few fire roads with limited access, but beyond those, you’re on your own. Prior to entering, one must make sure that they leave Monson with all the provisions to make it through. I stopped for a bit at Shaw’s Hiker Hostel, one of the last hostels on trail heading NOBO, and one of the most well-recognized on trail. I was super surprised to run into Kevin and Anne Roytek, relatives from back in Wisconsin, who were visiting Maine at the same time I was passing through! It was great to see them! They were kind enough to give me a lift to the grocery store, and treated me to a meal at a local restaurant! Truly some of the best trail magic I’ve received! Major shoutout to Kevin and Anne!

Moving on into the 100 mile from Monson, I encountered two problems. I called it, “the food and energy crisis.” Problem number one was that I got 20 miles into the 100 before I realized that I forgot a not insignificant chunk of my food resupply back in Monson; probably about 40%. Faced with the choices of turning back and re-hiking 20 miles or pushing forward, I chose to push on ahead. Let me tell you, hiking hungry is awful! In rationing my food, I was eating about 2,000 calories per day, but burning about 4,000 – 5,000. It certainly wasn’t to the point where I was concerned for my safety, but boy was I envious of other folks’ food!

A quick note on the nature of AT hikers: they are amongst the kindest folks you will ever meet. Even in the 100 Mile Wilderness, where resupply is nonexistent, my fellow thru hikers very kindly helped me out with some food to help me through that last stretch. They didn’t even bother to poke fun at my idiocy, they were just glad to lend a helping hand. Special shoutout to Tim and Rocket for their lifesaving contribution to my hike!

Problem number two: my power bank, which I use to charge my phone and headlamp, has a flashlight feature that you can activate via a button on the side. This fun little feature activated while my battery bank was in my pack, draining most of my power away as I hiked blissfully unaware. After a full day of this, my battery bank drained to about 40% after day 1 in the 100. Not the worst problem, but it did mean that I had to majorly ration the use of my phone and headlamp. My phone is not only my primary means of navigation, but my only means of emergency contact. And, with the days shortening, I rather needed my headlamp for hiking in the evenings and use at camp.

There is an upswing to the energy crisis, though. Being without power forced me to hike this last part of the trail “unplugged”. I usually listen to music, audiobooks, or podcasts while I hike, but I hiked the majority of the 100 with nothing more than the trail and my own thoughts. When folks embark on a hike of the AT, I think they often think that the hike will be accompanied by any number of personal epiphanies or transformative experiences. For me, the best of these came in this stretch of the 100 where I was unencumbered by distractions. Inadvertently, then, the 100 Mile Wilderness became one of my favorite stretches of trail simply due to the clarity of thought that it imposed. If you’re going for a hike in the woods, might I suggest skipping your phone across the nearest pond, and taking your stroll sans technology?

Exiting the 100 Mile, I was greeted with a good news/bad news situation. The good news – my mom and my aunt Deanne, the very same folks that dropped me off at the start of my journey at Amicolola Falls in Georgia, were there to meet me at the end, and they brought food!! I cannot tell you how great it was to see these folks. Mind you, they drove all the way from Wisconsin (a 24 hour continuous drive) to ceremoniously bookend my thru hike. I give shoutouts on my blog all the time, but these two are the true MVP’s of my support crew.

Now, the bad news… I emerged from the 100 Mile on October 15th. Snow was forecast on Katahdin that night. The rangers at Baxter State Park decided that they would preemptively close all trails leading to the summit of Katahdin. I cannot tell you how much of a bummer that was to hear upon exiting the wilderness. I had 5.2 miles of trail left to complete that was closed off. What was one to do? Well, there was a solid chance that the mountain would reopen in a few days, as temperatures on the summit were to return to 50+ degrees in short order. We decided that we would wait it out as long as we could.

So, we killed some time in Maine style. We took a day trip to Baa Haabaa (Bar Harbor) to bounce around the little shops, see the coast and get some lobstaa (lobster). We visited Stephen King’s old house in Bangor. We had a picnic overlooking Mount Katahdin. My mom even became an “AT hiker” by hiking a single mile of the trail to see Little Niagara Falls!

So we waited. And we waited. Checking with the ranger station, it appeared day by day that prospects were looking more and more bleak; that they were considering leaving the mountain closed for the season. As we held out hope that it would reopen, Deanne ran out of time to wait, and flew home from Bangor while my mom and I hung back. Eventually, on the 18th of October, they closed the mountain for good. The mountain having closed as early as the 15th was peculiar in that it historically doesn’t close until after the 20th. I felt a bit lead astray by the parks department in Monson, who seemed to indicate that there was no way the mountain would close on the 15th. I guess nobody can predict or control the weather. So, just like that, we had no choice but to head home.

I will not lie, me and another thru hiker did consider doing an illegal summit of Mount Katahdin by cover of darkness, especially after the snow had melted (which it did, mind you). We called it Operation MoonKat, as it would have entailed sneaking past the barricade and climbing by the light of the full moon. A well-researched plan, it would have worked, but we called off the plan due to strength of moral compass. Submitting in such a way would have had a certain wrongness about it; it wasn’t the way we were going to end this hike.

Before leaving Millinocket to head back to Wisconsin, I had a chance meeting with a number of other thru hikers that were similarly stymied by the mountain. You may remember Minion, High 5, Calorie Man, and Rogue from my 4-state challenge back in Maryland. I also ran into Van Gough and his dog Riley that I met in southern Maine. As we all conceded our defeat, we raised the serious prospect of coming back to Maine and summiting Mount Katahdin in the winter, when they reopen the mountain for mountaineering in the snow. There’s a strong chance I’ll be back to finish off those 5.2 miles to the summit!

So at present, I’ve hiked 2,192.2 out of 2,197.4 miles of the Appalachian Trail. That’s just about 99.8%. Do I consider myself a thru hiker, then? By technical definition, a thru hiker is one that has hiked the entirety of the trail, so by that definition, no…. However! I now plenty of folks that would claim the title despite skipping many more miles than that. Plus, like I said, I’ll be back, and maybe even as soon as this winter!

I am proud of my accomplishment. I do consider myself a thru hiker. This summer, I set out to accomplish something that has been a dream of mine for over a decade, and I consider this hike to have been a major success! I have met fantastic people of all sorts, seen a new face of the country, developed a brand new skill set, come to know myself better, and succeeded in something at which most people fail. I am proud of my little walk, and I intend to carry the lessons I’ve learned from the trail forward to all aspects of my life.

Thanks for reading my long post! Now that I’ve finally got a keyboard to channel my thoughts through, I realize that I can tend towards verbose. This will not be my last post, though! I’ll be posting a recap of the trail, and lessons learned in the near future!

Regards,

Alpine!