Samwise Hikes the Appalachian Trail! - Trail Journal -
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September 10, Speck Pond Campsite - mile 1896.7

I can't believe I'm here. I can't believe I just conquered the supposed two hardest miles of the A.T. And I can't believe how much my knees hurt! What an amazing day. I deliberately planned on going only five miles today, one of my smarter moves, if I do say so myself.

Well, the first of the big bad miles was the famous Mahoosuc Notch. Before I saw it today, I had envisioned it as a wide, open boulder field, but it was actually a very narrow, tree-lined boulder field, essentially a river of massive rocks pushed in there and left by glaciers. Many people describe it as going through a jungle gym, and that's pretty accurate. Most of the boulders are car and house sized, and you weave between the cracks, crawl under them, climb over, straddle the deep chasms that gurgle with unseen streams, and most of all, hope that you don't fall. I didn't, thankfully. I did get a tremendous upper-body workout. though, because most of the time I was pulling myself up with my arms or hanging on for dear life with them. After I got through, my hands felt so sore, I thought they'd start bleeding from all the layers of skin I must have taken off. All said and done, it took me about 3 hours and my pack only had to come off twice to get through the narrow spots.

After the Notch comes the Arm. The Mahoosuc Arm is the name of the mountain immediately after the Notch, and it's famous for its steepness, the "second toughest" mile on the trail. Personally, my standard was set by Wildcat, back in the Whites, and I didn't find the Arm as hard as that was. Certainly I had to go slow, but not even as slow as I expected. And then, just after I reached the peak and I was on my way down, who should appear coming up the trail? Monya! I knew she had planned to flip-flop in mid-August, so I expected to see her coming south any day now, and today was the day. We couldn't chat for long, as it was late afternoon and she still had to get down the Arm to the campsite before rain came. As it turns out, she was right to hurry because I barely got set up and supper cooked before it started to rain here, too.

Tonight I hurt in many places but I'm so thrilled to have this section behind me that it barely matters. I still have plenty of tough stuff to climb in the next 100 miles, but if I can survive the Notch, I figure I can survive anything!