Date: 2006-08-07
From: Hanover, NH

To: Moose Mountain Shelter
Miles today: 9.5
Weather: haze

After two zero days in Hanover and a very nice break from the trail today we were all ready to continue our journey toward Mount Katahdin. After checking out of our room we caught the local bus back to town and went straight to the post office to drop off our bounce boxes of supplies that we wanted to forward ahead. It was mid morning so we stopped by the Co-op one last time to pick up a couple of things for lunch. Just outside the store was a little picnic area with tables where we ate and made final preparations to leave town. While we were there Bare-Bear showed up and relayed the bad news that he wasn¢t going to be able to hike the Whites. For sometime now he has been having extreme pain in one foot and doesn¢t want to risk entering the White Mountains with and injury. He plans to detour around and rest for several days and try to continue from there. The good thing for him is he has already hiked this next section of trail several years back so he has already logged those miles. After a freshly prepared lunch from the deli and our talks with Bare-Bear we headed out of town around noon. Just a couple of miles outside town I could already tell that the new shoes that I picked up at EMS were going to be much better than the previous ones. When we crossed Trescott Road about five miles out of town we met back up with Hot Springs and Donkey. They had already done the five-mile section that we were completing and had planned to meet up with us at the trailhead. Since this was Hot Spring¢s hometown they managed to meet back up with three kids and one of their leaders that they had worked with previous to hiking the trail from Big Brothers and Big Sisters. Donkey and Hot Springs had invited them to join us on the trail for a couple of days. We only intended to put in about 10 miles today so around 5:00 pm we stopped at Moose Mountain Shelter for the evening. Our packs were weighted down a good bit from resupplying in town so we trickled in camp one by one. The shelter had two entrance trails from the AT creating a loop if you will. This is somewhat typical on several shelters and when it is the case I try to hike to the second entrance and enter so the next morning I will be able to leave out on the north side of the shelter instead of backtracking on the south side to start. I try to enter and leave shelters using the same entrance trail to prevent skipping any of the AT. Although it may only be a couple of hundred yards between entrances I attempt to hike as much of the AT as absolutely possible. Just inside that second entrance I found a nice flat place to pitch my tent and settled in for the night. I was only about 200¢ from the shelter so I gathered a few things for supper and went to join everyone by the fire pit. Tonight this place was packed and had about 18-20 hikers so of course everyone helped scrounge up some wood and we built a nice fire. No campfire would be complete without smore¢s so we had packed in the supplies from town and were roasting marshmallows and toasting graham crackers for desert. To top off the good time just after dark a full moon crested the distant mountains and filled the sky. Tonight was a perfect night on the trail.Tonight at Moose Mountain Shelter: Donkey, Hot Springs, Three boys and their leader from Big Brothers Big Sisters, Chardonnay, Jangles, Baro, Shasta, H-Bomb, Miss Parkay, The Jersey Boys, Leprechaun, and 2 South bounders.