Date: 2005-09-19
From: Shelter, Rainbow Streams Lean-to

To: Tent, Abol Pines camping area
Miles today: 15.0
Weather: broken clouds

Well today was our last double digit hiking day on the Appalachian Trail. How odd. Last night was our last night at a regular shelter.   We're going to be done in two days. How odd. We can actually see and feel the end of this adventure.   We went up and over Rainbow Ledges. It was not bad at all. We have been conditioned to expect certain words to mean bad things. Knob means long steep ass climb. Ledges mean sheer steep rock cliffs. Strangely though, Rainbow Ledges were not sheer steep cliffs. It was just rock face at the top of a bump. Really it was no big deal. We got a peek at Big K when we were up on top of the Ledges. She was all covered up in clouds, but we could tell that she was Big K. It was our 1st confirmed sighting since we had seen her from the top of Pleasant Pond Mt. Then she had been just a tiny light blue sliver in the horizon. We didn't see her again until today because of weather. Today she's not a tiny blue sliver, but a large cloud covered mountain. Oblivious yelled at her, warning that he was going to put a beat down on her.   Oh I forgot something very interesting about last night's shelter. It was one of those classic baseball bat shelters that you only find in Maine. The floor of the shelter was not smooth like a wooden plank floor. It was a series of thinnish tree trunks laid next to each other. It looked like baseball bats all lined up in a row. Apparently, this style floor was what you used before sleeping pads came into fashion. Hikers were supposed to go and cut fir branches to make a pine bough mattress for them to sleep on. Definitely not a leave no trace practice. Now only some older shelters still have these floors. This type of floor really makes hikers appreciate their blow up thermarests. Unfortunately, we don't have blow up thermarests. We have 3/4 length fold up egg crate like z-rests. We could feel the baseball bats every time we rolled over in our sleep. But we still slept.   We got some trail magic right as we left the hundred mile wilderness. A cooler with sodas and little Debbie¢s snacks. It really helped. I love Little Debbie.    It was very odd as we walked out on the road. There were no blazes. Troll was kind of lost and not sure what to do. Not so much lost in the sense of not being able to find our way, but lost in the sense of being overwhelmed. The white blazes were on the side of the pavement.   We walked to the bridge and saw her in all her glory. Squid Jerky was on the bridge staring at her. As Troll and Oblivious got to the bridge, the clouds at the top rolled away. They briefly got a full on view of Big K. She had discreetly re-covered her top by the time that I got to the bridge.   We got a camp site with Squid. The camp store had an old Schlitz sign on it. We made phone calls on the expensive pay cell phone. $1.00 in quarters per 3 minutes and no 1-800 calls. We bought food, soda and beer.   We picked a campsite that had a full view of Miss K. We set up our tents (the pole splice piece from Forever North worked great) and then sat there on the picnic table staring out at her. After about 15 minutes all the clouds had blown away and she was completely clear. She is amazing. It's not like looking at Mt Rainier in all her glory back home. It was like looking at a promise. Mount Katahdin is the place where the white blazes end. She is the physical end of an adventure. We just have to go up her and finish and then we're done. We just kept looking at her. It was so unbelievable and surreal to be able to see the end.   Ug and Pickwick showed up. They took the campsite next to us. We grilled hotdogs and drank beer and talked about Miss K.   Take care and we will see you on the trail.