Date: 2016-08-11
From: Pinkham Notch 

To: US2. Gorham, NH
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: light rain

When you have an injury that sidelines you from reaching the finish line, or the finish mountain as it were, you don't really know what the future will bring. Will it end your hiking career permanently, or will you live to hike another day.   I sat around the house for almost three weeks, leg propped up, ice pack draped over my knee.   I hardly stuck my nose out the door. And still my knee hurt. We went to an Urgent Care and had it x-rayed. Not broken. And still it hurt. Until it didn't.   I picked up some shifts at work where I walked around all day pushing ER patients to Ultra Sound and back so I could scan them.   And my knee didn't really yell at all. So here we are, back in New Hampshire   We arrived via airplane in Portland, Maine on Tuesday. Picked up a rental car and went to our room. Wednesday we got our resupply boxes organized and then drove to Gorham, NH. I don't know if you remember, but the first time we came through here Will hiked the 21 miles from Pinkham Notch and I stayed at the Hostel and rested my knee. But since we are coming back to finish our thruhike, Will kindly made plans for us to hike the bit I missed. That way I can have a thruhike too. We went to the post office and then grabbed a quick meal. Then we headed out to Pinkham Notch. By the time we did all that and organized at the trailhead it was 12:15pm. Oh well we know we are way out of shape and plan to take it slow. Breaking what Will did in one day into two.   Of course it was tons of climbing up rocky and steep uphill. I should make a little disclaimer here and say that pretty much ALL my friends and family said "please try not to fall and hurt yourself this time when you're out there hiking". To which I replied, I'll do my very best, believe me I don't want to fall! Well, Day 1 and under two hours into our hike Will, not me, steps up a slanted rock face, his foot slips off it and he does   a face plant right before my very eyes. I can hear his head go KATHUNK as it strikes the rock. This all looks and sounds very serious. He hits the ground as I am rushing to him. He didn't pass out or break his skull open thankfully. But he has a couple of generous scrapes and a huge headache.   One of those things that could have been way worse. About 15 minutes later he starts laughing. I know immediately what he is doing since he has done it before. He has a mental picture of what that fall must have looked like and he thinks it is funny. Well, I didn't think it was funny but I can appreciate that he kept his sense of humor through it all.By the time we made it up to the gondola drop off point our legs were quivering from the strain. I think perhaps 'out of shape " is way too mild a descriptor for us. In our defense, my knee had to heal and it is anywhere from 110 to 115 degrees in Arizona. A bit tough to train. We took a break at a picnic table there and then hiked to a spot near the Carter Notch Hut. We set up our tent and then hiked in to the Hut. We hit it just at dinner time but only picked up some tap water and returned to camp. We ate dinner and turned in. Which brings us to today, Thursday the 11th of August. Sore wouldn't even begin to cover it if you're asking how we feel. I told Will that the only thing that didn't hurt on my body was my hair! And he said 'me too' which is sort of an inside joke because he has a shaved head.   We left our campsite and headed up the Carter Dome trail. Of course it was super rocky and steep. Today would end up being one of those days when it felt you were always climbing steeply uphill but never reaching the top. Or if you did reach it, you would have a short descent and then you would resume climbing again. We did reach Carter Dome but it was encased in trees and so no view to be had. The same for Carter Peak. Today was super hot and we were feeling it. I was sweating but Will was sweating buckets. We would drink about a gallon of water during our hike today and still feel 'behind ' in our hydration. We hiked 6 miles yesterday with the late start, leaving us about 15 for today to get to US 2 and the hitch into Gorham. Which doesn't sound like much for us, however, between the difficult and slow going uphill and downhill and our out of condition state, I was seriously wondering if we would make it to the road tonight. But the last 4 miles eased up and we were able to make better time.We got to US 2 and stuck out our thumb. Took a little bit but a van pulled over to pick us up. They had hiked 1,000 miles of the AT last year and were out filling in some of the spots they had missed. They dropped us off in Gorham. We sure appreciated it. We then got a second hitch back to Pinkham Notch to pick up the rental car from a super nice guy. He wasn't even planning on going all the way out to the Notch, he just did it out of the goodness of his heart. Pretty cool hey?So we picked up the car and drove back to Gorham and got a room. We're clean, we've eaten and we're ready for bed. It's good to be back my friends.   And on that note, I'll catch you later!Road Runner