Date: 2010-09-07
From: Gentian Pond Shelter

To: Stealth Site N of Goose Eye Mountain
Miles today: 9.5
Weather: clear sky

Rain stopped by morning and we got an 8:00 start. The forest has changed yet again. More fir trees, more bogs, different soil and everything covered in moss. It's beautiful. We made an almost vertical 700' climb to beat Mt. Success where we had a beautiful view of the mountains we've climbed in the last two days and the northern Whites. Again, the miles were slow and the trail difficult. We pressed on crossing an insane boulder field that slowed us down to about a half a mile an hour. We finally made it to the New Hampshire/Maine border and this whole trip suddenly became very real to me. The end is in sight (not literally). I'm in the last state of the 14 states through which the Appalachian Trail runs with 281 miles to reach the end.   Wow! I don't feel like I've come this far but one look at my gear disabused me of that notion. My poles are scratched and no longer quite straight. I hope my shoes make it. They're my second pair and have about 1,000 miles or so on them and look it. My aluminum water bottle is scratched, crushed and dented but still holds water. My socks have a permanent stink to them that no amount of detergent or Fabreze can get out. My clothes hang loose from all the weight I've lost. Onward!The afternoon wore on. We crossed deep peat bogs that disconcertingly were at the tops of the mountains. We walked mostly, but not always, on intact puncheons. New Hampshire always seemed to have one puncheon missing either at the beginning or end which had us leaping to try to stay out of the mud. Maine has missing puncheons in the middle!Tired and sore, we summited what we thought was East Goose Eye Mountain two hours before sunset. It had been a long day and we were hungry so decided to have dinner on top and then make the 600' descent to the shelter. On the topographic map, the descent looked relatively easy. After dinner, we expected to go downhill, which we did for a little bit but then we started climbing again. Where were we? We weren't sure. All we knew is that we were still on the Trail.In failing light we reached a second summit¢maybe THIS was East Goose Eye. But then our nice, easy down turned into a nightmare. Rock walls, wooden ladders, bouldering, rebar handholds and STEEP, STEEP, STEEP. And we were doing this by headlamp struggling to keep track of where the trail went next. In retrospect, it was probably good we were doing it at night because I don't think I would have wanted to actually see how long or difficult this descent was. Finally at the bottom, there were more bogs with missing puncheons to cross. Cahoda made a misstep and ended up with one foot knee deep in the mire. It took her more than a few minutes to extricate herself being careful not to lose her shoe in the process. At last we were back in the woods again. The shelter HAD to be just ahead.It's 7:00. We trudged on. It's 8:00. Still no shelter. We kept on going. At 9:00, tired and trail weary, we finally decided we must have missed the shelter but now we were all in dire need of water. Wild Poodle found a couple of flat spots where we could stealth camp and when I found water 50' down the trail, we decided to stay there for the night. We were all so discouraged and exhausted, setting up tents was beyond our energy. All three of us opted to cowboy camp. So here we are in the middle of the woods and I'm actually going to just lay down on the forest floor and go to sleep? What about the bugs/snakes/critters/bears/moose? The idea of doing this six months ago would have had me running back home. Without even a second thought, I climbed into my bag and fell asleep instantly.Oh, but our day wasn't over yet. At midnight, I woke up to the strobe lights of lightning in the distance. It was so far away I couldn't hear any thunder. I prayed it would miss us and went back to sleep. I woke up a couple hours later to more strobe lights only this time it had sound effects and the storm was getting close. I looked over to where Wild Poodle and Cahoda were camping and both of them were putting on their headlamps. Moving fast, we got our tents up and gear stowed just in time for the first pelts of rain to hit. I stayed awake for about 15 minutes catching my breath from the mad scramble to pitch my tent. But the rhythmic patter of rain soothed me back to sleep.Today had been some truly hardcore backpacking¢a totally insane day! Welcome to Maine.