Date: 2005-09-14
From: White House Landing

To: Rainbow Springs
Miles today: 16.0

Today started out with a wonderful breakfast at White House Landing that included AYCE blueberry pancakes. Breakfast is my favorite meal when hiking. If I eat a huge breakfast in town, and then head out, I have an unbelievable amount of energy, and don't typically have to stop again til lunch. When hiking, I usually have a bagel with peanut butter for breakfast, and I'm starving again an hour later.I got a late start around 9:30, and hiked a little while with Crazy Legs. He is a very strong hiker, and at the first bio-break he moved on ahead. The hiking today was great with some awesome lakes. I found Crazy having lunch on the edge of one of these lakes, perched up on some rocks. I stopped to eat and chat also. Crazy left around a half hour later, and I stayed to just relax and admire an absolutely gorgeous body of water. The sky was a beautiful egg shell blue, which reflected off the the slate, bluish waters that glittered in the sun. The huge lake was ringed by large light colored boulders that looked as if a giant had systematically ringed the lake by hand. It was really amazing, but most amazing, was the lack of civilization. There were few to no roads into the lake, which made for a very remote location. It is still hard to believe there are places like this left on the east coast. As I sat eating, I heard the mournful cry of a Loon. I glanced across the water just as another Loon answered. I was amazed to see them only about 50 yards away, and held very still as they slowly circled each other. In a few moments, one of the Loons gracefully raised itself out of the water immediately in front of the other Loon with it's wings spread wide, and held the position. The Loon it was raised over tilted it's head back and let out a chortling "Loon call". It was if the male was showing his prowess, and the female was calling out her approval. They repeated this dance several times before both dove and disappeared. I smiled softly as I quietly left the rock. I almost felt priviledged to have witnessed the performance. They are beautiful birds.The rest of the day was beautiful with only a few climbs. Trail maintenance was being done by kids from the MCC, and I stopped to chat and say thank you for all their hard work. They were all very nice teenagers, that really seemed to enjoy what they were doing.I took a break at Wadleigh (I believe it was Wadleigh) to leave a rather long register entry. I wanted to leave some parting words for many of those I had hiked with, in the shelter register. The entry ended up being quite lengthy, and I was there longer than intended, but when the mood hits to write, I usually go with it. Most of my register entries are seldom longer than two sentences, if that, but the hike was drawing to a close and this was some of the closure.I finally arrived at the Rainbow Spring shelter to find Crazy, Noodle, and Newhart, and a couple of section hikers. There were no good tenting sites in the immediate vicinity that were vacant, and I did not want to stay in the shelter, so I forded the stream and moved up stream about a tenth of a mile where I found a small spot by the water. I had left over pizza from WHL for dinner and climbed into my little tent for the evening. Three more days left. Wow!