Date: 2012-09-05
From: Poplar Ridge Leanto 

To: Town and Lake Motel, Rangeley, ME
Miles today: 10.7
Weather: overcast clouds

(In which I wake up in 2 inches of standing water and almost break my ankle)-Currently sitting in a motel room in Rangeley, ME-This post starts at 3:30 in the morning. I woke up to about 0.5 inch of water on the floor of my tent. That isn't that surprising considering that my tent floor is simply a piece of Tyvek, and there wasn't much I could do about it, so I propped my pack up on my shoes and my cookset and went back to sleep (my sleeping pad is about 2.5 inches thick).At 4:30 in the morning I rolled over to find myself floating in 2 inches of standing water with the rain pounding on roof of the tent. To add to it all, the seam seal job is a few years old now and was failing despite a valiant effort in the face of this downpour. My pack was soaked and the only things still reasonably dry at this point were my down sleeping bag, my electronics, my spare clothing and me. I was never a boyscout, but I think I should get an honorary merit badge for managing to get out of my down bag in a lying-down position and get it into its stuff sack without getting any of it wet while floating a half inch above a bog on an inflatable sleeping pad. Once I managed to get the bag out of harms way, I picked up and packed up my soaked everything and decided to start hiking before the cold got to me.At about 5:30, as I was finishing breakfast (pop-tarts and snickers) under the shelter overhang, the first nobo to wake up came over to me: "last in, first out eh?" I told him it was in part because things got a little wet over night, and I indicated the location where my tent had been. With a cigarette bobbing in the side of his mouth, his eyes got wide and he mumbled something about Jesus Christ that I couldn't quite make out.The rest of the day was a push to get over Saddleback Junction, the Horn and Saddleback. If going over a mountain called the Horn in a strong rain storm sounds intimidating, then you're right. Sideways rain and nasty wind above treeline. There was no thunder or lightning otherwise I wouldn't have tried it. The climbs themselves weren't bad but the descents were treacherous. It took easily twice as long to go down each one as it did to go up. With about two miles left to Rangeley I slipped on a split-log bog bridge and my left foot got stuck between the logs as I fell forward and to the left. While falling I thought for sure I was about to break my ankle but my left trek pole caught a rock and bent to about 60% of its normal length, holding my weight long enough for me to replant the other one and lift my weight off my ankle. Close call. Every northbounder I've talked to about poles tell me those things have saved them a hundred times over. Necessary gear as far as I'm concerned.Rangeley is a great town and the Town and Lake Motel is cheaper than AWOL's guide advertises - it's also very nice. Steven and Catherine, who run a hostel 0.3 miles off the trail on ME 4, gave me a ride to town - very nice people.Tonight I clean and dry everything, regroup and plan for a 6 day stretch to Gorham, NH.Today's post was brought to you by the Neoair mattress, because when you wake up in 2 inches of water, it's real nice to have a sleeping pad that's 2.5 inches thick. Props to the Goretex jacket too - most critical yesterday.