Date: 2011-08-29
From: Appalachian Trail Lodge, Millinocket ME

To: The Birches Campsite, Baxter State Park
Miles today: 10.2

(In which I hike to the base of Katahdin and try to comprehend the fact that I am almost done)I head back to the AT Cafe for breakfast, and when I find out that there will be no cinnamon rolls today a hole is created in my life. This hole is soon filled when I learn that the cafe sells french toast with peanut butter, marshmallow fluff and strawberry preserves inside, which turns out to somehow be even tastier than it sounds.Back at the hostel the finished hikers slowly start to move on. Before Wakarusa heads out on a bus I ask him how it feels to be done. He shrugs, "I guess it hasn't really sunk in yet." In the driveway Big Ben works on the bicycle he bought at a yard sale for $35, changing a tube and tire, and I wave goodbye as he heads out on a bike trip across Maine before flying back to England.Hakuna Matata calls Baxter State Park to see if there's any camping allowed for the night, even though the website says that there isn't. When it turns out that we are in fact allowed to enter the park today, though we're not allowed to summit, the news spreads like wildfire through the hostel. "Baxter is open!" three or four different people tell me breathlessly within a couple minutes of the phone call. We quickly collect a crowd to split a shuttle, and two hours later we are back on trail.The rivers have swollen since I left, and several times the trail is two or more feet under water with no dry way around. Stanley Thermos and I stop to take our shoes off at each flooded section, but Goldilocks, who along with her brother is one of the youngest two thru-hikers this year and whom I had never met, splashes right through in her sneakers. The trail comes to a fork where a high water trail allows hikers to bypass a series of fords said to be dangerous after heavy rain. I've already decided to take the blue blaze (which the ridge runner says is the official route in the current conditions) when Goldilock's father and brother come walking south from the AT, having investigated the non-bypass trail and turned around at the sight of the first raging river.The high water trail itself has the worst flooded section, a small stream that has expanded into a river four feet deep in the middle. A half-floating, half-sunken log rests between what used to be the two banks of the stream, and Stanley Thermos braves it first, balancing barefoot on the slick, underwater log to cross the deepest section. I follow with some trepidation, not liking the precarious look of it but also not wanting to soak my shorts and shirt. I make it across, and from there the trail seems to dry out as we gain a little elevation.When we get to the Katahdin Stream Campground, a beautiful grass pasture with views of the river and mountain, we register at the ranger station. I am thru-hiker 228 for the year to make it this far (I was number 201 at Harpers Ferry), and in compliance with the park rules I pay for a tent site for the first time since I started.The tent spots for thru-hikers are a quarter mile up a gravel road from the ranger station, and when I get to the spot I walk around it three times trying to find out where the areas to set up a tent are. "Yup, this is really it," Stanley Thermos says, nodding at the flooded, hilly patch of woods. "Ever since I heard of 'The Birches' I thought it sounded like an upscale resort," he says. "And we get this." We manage to find two bumpy patches of ground that aren't flooded and set up our tents.Balance and Y-Knot take the tent platform when they show up, and Hakuna Matata and Rem hammock and claim a lean-to, though we are unclear as to whether the lean-tos technically need to be rented separately or not. Eating dinner around the picnic table we try to comprehend how close we are to finishing our journeys. "This is the last time I'll use ever this stove," Rem says of his nearly broken stove he plans to return to REI, and we all contemplate the fact that this is our last dinner of the hike.As for myself, I'm focused on the challenge still ahead, more than 4000 feet of elevation gain in 5.2 miles and what is supposed to be some of the toughest trail on the AT. The weather is supposed to be good tomorrow but anything can happen and until I actually touch the sign the end feels (and actually is) miles away.