Date: 2003-07-30
From: Monson

To: 100 Mile Un-Wilderness
Miles today: 0.0

Before I set foot on the Appalachian Trail, when I first told my parents that yes I really was going to walk 2000 miles through the woods by myself, my mother had already picked out her Pet Worry: the 100 Mile Wilderness. As I was stressing over my flight to Georgia, she would come up and say, "I have heard so many things about this 100 Mile Pit of Disaster and Danger. I want to make sure you have lots of people and a large and menacing dog, preferably a rotweiler, with you." I wish I could have told my mother then what I now know: the 100 Mile Wilderness does not exist. Yes, there is a stretch of 100 miles between Monson and Abol Bridge where there is no paved road or straight-arrow hitch to town. However, this section of the AT, renamed by one hiker as the JMAT, or "Just More AT," boasts numerous dirt and gravel roads, one tourist spot at the Gulf Haggas with a parking lot and many day hikers, and even a resupply point/hostel with beer and cheeseburgers that is a one-mile walk off the trail. Wilderness? I think not.Not to say the terrain wasn't challenging. The Un-Wilderness is deceptive because it consists of long periods of Absolutely Flat miles interspersed with torrid river crossings and Pain In The Ass mountains (the kind with three or four peaks and steep ups and downs between them). We had some nice views from the Chairbacks, but the day we went up and over Whitecap was rainy and generally miserable until about 3pm when I ran into Rocket, the first NOBO featured prominently on Trailjournals! He is working with an MATC trail crew and I spotted him and probably frightened him by trying to give him a hug without introducing myself. So, I complained a lot about fording rivers when I wrote from Monson. Little did I suspect that we would run into FIVE major river fords in the first 15 miles of the Un-Wilderness. However, our intrepid group, enhanced by the addition of Ben, Witt, Kool-Aid Luke and Sticky Fingers, figured out how to make fordings fun: turn them into a spectator sport! At every crossing, those across first would grab a snack on the other side and watch everyone else cross, offering advice and encouragement and the most inopportune moments. There is nothing better than trying to balance on a particularly slippery submerged rock in a roaring current and hearing snippets of: "Come on, Poptart!" "...hey man, betcha a Snickers she slips." "Use your poles!" After our first 15 mile day it was high teens and 20's the rest of the way through; we made it to the last shelter, Hurd Brook, in five days and only had a three-mile walk to Abol Bridge and the end of the Un-Wilderness on Wednesday. Other highlights include Chicken and Witt entertaining us on pack-guitar every night, the constant playing of wiffleball, campfires and roasting marshmallows I packed in. I stayed alone one night on the shore of Nahmakanta Lake, definitely the most beautiful campspot on the trail, swam every sunny day, and picked the newly-ripened blueberries at all the exposed rocky areas, especially on the Rainbow Ledges where I was held up for an hour by a particularly plentiful patch. To top it all off, when I got to Abol Bridge they had Strawberry milk, coffee and donuts, AND they took credit cards. Really, what more could a hiker ask for?