Date: 2021-07-01
From: Carlo Col Shelter

To: Speck Pond Shelter
Miles today: 9.5
Weather: light rain

After a good nights sleep I got on trail at 6:15 with Iceberg and Quiksilver with the plan to hike fairly close until reaching Full Goose Shelter 4.5 miles away. There we would take a break before entering Mahoosuc Notch 1.6 miles ahead. The weather was very overcast and after the first climb of the day we remained in the clouds for the next three hours. Passing over multiple summits buffeted by a strong wind forced me to hike with one hand one my head to keep my hat from Mary Poppinsing away into the ether. Then I would go down below the tree line and relax into normal hard hiking. It took me three and a half hours to hike just under 5 miles to the shelter. The good news was there was actually flowing water .1 miles downhill so I drank up and packed out two liters for the next stage. 900 feet of descent later, we were at the west end of Mahoosuc Notch, often described as the most often described mile of the AT.  How to convey what the trail was like¢¦it was like walking through an auto salvage yard, only with the cars stacked in every possible configuration with occasional gaps of 5 feet between them and 10-20 foot drop in the gap. The Notch is at the base of opposing steep cliffs (and it was hard to get the notion out of my head that all these boulders had started up above and fallen down here - would one join them now?) and has its own microclimate to the extent that there was still ice in some of the low spots.  The Notch-proper is just under a mile in length and takes most hikers somewhere between an hour and a half and three hours to traverse.  Hiking poles stowed away, we entered at 10:30.  I for one, had a blast jumping, climbing, crawling, controlled-falling, and shimmying through the morass of rocks. Twice I had to take my pack off to squeeze through a rock tunnel and I only made one dumb decision to jump three feet down onto a rock and still lived to tell the tale. The three of us took turns picking a path and emerged 90 minutes later from the east end of the Notch with a few scrapes and bruises for our troubles.  There are plenty of places on the trail that require boulder scrambling, but nothing like this where it¢s all you do for most of a mile. After taking a break, we then had the Mahoosuc Arm climb, which as I mentioned yesterday is one of the steepest on the AT.  But it really wasn¢t bad - sorta just another long plod-plod-plod sixty minute slog up a mountain. Halfway up we ran into Rain Catcher and Vikingman. I was really pleased to see Vikingman in particular as I had last seen him just before entering New Jersey. I knew that his Trail family had split up at about mile 1600 as some started to do bigger miles and others had off-trail obligations, but all are still hiking.  I¢m excited for Vikingman that he¢s still hiking and is so close to his goal of completing the AT. After all the tough hiking over the last two days I managed to emerge injury free until we were walking along the edge of Speck Pond and I absentmindedly slammed my left knee into a rock that had waited 300 million years for me to come along and do something asinine like not look down. I¢ve got a nice cut and another knot to show for my self-inflicted troubles. This is fine.So we are at the Speck Pond shelter for the night and I am beat. Maine is a butt-kicker and will remain so for another 80 miles. It¢s supposed to start raining this evening and not stop for 36 hours with temps plunging into the 40¢s. Iceberg had already arranged for a hotel room in Bethel, Maine for tomorrow and Quiksilver and I are going to bunk with him to get out of the weather and resupply. We¢ve got Old Speck Mountain to climb first thing and then a steep three mile downhill to the road. With the rain that¢s predicted, it¢s going to be slow going over the harsh terrain before we meet our shuttle at 10am. My goal is not to fall.