Date: 2019-08-19
From: Near Osgood Tent Site

To: Zeta Pass
Miles today: 11.6

Day 140 The Wildcats Up and down the trail, folks relay the next terror tale of what ridiculous climb or descent is coming up. It seems every evening the hiker conversations speak of new horror scrambling and clambering stories. I then wake in the middle of the night with apprehension, fear and trembling. Just how am I to get my tired aching legs and knees up and over or down these cliffs and boulders? Today¢s feature was ¢The Wildcats¢ which were a series of 4,000ft peaks. I had no idea what was to come but as I was often told: ¢You have been warned¢ First though I had to make quick tracks to the Pickham Notch Visitor Centre down at the bottom of the Wildcats. I was still in the damp rocky root obstacle course of the Gulf Wilderness and made slow work of that. What a relief to eventually come to an old road and smooth walking! At the visitor centre was Joes Lodge and I was greeted with the advice(?): ¢Treetrunk, if you don¢t eat breakfast here you are a fool¢ Well I think that just doing the Wildcats and the AT probably raised serious questions about my sanity, however just to prove to my hiking friends that I was not a fool I took up the $15 AYCE breakfast challenge!Wow what a feast. I gorged in total happiness. The food was great and as any AT hiker would appreciate, there was lots of it. That done it was to the Wildcats! First up was a boulder nightmare around an old glacial lake. Then the path took an ominous turn upwards! Sheer cliffs beckoned. Don¢t look down. And so it went on for a couple of hours (at least for me!) Finally I reached a peak (called Wildcat E) then another (called D) and another! At this point I rounded a corner and ran into a finely dressed lady in clean smart shoes carrying a handbag. ¢Whaaaat?¢, I thought. ¢There¢s no way she could have carried that handbag up those cliffs and not mess up her shoes?¢I rounded the next corner and there was a ski gondola depositing day visitors for a view!! Well clearly they were taking slack packing to a new level. I stopped had lunch, then completed Wildcats B and A. Way down below I saw the Carter Notch Hut. There¢s a saying ¢What comes up, must come down¢ So down we went. Much to my relief with steps this time! It was by now late in the afternoon and I asked if I could get work for stay but the manager wasn¢t interested in me. Before me and intimidatingly high up was Carter Dome, another daunting climb. Dangerous thunderstorms were now forecast and I really didn¢t  look forward to another ascent. But I had little choice and off I went. Thunder rumbled in the distance but lucky for me that¢s the closest I came to the storms. When I reached the summit I was gifted glorious views all around. The descent down was grimly back to crumbly, slippery cliff faces. But I made it to Zeta Pass where I recalled there was a spring. Sadly my new phone decided at this moment to reject the Guthook app which told me where I was on the trail. So I had no idea where my water source was. That¢s the luck of new technology. I wandered a bit further in the fading light and set up camp. My bed was comfy and I went to sleep knowing I¢d conquered the Wildcats!