| August 28, 2005 |
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My husband brought me up to the ranger
station at Katahdin at Baxter State Park, so that I could summit
Katahdin today, 5,000 elevation. It's 9:20am. I'm on the Able Trail. I
guess it's pretty steep, strenuous, with 5.8 miles, but it's the
shortest way up. The intersects with the AT the Rose Spring.
I'll go north a little way to Summit Katahdin, then I'm coming back
down the Hunt Trail. |
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It's already starting to be a little on the
rocky side. Just little boulders. The rest is dust and
sand covered. The trail is also lined by spruce trees on both
sides very thick. When I finish today and come back down the
Hunt Trail, then I have to hitch a ride back out through Baxter
State Park. My husband (John) will pick me up because he
couldn't bring me up to Able Campground because of having a dog in
the car. I'm here a little the round about way, but with luck
this evening I'll be able to catch a ride out. |
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I was lucky today when I got to the first
registration place and there was a car that came by and I ask her if
she was going up to able and she said wasn't quite, but she would
run me on up there. The shuttle time is 10:30am. |
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Trail is fairly open small stuff, mostly
hardwoods at this point. Fairly easy and with some big rocks,
nothing I haven't handled before. The lady that drove me up
said that she hikes NH all the time and that NH was twice as hard as
this will ever be. |
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The trail now is extremely rocky and rooty.
Starting to get bigger boulders. Getting back into the pines
again. I still have a place to set my feet, so that's good. |
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The trail is getting steeper now and I'm
doing small boulder hopping, mostly rocks. I hiking on solid
rock now, still going up the hill. This is a bad section
through here, it's nothing but real, real large boulders, pine tree
lined, I must be nearing the top because the stones are getting a
lot lighter. It is now 10:20am. I don't know if I can
make 2 and a half miles and hour going up her or not. It's
going to be interesting to see how fast I can climb this. |
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There goes EJ again, I'll be an easy target
for that water balloon. Not very clear though. It's very
overcast with big dark clouds. A few clear areas every so
often. The pines are getting to be shorter and scrubbier the
higher I get on the hill. A lot of the pines are dead with
that spooky liken growing all over them. I can look back to
the south and I can see pines off into the distance. Some of
the mountains. The sun is wanting to shine in the valley. |
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I've been hiking for an hour and as closer
as I can guess I've been hiking for about 2 miles. This trail
is getting steeper as I go up and I'm beginning to see some clouds.
It's real cloudy up there. The wind is blowing, the air is
starting to be cooler and a lot moisture in the air from the clouds.
I can clouds moving down below in the clearing of the trail.
It's gotten a lot hazier as I climb up. |
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I'm still ascending and the trail is
getting steeper, the boulders are getting to massive and the fog is
getting a lot thicker. The air still feels pretty good though.
Some of these boulders are so steep, that I have to put my poles one
hand and use my other on the rocks to about half crawl up them.
I'm getting closer to the top. I can feel the warmth of the
sun on my back. The sun does want to peek out. once in a
while. |
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It's interesting to be able to turn around
and look back to see where I've come from. When I look down
I'm looking a big pile of rocks. and every now and then I see
a blue blaze, but it's just a stream of rocks from where I came.
I can also see the pine trees and what is interesting I can see the
clouds when they move across the mountains and up over the mountain
towards me. They are moving fast. They are really thick. |
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My poles are getting to the place where
they are useless climbing up these rocks because I have to do hand
over hand. I must say close up the rocks are beautiful with a
lot of green algae on them, a black liken and the rocks are a dark
gray, granite with specks of white in them also pink ones with
flakes of white. |
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I'm still going up and it's 12:15pm, I'm
getting more and more socked in. The wind is picking up a
little bit and every now I get a gust. Nothing I can't
tolerate at this point. I think I'm now what they call the
Table Top. It's real flat and I able to stand up straight and
hike over the boulders. I'm so encircled with fog that I can
see very little. I just passed the Henry David Theroux Springs
who hike up to Katahdin Peak in 1846. I'm hiking now up to the
peak and then I will come back down the same trail where I do a
Theroux Springs, Then head down
This
must be some gust of wind...it sound awful! Kathy
I can hardly see because of all the fog that's on my glasses.
I put my rain coat, my hat and my hood over my head to try to break
the wind a little bit The wind is ferrous. I finally
made it to Baxter's Peak elevation is 1,217. This is the end
of my trail at Katahdin. |
 I'm standing here in the wind with my rain
coat on, my hood on, surrounded by clouds. I feel like I've
done the impossible dream. I also feel like I've gone up the
steps to the heavenly gates so that I can present to God little
shoes that I'm going to be leaving at the side for the souls of the
preemies and infants that have not made it this far and lived their
life. I'm going to hang the NIN booties on the side. I put a
guardian angel at the top of the baby shoes. I feel like my
mission has been completed, although I still have a couple more
states to do, to really finish.
The wind noise to bad here to get
the rest. |
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Time is 2:10pm. Going back off the
mountain. I was still in the clouds, it rained making the
rocks very slippery. It was going down the hunt trail that the
rock boulders were very huge at the top, massive rock boulders
making it very difficult to come down. I had to stop several
different times and figure how I was going to get myself down to the
next level. It looked like I was going to go out the point and
just drop off. It was very scary, no one was around. If
there had been an accident no one was around me that I knew of.
I did meet going up 3 guys that I had met that morning that I knew
were going to summit. We passed me on the table top and I
didn't know how long they would stay up there or how far it would be
till they caught up with me. I was lucky they did catch up
with me. To be honest I was relieved that I had somebody to go
down the trial with. Like I said that it was very dangerous
and the guys were able to give me the assistance that I needed as
far as taking my poles and handing them back to me. I
literally slid down the sides of the boulders because I was afraid
to walk hike on them. They were very slippery because of being
damp. A 5 mile trip back to Katahdin Stream and it took a
little over 5 hours for us to get back. There was no way we
could be in a rush. I was very grateful for their assistance
and we arrive back a little after 6:00pm. My husband had been
waiting on me outside of the camp ground so I knew once I got to the
ranger station that I would still have a way to hike out to go back
to the truck. I was number 166 through hiker to hike Baxter to
Katahdin. He gave my through hiker papers that can turn
in for myself and Simon when I complete everything. |
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The guys that I hiked with, their wives
came and they had a truck so I lucky again and they did some trail
angel work and put me in the back end of their truck took me out the
8 miles that I needed to get to our truck and meet my husband.
I think we were probably the last people to come off Katahdin that
day. |
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Climbing Katahdin was definitely a
memorable experience. One that I will always cherish. At
the same time it was very scary! It was very dangerous with
the high winds and how they could change immediately to colder
weather and snow or any thing else. I was glad to be off of
it! |
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John and I stayed at the motel at
Millinocket for several days waiting out the rain storms, thunder
storms from Katrina coming up the coast. |
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Swing'n Jane |
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