Date: 2009-09-21
From: Brook Before Grafton Notch

To: East B Hill Rd. (Pine Ellis Hiking Lodge)
Miles today: 11.4

We knew that today would be a very difficult day, logistically and terrain-wise. Jungli and I had both been running out of food and we had only enough that would (barely) last until the end of the day. I started off rationing my Balance Bars in the morning, eating only 14 a piece at a time. I had four Balance Bars total for the entire day, along with one pack of Lipton noodles that I would be eating later on in the day. Jungli and I shared some of her gummy worms for breakfast, hoping that the sugar might give us a bit of energy to get us up the mountain. Most likely, some actual worms from the ground would have proven better. I hiked ahead, climbing the very difficult Baldpate Mountain West Peak. It was surprisingly warm today and I was in full sweat halfway up the mountain. Some of the sheared rocks on the way up the mountain were loose and I was forced to take an alternate route to the side, using small trees to pull myself up the steep terrain. It was becoming a common occurrence to fall over the past few days, scraping my arms and my legs in the process. This time, I fell and received a deep cut on my knee. I wasn¢t so much upset that I hurt myself, I was more frustrated by the fact that blood continued to pour out of my knee. All I would do was to wipe it off with my finger and then wipe it off on my shirt, shorts, and socks. As a result, I had blood stains up and down my clothing. Another ailment that I had to deal with over the past few days was that I was becoming rather sick. I was growing more and more tired each night and I was just not receiving adequate sleep. I had chills, my nose was constantly stuffy due to the cold conditions, and I was starting to have a deepening pain in my chest and a lump in my throat, as my glands were inflamed. It was terrible, but I knew that I had to hike on. Coming down from the first Baldpate Mountain, there was a beautiful glimpse of the huge rock face of the second Baldpate Mountain and the surrounding forest with autumn in full effect. Again, it was another spectacular day: blue skies, no clouds, and warm weather. It was marvelous! Normally, I do not enjoy when other hikers pass me on the trail. Therefore, when I heard a couple climbing up the first Baldpate, I made a dash to the top. I heard them again as I started climbing the second Baldpate and scampered off again. One of the main reasons why they continued to catch up was because I continued to turn around and take pictures and videos of the landscape. During one of the videos on the second Baldpate, I saw the man, using a rope attached around his stomach connected to the woman behind him, pulling the woman up the mountain. It looked (and sounded) as if he was in tremendous pain and I figured, ¢Geez, now wouldn¢t it be great to have someone do that to me??¢ When they reached my location, as is customary with most of my encounters with other hikers, I introduced myself. They (Trev and Chris) were a married couple from Lewiston, Maine, who loved coming out to climb the local mountains in Maine and New Hampshire, whenever the opportunity presented itself. They had just dropped their kids off at school and had immediately made their way down to Grafton Notch. Trev worked at Bowdoin College and lived just outside of Bates College in Lewiston, two colleges with which I have had to work and to visit each year during my time with Duke/OTS. We continued chatting on top of Baldpate Mountain East Peak at 3,810 ft. and they offered me a piece of bubble gum, a 3 Musketeers bar, and a bottle of water. I was in need of any food at all, so I graciously accepted whatever they were willing to give me. They ended up giving Jungli an apple on the way back down as well. They seemed to have been very experienced with their hiking and climbing, choosing to climb some of the larger peaks in Maine ¢ even in the dead of winter, which happens to be their favorite season. I can only imagine how beautiful it would be on top of Baldpate in the middle of the winter season. After thanking them for their generosity and kindness and exchanging contact information, I quickly hiked on; I had to make it into Andover before the post office closed. When I made it to the Frye Notch Lean-To, I cooked up my last bit of food that I had in my pack. I left the shelter full, but worried that I would be hungry if I didn¢t make it into town. Jungli was also out of food, but being several miles in front, I had no idea as to her own situation. I found Floater, a 67-year-old thru-hiker from New Orleans, who was sitting at the side of the trail with his eyes closed listening to his iPod. The first and last time that I saw him was at Culvers Gap in New Jersey, when he was leaving the trail the next day to fly back to New Orleans to watch his grandchild be born. He had then skipped ahead to Vermont to hike the colder weather before turning around and hiking south through the missed section(s). Floater has white hair and a grizzly white beard and looks as if he is about to perish with each breath. His voice is high-pitched and light and some people have said that he sounds like Michael Jackson. He¢s a stand-out guy and we¢ve all had great fun with him.   When I ran up to Floater, he told me that he had run out of food and water. Unfortunately, I, too, had run out of food and had nothing to give him. He looked in really bad shape and I offered to walk with him to the road. However, he said that he was very close and that Eileen from Pine Ellis would be picking him up from the trailhead with some grub. I left him and walked ahead, trying to get to the road before the PO would close. I was starting to get more and more hungry at this point, as I had burned up a lot of calories on a warm September day. I arrived at the stream crossing close to the road and ran into Buttchinz and Big Camera, who had decided to take a ¢nero¢ day and camp just outside of town. I tried to get a hitch, but not a single car was passing by, so I went over to the campsite of the BC¢s and explained to them how hungry I was. They didn¢t catch on at first that I was famished, so I more bluntly asked them if I could have some of their food to tide me over. They instantly reached into their sacks and gave me a few bars and mashed potatoes, which I ate right away. Again, no cars had passed by, so I then decided to wait for Jungli to arrive to decide what we would do. When Jungli arrived an hour or so later, we made the decision to head into town and get showered up and have a warm meal. We decided to walk along the road until we had cell phone service and could call Eileen at the hostel to come pick us up. Fortunately, a car was passing at that time and, after sticking out our thumbs for a hitch, they offered to give us a ride. It was obvious that the couple inside the car had just smoked pot, as the air was smoky and everything smelled like marijuana. We were both just happy that we were being given a ride. The man driving told us that he had been laid off from his job at the local mill in Andover, the town to which we were driving. The mill had been the economic staple for many decades and many people in the area were losing their jobs and income. But, so goes Adam Smith¢s ¢Invisible Hand¢; when one industry shuts down, another one will certainly take its place. The Pine Ellis Hiking Lodge was a New England-style home in town and the two owners, Eileen and her son-in-law David, were very friendly and resourceful. The only thing that struck me as being somewhat strange was that David was the ex-husband of Eileen¢s daughter. The daughter lives somewhere entirely different, but Eileen had taken David in. In the hostel, we saw SnP and Strider2 for the first time in months. They had flip-flopped from Bear Mtn up to Katahdin and started hiking south to ensure that they would be able to hike the colder, more difficult regions first. SnP, more commonly known as Snot and Piss, has a wonderful spirit and Jungli was excited to reunite with one of her female hiking friends. I had been struggling with a chest infection for several days and it was just continuing to get worse. In the evening, I took some drowsy Nyquil, but I was so tired that I just kept smiling and slurring my words. Jungli decided to take me upstairs to sleep after I was questioning everyone what ¢DV¢ (Daily Value) meant on the back of my Nyquil bottle. Hopefully, I¢ll be feeling a bit better in the morning.