Date: 2017-08-16
From: Rainbow Stream Lean-to

To: Abol Campground
Miles today: 24.9
Weather: scattered clouds

This morning I ended up rolling over to my first two alarms before finally being roused by the third. It was cold out there and warm in my quilt and I really didn't feel like moving.I ended up getting all packed up and rolling by 530, 30min later than I had wanted, but I still hit the trail before anyone else in camp had moved. I ate a poptart on the trail as breakfast and kept rolling. My goal for the morning was to make it to Abol bridge as fast as humanly possible to sign up for one of the twelve spots at The Birches for tonight in Baxter. I knew there were a fair number of thru hikers ahead of me, but it was really going to suck if I had to walk 10mi into the park and summit on the same day, hence the early start today. I passed a pond, misty and with the ghostly echo of a loon's call still hanging in the air above the water, in the pre-dawn light and kept blazing on. The trail, though mostly flat, was not easy and mud, roots, and rocks made it feel like I wasn't moving nearly fast enough for the amount of effort I was putting in.Finally the trail broke away from the pond and back up into the woods and the trail smoothed out a bit more. I didn't bother to head up to an overlook of Katahdin since the gray clouds overhead would more than likely be obscuring the mountain and kept moving, coming up to Rainbow Lake campground. I chatted with Jailbird there for a couple minutes amidst the multitude of tents setup in the surrounding area... most of their occupants yet to rise. I was glad of the decision to stay at the lean-to last night... Jailbird said that he had barely gotten here last night before the rain started and I think we had a much better time eating and singing along to Lost's playlist in the shelter than we would've otherwise. I didn't stay for long, and back on the trail I soon ran into (and passed) Jam who had just left camp. The trail followed the lake for the next couple miles, dipping down to the shore and then back up into the woods, adding a surprising amount of elevation for a flat section of trail. The roots, rocks, and mud came and went as I continued and soon enough the trail headed up and away from the lake for the last time and started climbing up into rockier terrain.Though the sun had started to shine down on me as I hiked, the clouds had not yet cleared enough for a view of Katahdin from Rainbow Ledges and so I didn't linger there. It was painful, but I kept myself to only having a few blueberries up there, not wanting to get caught for too long and fall behind. I had been passing hikers sporadically throughout the morning and each one meant a better chance of getting my spot for the night.The descent was pretty uneventful, I wrote a quick note in the Hurd brook shelter log as I moved through and kept pushing, making good progress. Finally, I reached a long section of bog bridges which signaled my proximity to the road and sure enough I could heard logging trucks in the distance. The last half mile of trail was wonderfully flat and devoid of roots and rocks and I cruised. I snapped a quick picture with the "There is nothing for the next 100mi" sign that marked the northern end of the 100mi wilderness and emerged onto the Golden Road. I crossed a bridge which had one lane for trucks and an entire seperate bridge from snowmobiles and stopped the admire the view of Katahdin from the bridge. Standing in the middle of the Penobscott River the rocky peak of Katahdin had finally freed itself of clouds and shown in the morning sun surrounded by crisp blue sky. The gray of the rocky summit yielded to various greens of trees on the mountains flanks which were interrupted in spots where rockfalls had cascaded down the steep slopes and left the path littered with boulders. I snapped a few pictures and finished crossing the bridge, coming to the store and campground. My watch read 10:15, which meant that I had covered the 14.5mi from camp this morning in just under 5 hours... not bad, not bad at all. I blew past the store and headed for the entrance to the park, eager to get my name on the list. After that I could go back, get some food at the store, and relax for a couple hours before doing the next 10mi up to The Birches. Before I got there I ran into Longjohn, the "trail steward" for the area who was tasked with dispensing info about Baxter to long distance hikers and to help them figure out their plans. He informed me that there were only 6 names on the list so far and that it was frowned upon to sign up to hold yourself a spot and then double back to hang out at the store. Well shucks... I figured as long as I kept a count of how many hikers passed me I could still get a spot and headed back to the store. I picked up a couple of items... a mini apple pie, a bag of chips, a bottle of orange juice, and a 6 pack of apple juice in a can and enjoyed them outside and chatted with a couple of other hikers who were hanging around. And I also got 2 scoops of muddy sneakers ice cream, cause why not?Not long after the hikers I had passed on the trail started showing up, Caboose and Engine, Sarge and Pudge, Tiptoe and Honeysticks and Jam, but none of them were planning on heading into the park until the next day, so they weren't my competition. The store had no cell phone reception and the only way of communication was a satellite phone the store charged $1/min to use or a ranger's radio. And it turned out that LongJohn had one. As he does for hikers, he volunteered to call up to the ranger station and see if there were any campsites available for the night, which would mean that I wouldn't have to worry about a spot at the birches. After a couple minutes of back and forth on the radio, it turned out that there was a spot available at Abol Campground, which was 2mi down the tote road from Katahdin Stream Campground. I'd have to get myself down to the campground and back, but as long as I could get myself there tonight (and I was fairly confident in finding a hitch from on of the day visitors to the park) Topbunk could meet me