Date: 2018-08-10
From: Hanover NH

To: Franconia Notch
Miles today: 69.0
Weather: scattered clouds

In 1988, when I was seventeen years old, I spent a summer overseas on a missions trip. We didn¢t have email or Facebook back then to keep in touch with friends, but many years later, with the invention of the internet, I was able to find some of my former team mates. Mary Ruth was one of those long lost teammates.In March, when I announced to my family and friends on Facebook that we would be hiking The Appalachian Trail, Mary Ruth said that she and her husband would love to help us out once we got to New Hampshire. New Hampshire. Would we even make it there? That was almost 1750 miles of hiking we would have to do before we reached her. Could we do that?Apparently we could, and we did, and now here we were waking up in Mary Ruth¢s home in Piermont New Hampshire. For four days and five nights Mary Ruth and her husband Richard completely spoiled us. They made us breakfast, drove us to the trail each day, picked us up (sometimes with treats in hand!) and fed us dinner. Their two daughters gave up their beds for us. Richard, a triathlete, had recovery boots that massage your legs to push the blood back up. He let me use them every day. Each night our boots went on his boot dryer over night so we started each day with dry feet. We used their washing machine, their shower and even their soap and shampoo...because thru hikers don¢t generally carry those things. We stunk up the house, we stunk up the car and somehow we even managed to stink up the Jeep even though the doors and roof were off. We saw and experienced more of New Hampshire than we would have seen on the trail alone.  I thoroughly enjoyed recalling memories of our 1988 summer trip with Mary Ruth, as well as catching up with the present.At the end of it all we were sent off with full food bags and enough support and encouragement to fuel us to the end of this journey.I did not write in my journal during our time with Mary Ruth and Richard. Since I am so far behind, I will briefly write in this one post what I remember from our four days of pampering. Tues Aug 7thHanover to Dorchester Rd. 17.5 miles Richard cooked pancakes for us in the morning and then drove us in his Jeep back to Hanover. I¢d never been in a Jeep before with the doors off. Mark would be jealous. (He had a Jeep in his pre-married life and would love to have one again.)The terrain was much like we had been experiencing for the past few days. There were some climbs, but nothing that I would describe as difficult. It was a wet drizzly day. We had one good view from Holts Ledge.Richard picked us up at the end of the day and we stopped by a variety store for snacks to tide us over until dinner. I grabbed a very large container of chocolate milk, two pops and a cinnamon bun (not knowing Richard was intent on paying). The chocolate milk was from a local dairy and it was absolutely delightfully delicious. I think that Richard was surprised when I downed the entire container. We stopped in at a local self serve farm store to purchase bacon and eggs.We met up with Mary Ruth, her mom and her daughters and we went out for pizza for dinner.Mark had mailed a box to me with a new pair of boots as well as some of our warm gear. It arrived today.Wed Aug 8thDorchester Road to Cape Moonshine Rd. 17.9 milesFor breakfast Richard made us bacon and egg breakfast sandwiches. Yum!With new boots on we climbed two mountains with nice views, Mt Smarts and Mt Cube. I started off going very slowly and when we reached the fire tower on top of Smarts, we were so far behind where we thought we should be that Cole wouldn¢t even climb the tower. We were out of water and the source by the Fire Wardens Cabin was difficult to collect from, delaying us further. We picked up speed in the afternoon though.  Some parts of the trail were incredibly muddy. At one point I came to a big ¢puddle¢ of water with a log across it. No problem. I would walk on the log. I didn¢t test it with my poles first. I stepped and the log sank. It had been floating on top of the water. My poles couldn¢t find solid ground to save me and for a millisecond I thought I was going for a swim. I stopped sinking at my knee. For the rest of the day I sloshed along with a wet foot. My new boots had been christened and I was extremely grateful knowing there was a boot dryer waiting for me at Mary Ruth¢s house.Cole made it to the meet up point near the time Richard arrived, but I was a ways back. Mary Ruth had hamburgers and corn on the cob waiting for us when we returned. Cole and I both went to bed early.Thurs Aug 9thMoonshine Rd to Kinsman Notch17.3 milesMary Ruth drove us to the trail head. The drives are not short little jaunts, but thirty to fourty-five minute rides along country roads. That is a lot of time....and gasoline used to help us!When we arrived at the trail we discovered that we had forgotten our trekking poles at the house! Of all the days to forget poles, this was the wrong one! We had a long steep climb up to the top of Mount Moosilauke. On our way up I asked ever south bounder we saw if they¢d had a good view at the top. 50% said yes and 50% said no. We got lucky. The sky was bright and clear as we ascended above the tree line. It was windy and cold though and while I wanted to hang around and take dozens of photos, Cole wanted to move on quickly. On our way down, there was a very steep, wet rocky treacherous section of trail that we had been warned about in Guthooks. I was descending very slowly down it.Richard arrived at our meeting point and started up the trail to find us, then he descended with us. At the bottom, someone had enclosed an area of the creek with rocks and had filled it with cans of soda. Richard had chocolate milk, Mountain Dew and whoopie pie waiting at the Jeep for us.For dinner, Mary Ruth made delicious tacos with beef, beans, rice and guacamole. Delicious!Fri Aug 10thKinsman Notch to Franconia Notch16.3 milesMary Ruth brought us back to the trail in the morning. The first thing Cole did was backtrack to the creek to see if there was still trail magic in the water. There was.Up up up we begin to climb. I describe a lot of terrain as steep and rocky, but the meaning varies a lot. We were now in The Whites, the most difficult 100 mile stretch of the Appalachian Trail. Here, steep and rocky means using your hands and feet to climb. It means flat vertical rock faces that you need to climb up with the help of small cracks for footholds and conveniently grown trees to assist. Many of these trees have been bent over and partially uprooted from repeatedly lending a hand....or branch.We had more beautiful views on south Kinsman and another slow slow descent. The day was getting long, the time late and my feet tired. Cole¢s belly was rumbling so when we came across our first Hut, we stopped briefly to purchase a piece of lemon cake each. The huts in the White Mountains are places you can pay (a hefty price) to stay overnight and get fed dinner and breakfast. They make a baked good each day and soup that they sell for $2. They also have an assortment of supplies and snacks for purchase.Three miles from Franconia Notch the terrain levelled out. By now it was late in the day and I could not find on Guthooks the parking lot where Richard and Mary Ruth were going to pick us up. I also had no signal on my phone and my battery was low.We reached the notch. Still no signal. The sun was quickly setting and the one headlamp we had brought had low batteries. There was a visitor centre close by, but it would surely be closed. There were two parking lots, but neither matched the name that Richard had given me from his map. Now what?We decided to head for the visitor centre, praying that perhaps an employee would still be there. A short way down the trail I could see a figure heading towards us. In the twilight I couldn¢t make out a face, but the glow of a cel phone was partially illuminating him. A cel phone! Hopefully with a signal!!¢Hello!¢ I called out.He lifted his head and spoke. It was Richard! Horray!!!Back in the car Richard pulled out a shopping bag full of dehydrated backpacking food. They had already done so much for us...too much really, but he wouldn¢t let me pay him for the food. We stopped at a grocery store to pick up a few more items and then Mary Ruth, Richard and the girls, Cole and I all went out for dinner.It was a late night. Mary Ruth drove while the rest of us closed our eyes as the car meandered through the dark along the winding country roads towards home.