Date: 2009-08-12
From: 3.5 Mountain (halfway 'tween Third and Fourth)

To: Monson - Shaw's Lodging
Miles today: 2.8

III. Report: It was a very long night; my chest was hurting even more, and it rained hard all night. I reviewed my situation and options: it was still 23 miles to hike out of the 100 mile wilderness, which included 3 fordings, 2 described as difficult. I still had food for 2 12 days and could probably make this option if forced in to it. Or, I could hike 8 miles in the rain to the Long Pond Lean-to and try to call Shaw¢s for a shuttle out¢¦ if my cell coverage was available. OR, backtrack over some very rough rock scramble trail to a side trail and take my chances at a logging road.   My pace now in inclement weather was surely less that 1.0 mph and I was getting more and more concerned about an 8 mile hike to the shelter, especially in a pouring rain At 0600, I called Shaw¢s to confirm a possible meeting and shuttle - - no answer. After some hesitation, I called 911 and everything worked perfectly after that. The original sheriff¢s office dispatcher transferred me to the local sheriff¢s office, who subsequently transferred me to a Maine Ranger and Game Warden, Officer Glen Annis. Officer Annis wanted me to backtrack 2 miles to West Chairback Pond Trail. He would drive his truck to a logging road, then ATV up a portion of a side trail and then meet me on foot at this intersection at 0930. It was now 0700 and I thought it would be a stretch to pack up and meet him there by 0930; but I sure intended to give it my best. It was still raining hard and I bet my tent and now soaked clothes, probably had an extra 5 lbs of water. I put everything in my backpack and started backtracking very carefully. It normally takes me about an hour to take down camp, eat and start hiking. However, today, I think I made it in about 20 minutes. After about a mile, I came upon a new blue blazed trail, Third Mountain, with a 1.8 mile sign to one trail road and 2.2 mile sign to another trail. I called the sheriff¢s office again, got patched into Officer Annis, and revised the meeting place based on this new trail. This trail was one of the prettiest in Maine. It had a very wide tread, lots of running water, and new wooden steps and log trails. I had almost reached the logging trail when I met Officer Annis. He had called Shaw¢s and arranged for me to pick up a shuttle at a nearby parking area. I was still hesitant about having called for help; but, Officer Annis assured me he would much rather prefer an easy rescue during the day rather that a much more difficult rescue in the middle of the night.My shuttle driver, Gary, soon arrived and drove me to Shaw¢s. I hung my gear out to drive, washed and dried my clothes and then took a shower. After eating and putting away my gear, I started looking at options on getting home. I had decided that a couple days of rest probably wouldn¢t be sufficient to recover and that I wanted to get checked out at home. After several trips to the library to check flight options and confirm shuttle service to Bangor, I made reservations for a noon time flight home tomorrow. Now, I could relax finally. I went to the Lakeshore Pub for dinner and passed Lightning, who Lumpy and I met in VA. I had a moose reuben sandwich and a pizza, I met the man in black, another NOBO we had seen in VA. Back at Shaw¢s, I met up again with Tree Artist and met Backtracker, a section hiker and Madeline from Maine, an interesting lady even more senior than me that started NOBO from Springer on March 23, hiking alone with the end clearly within reach.V. POD: Bull Moose. During my time off the trail to be with Libra Lady, I prepared a number of QODs and PODs to fill in for the days when I knew cell coverage would be problematic. And I had completed these prepared entries with the last report. Today, I am saddened to include Bullmoose as the POD. Just before leaving home and returning to the AT, I learned of Bull¢s unexpected passing. Bull was one year behind me in school and we became good friends thru Scouting. One of our counselors was Mr. Kennard Smith, who advised us in handloading ammunition and amateur radio. The handloading was very convenient as we loved to hunt together, and the amateur radio would become a lifetime passion for Bull. Bull was your stereotypical gentle giant: relative large in size, but the most gentle of temperments. I recall one of our camping trips, where Bull had stayed behind in camp while the rest of the group was out swimming or doing something else. Some rival Scouts, probably from West Columbia, came by our camp and decided to pull up all our tent stakes. Bull was there and generally watched them with humor, until they decided to mess with him a bit. Then he became somewhat aggressive and ran them all off. At another time, Bull, Kirk (Doc¢s son) and I were duck hunting at the newly created Phillips reservoir. This was a 50 or 100 acre tract of land, that had a high levee bulldozed around it, and then flooded with water. The reservoir had a lot of trees and was an ideal duck hunting spot. It was still dark, very cold and we had just set our decoys out and were about to position ourselves in the trees, when a water moccasin dropped out of the tree into the aluminum jon boat. Kirk was trying to shoot the snake, I was trying to jump into the tree, and Bull finally was able to flip it out with a paddle. Later, we would take my German Shepherd Thor and use him to retrieve the downed birds. After one of our more successful duck hunts, we were cleaning the birds at Kirk¢s house. LL came by later and commented to the fact that if I could clean ducks, then it shouldn¢t be that much of a problem for me to change dirty baby diapers.