there tonight, have a place to sleep, and then we could both drive back to Katahdin Stream in the morning and head up the mountain. Plans made, I not longer had to worry about getting a spot at Katahdin Stream and could spend as long as I wanted here. Having Longjohn here to help thru hikers is a super helpful gesture from Baxter, which is known for not being the easiest/most hiker friendly portion of the trail.At 11am the restaurant opened and we all sat down to get some beer and burgers. The waitress confused most of our beer orders, and I was super sad when she took back the 22oz cider she had brought me, dumped it out, and then poured another 16oz cider for me... what a waste of cider!! Not to mention that I would've taken the 22oz if she had given me the chance. The food was delicious, we all ended up ordering almost exactly the same thing... a burger with fried egg and bacon on top. Jam got the lobster roll, which the waitress somehow confused as spring rolls, which Jam jokingly pointed out was a somewhat stereotypical mistake to make on the only asian guy's order. After the meal I waited around for a bit more, hoping Lost would catch up, but everyone else started migrating off to the campsite across the street (they weren't entering Baxter until tomorrow) and the clock struck 2pm and I figured I had better get moving if I was going to make it before the ranger station closed at 7pm. I shouldered my pack, got another scoop of ice cream, and headed into the park.Besides immediately getting swarmed with mosquitoes, the 10miles up to Katahdin Stream were wonderful trail. Not too rocky, following the Penobscot river for a couple miles before running into a larger tributary and following that upstream, the sun shone and the trees provided shade and kept the temperature down. I enjoyed a can or two of apple juice on my way up, and realizing that I was going to make it with plenty of time (I was 3mi away by 430pm), I stopped by one of the rivers to hang out for 30min and take a swim, not unaware that these were my last couple miles of actual hiking.Moving again, I passed Dorsey pond, where a number of people were out in canoes, and followed the trail as it wound up and over some hills, the trail soft and gentle under my feet, perhaps as recompense for the past 500miles of rocks or perhaps lulling me into a false sense of security for the hard miles tomorrow. At last though, the trail popped out onto a road which I followed past a series of lean-tos (a shelter that you can rent... the exact same type I had been sleeping in/near for the past couple months, but all to yourself... what a (lonely) concept) and I emerged into a parking lot/small field which I recognized from the last time I had been here. Just past the bridge which spanned the unreasonably clear water of Katahdin stream I came to the ranger station and signed in, long distance hiker 1544 for the year and NOBO 372.1544 seems like a lot of hikers, and taking out the 372 NOBOs still leaves 1200 SOBOs, which seems like far too high a number, but its hard to draw conclusions from it since long distance hikers are classified as anyone hiking farther than the 100mi wilderness. Not that it was the goal, but I am pretty happy about my number... I was NOBO 1456 to start from Amicola, 655 to pass through Harpers Ferry, and now 372 to arrive at Katahdin, which meant I halved my position with each leg of the trip. And its pretty cool that they give you a little card (both as your permit and something to keep). I still had to find my was another 2mi down to Abol campground, which I really didn't want to have to walk, but it turned out that there was a ranger program about the history of the park and the trails going on tonight, and the KS ranger was pretty sure the Abol ranger was coming, so I decided to hang around for another hour and listen to the program and see if I couldn't bum a ride back down the road after. Worse comes to worse I have to walk it... I've done that. I setup my tent in the small field so that I could dry it out in the last of the afternoon sun, and got a number of looks from the day hikers which seemed to say "you know you can't camp there?" (which I was aware), but none of them had the courage to tell the dirty hobo that. I changed into camp clothes and started eating through that snacks that I wouldn't need for tomorrow while I waited. The ranger program was quite interesting... she talked about when the various trails were established and how they had been rerouted throughout the years. I also found it interesting how much work goes into trails... Baxter has at least 4 full time trail crews which are constantly working on the trails (mainly they handle the reroutes) as well as a bunch of volunteer groups (including MATC, which handles most of the AT within the park) and a lot of work goes into the park every spring to clear the blowdowns from the winter. One of the other attendees of the presentation was Snap's husband and was waiting on her to get to Katahdin and was going to summit with her, so I was able to inform him that I had stayed with Snap at White House Landing 2 nights before and that she should be here soon. The ranger was nice enough to give me a ride down to Abol campground (though she forced me to ride in the back of the pickup truck... park policy... oh shucks), and it was a lovely ride as the pickup flew down the road to the campground, the night air already had a refreshing crispness which seemed to foreshadow the coming of fall. I setup camp, grabbed some water from the spigot attached to the ranger's cabin (what luxury), and started cooking dinner while the sun set and I waited for TopBunk to arrive. About halfway through my dinner my stove ran out of fuel (talk about timing... 2more min of fuel would've been all I needed to finish the trail), so I let it continue to sit so that the noodles would soften. TopBunk arrived just before 9pm with the sun already set (what a difference... a coupe months ago it would've still been light out) and she setup camp while we caught up. We didn't stay up long though... it was past my bedtime and we had a long day tomorrow.