Date: 2013-09-17
From: Katahdin Stream Campground: Millinocket

To: Katahdin: Baxter Peak
Miles today: 5.1
Weather: broken clouds

9/17Today is the day. My mindset going into the day was "Let's get this thing over with". Maine has been so hard on me that I'm just ready to go home. I was hoping to be all excited but that just wasn't the case. My mental game was struggling. We got up early and arrived at the park gate as they opened. As the sun broke through it was clear that they had nailed the weather forecast. It was going to be a beautiful day. Ty and I didn't take too long at the car before heading up the Hunt Trail. As many have posted in the past, the first mile is surprisingly flat. It was a good warm up for what was to come. Soon enough it got steeper, very typical AT stuff. After a 1000 feet or so of gain the trail upped its game. It went from just a steep climb to a steeper rock scramble. I normally do really well on these rock scrambles as I still have pretty good upper-body strength. There was a difference today. One had to put their foot in some difficult and high positions. I just do not have very good flexibility and the trail, yet again, had found a weakness. Fortunately I had Ty with me. On areas where I was struggling Ty would extend a hand and dang near lift me up. He hadn't had six months of the trail eating at his upper-body muscles. I joked that I had the right kid with me. April would have rooted me on but would have been ill-equipped for the lifting. All kids are different. I have backpacked with my daughter. She seems to be a natural in the mountains. This was Ty's first time on such a climb. He is not comfortable in exposed areas on a mountain but turned off his fears while helping his dad. I knew this mountain had to be tough on him. Here are a couple pics of April from a trip to Yosemite. Heights don't seem to bother her. With about two and a half miles to go the emotions started to flow. The trail started to get very hard, and while doable going up, I couldn't imagine how hard it was going to be on the way down. Combining the difficulty, my pride in my son taking charge, and the realization I was about to finish this thing, the emotions took over. As stoic as I normally am, I was falling apart. The difficult sections for me just kept coming. As we got near the top of the scramble the rocks became covered with a thin veneer of ice. It was like the trail knew my weaknesses and was giving me one last test. I laugh at those that state, "it's just walking". It's far from that. Finally the trail leveled out. We were on the Tablelands. Gone were the rock scrambles as we entered a flat area akin to a moonscape. And there it was. My first view of The Sign. I sent Ty ahead to video my last few steps. I had no idea he was about to capture emotions so rare for me. I'm glad he did. His video will go down as the most moving part of the trip for me. It all just hit me at once. Other thru-hikers can fully relate to this moment. The Arduous Grind had come to an end. Once I gathered myself we posed for the requisite sign photo. I had always wondered how to do it. People have had many ways of expressing themselves in these pics. What should I do? It then became obvious. We carried a Springfield Noon Lions Club banner up there. It was so windy that it was hard to get a good pic. The banner acted like a sail. After a hour or so at the peak we headed down. I was dreading the descent that required those awkward foot positions. To my surprise the descent was much easier for me than I feared. The trail was taking it easy on me. Here are some pics from the descent. We got to about a quarter mile from the parking lot where Sa met us on the trail. We hiked the short distance to the car and said goodbye to some other thrus that had just finished. We drove straight to Bangor where Ty would be catching a plane home the next day. We had a quiet celebratory dinner with B-Rocket in Orano at a Thai restaurant. It was a fitting end to the trek. Completes thru4:06 duration 4364 ascent 164 descent Return trip4:04 duration 164 ascent 4364 descent