Date: 2011-08-18
From: Spaulding Mountain Lean-to

To: Stratton Motel and Hostel
Miles today: 13.4

(In which I see a porcupine and take my first shower in Maine)When I wake up in my tent the shelter is already empty, and having overheard Doc Boom, Colorado and Raw Indy's plans to hitch into and out of Stratton today and pull a 30 tomorrow, I doubt that I will see any of them again. As always you never know, but with trail running out the odds grow slimmer.The day is sunny and warm and I take my time up and down the day's hills. I follow a short side trail up Spaulding Mountain, but am disappointed to find that the summit is tree covered with only a few trees cut to offer a hint of a view. When I get to the 0.6 mile side trail to the Sugarloaf peak I am torn, wanting the view but also wanting to reach Stratton for my first shower in Maine and knowing that the side trip will likely mean an hour less town time. After a short inner debate I decide to skip the summit, knowing that Treebeard would shake his head and tell me that if I had planned less I could have appreciated the view now and worried about town whenever I got there.Other than a handful of day hikers and one sobo I seem to have the trail to myself. Coming around a bend I see a small brown animal waddling up the trail ahead of me. At first I think it might be a baby bear from the waddle, but it seems too small and the tail looks wrong. When I get a bit closer I see quills and decide porcupine, which while lower on the do-not-mess-with list than baby bears, still ranks somewhere in the "you did *what*?" range. I drop my pack for a picture anyway, and get within ten feet when the porcupine hears me and jumps, startled, turning its head away from me and presenting its spiny back. Despite the quills it is a remarkably human expression of surprise that leaves me feeling slightly embarrassed, like I just snuck up and startled someone as they were going to the bathroom. When I stay still the porcupine switches from defensive position to waddling off the trail doubletime. I've only gotten the "I saw a porcupine" shot but pursuing it off the trail seems I'll advised, so I stick with that.I reach the road shortly after 5 and play iPod games with one hand (Cut the Rope: Experiments) while I hitch with the other. Six levels later I have a ride and am whisked to the hostel. In contrast with the White Mountains Hostel, the Stratton one is the epitome of chill, and the check-in process involves me handing a twenty dollar bill to the lady sitting on a picnic bench and telling her my trail name. The twenty dollars here includes unlimited kitchen and internet use, which sounds good to me.At the hostel I see Guinea Pig, who tells me that, as expected, Doc Boom hiked on with Colorado and with Raw Indy tagging along. "I saw THAT one coming a mile away", she says.At the hostel I also see Scholar again, one of two German brothers whom I haven't seen since Connecticut. Scholar just quit the trail after weeks of battling foot pain and is waiting for his brother to finish. "Do you think you'll ever come back to finish the last 200 miles?" I ask. "I sure hope not," he replies.Today I cross the sub-200-to-go mark, and tomorrow I should cross 2000-miles-down. Under the loom of Katahdin these milestones seem somehow less important than the earlier ones that helped break up what might otherwise seem like an impossibly long distance. Still, the thought of seeing the fabled 2000 sign and knowing that's how many miles I've walked gives me chills just thinking about it.