Date: 2008-08-20
From: east B Hill rd

To: grafton notch
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: scattered clouds

Ever seen griswolds family vacation movie?? remember the woody station wagon they drove? well we all loaded into that exact station wagon today as we left the hostel en route to the trail head. what a picture old hostel building station wagon parked out front 8 hikers piling in with their packs, an AT sign in the front drive. dust in the wind, hammer and thier packs crammed into the seat facing the cars behind us the rest of us filled in the remaining seats and we floated down the road. as we drove up a big hill the driver pleaded with his car to make it up the hill, come on baby, as he changed it into a new gear. sighing with relief that the car had made it without us having to push it up hill, he put the car in park and let us out at the trail head. so we headed onto the trail...creekdiver full of energy took off like it was a race practically running up the trail so needless to say I didn't see her until the hiking day had ended. the rest of us plodded along, my arch has been hurting pretty bad so had to stop a few times to tape it, retape it and finally untape it all in hopes of relieving the pain from walking up hill. before begining the actual climb up baldpate i heard from a few hikers that it was really windy today, some saying they had to brace themselves from the wind and one that she was on all fours so I was curious about what I would be experiencing as well as excited b/c I absolutley love the wind and its power. Climbing up baldpate mt you can hear the wind blowing up above and upon getting near the top where it is all exposed (hence name bald pate)I really felt the strong power of the wind. it literally was pushing me to the left and shifting my pack to the left of my back, my hiking poles being blown to the left every time I lifted them up, at times i had to push against the wind to go the way I wanted to go opposing the way it wanted to push me. An amazing view, I had a great time up there in the wind so exhilerating. I was able to see whisperer in front of me since it was not tree covered. This is one thing i have really enjoyed about maine is climbing up to where you can see others climbing the next mt. at one time i was on a mt top and looked to my right to see dust beginging the ascent up and the across to my left at the next mt and saw hammer climbing up a ladder on the next mt over. the hike down was pretty gentle and quick so all a great day. upon reaching the road we had trail magic from queen diva, fried chicken potato salad and lemonade and desert, amazing! she is so sweet and said she will be doing trail magic in the 100 mile wilderness so hopefully we will cross paths with her once again! afterward we climbed back into the station wagon for a ride back to the hostel...i took the back seat this time and let me just say this was a close second to being on top of the mt today...was able to get great views of the mts just climbed today and watching the road fall behind us as we drove reminded me of watching a movie in rewind. had my feet up my hands behind my head with the sun shining and some duby brothers playing from the back speakers...greatness!