Date: 2008-09-26
From: Katahdin Stream Campground

To: MOUNT KATAHDIN!
Miles today: 5.2
Weather: overcast clouds

and this is how the story ends...Well, I had S. Forecast wake me up this morning as my cheap new watch has no alarm. It was 5:00am and pitch black. I asked for 15 more minutes and laid in my bag, knowing that today was the final day! I think it is funny that through my whole trip I never tried to use an alarm... real life is so rushed and busy that we need to use them, so I figured 6ish months with out using one wouldn't hurt. So the 5:15 up and at em' was a bit of a shock compared with my usual 8:30 wake up haha. To make the morning easier S. Forecast was nice enough to make me a cup of hot cocoa to get me moving. He is such a good morning person! For my final breakfast in "bed" on the trail I had a delicious whoopie pie and my cup of hot cocoa. There is nothing like lots and lots of sugar to power me up the big mountain. Once the sugar set in... excitement took over. I got all my gear packed up- (I am bringing my whole pack up to the top today, I mean we have been together this long why shouldn't the stinky Beast reach the summit with me?) As usual I was the last out of the site. It was pushing 6:10ish and we had planed to head out around 6. As I was walking over to meet the crew a car pulled in... sure enough I knew the crazy fools who got out! It was two more awesome friends from school Chris and Ritz, up to conquer the Big K with me! I tell you I really do have some of the most amazing friends out there. After getting all the messages relaid to my 4 homies we started off.. on the final climb of my dream. It was a beautiful crisp morning, we had left before the official word of what class today was, but to us it sure seemed like a class I day! Not too cold nor too hot. I did need to lose some layers on the way up though, which worked out well because everyone else did too. We stopped at a nice little rock area, I unzipped my pants into shorts. As we started to go Kyanite mentioned something about bees, I didn't pay much attention though... Then I started following Moonshadow, she stopped and started yelling "BEES BEES!" I blondly thought she was just freaking out because she was seeing bees... and continued to follow her until I too was getting stung! It hurt so bad, instant stinging in my feet, they must have liked the smell of my nasty socks because they stung right through. All In all I must have gotten stung 5 or 6 times in my feet and legs! After a quick break to survey the damage we moved on.. It looked as though Moonshadow and I were in for an adventure today.    My friends got behind, as they had not had 6 months of training for this event.. they were very supportive and didn't expect me to wait. I followed Aggie for a while, getting the giggles from a mix of the sugar, excitement, and sadness. We bounced up and down crazy rocks along the trail. Eventually we hit an odd section with a big rock slab. It was very hard to bust up with our full packs. I watched Aggie have a go and decide to take a different route... for some odd reason I thought I may be able to make it. So after just watching Moonshadow take a running jump and not making it... I tried the same thing. ONLY MUCH DIFFERENT RESULTS haha. Instead of making it up the rock, I smashed my face off of it. Haha, it hurt a bit and I lost a bit of skin on my nose but all was well. My elbow was gushing blood, enough to slap a bandaid on to keep from getting blood all over my pack. I was beginning to think that the almighty Kathadin didn't want me to climb today. I mean seriously BEES, face plants, and blood... ohh yeah - all in a good days work. I wasn't going to turn back with out finishing now! From there we continued moving up - the views from the mountain were unbelievable! The leaves were so colorful and there were some pretty low hanging clouds as well. Everything was as it should be, I stopped for a few pictures and eventually Chantrell caught up with us. So many hikers had been flying on by due to their very small day packs. The weight and the crazy climbing slowed us down a bit, we were just fine with it... heck we were going to finish this thing!    When we reached the tableland we caught back up with Brown Bag, Sunkist, and Kyanite. They had been awesome enough to wait for us. We were all smiles! We would hike the last mile together up to the top. I can't really tell you what was going on in my head... if you can imagine looking back on 199 days of a life long dream while hiking up the final mile to the sign... that is kind of like how it was. So many moments on my trip I had dreamed of seeing that beautiful sign, it powered me when times were rough, and it energized me to get to the top. I am not even sure what time I reached the summit, I was just so happy I even didn't touch the sign till all 6 of us had made it! I had done it. I had hiked 2,176.2 miles from Springer Mountain in GA to Mount Katahdin in ME! We took zillions of photos (my memory card was full at the summit... eek so I had to go in and delete some pics.) We laughed, some cried, and we definitely smiled. Besides the snackpackers (Sunkist, Kyanite, Brown Bag, Moonshadow, S. Forecast, and myself) we were joined at the summit by several other '08ers. Vegas, Rue, Achilles, Babu, Powder River, "Santa," Pixie, and Hollar. Eventually all 4 of my friends reached the top. I was spoiled rotten with goodies. Alicia had brought me my favorite snack - homemade special k bars! Chris carried up a gift from my friend Amber- who sent it to him.. (they didn't even know each other CRAZY~!)It was a great bath set, I joked that it was because she thinks I stink (Which I did haha) but in her final card she wrote that it was because I deserved to relax after my journey.. how sweet! And Ritz got me an amazing flask with 3-1-2008 and 9-26-2008 engraved with the miles on it!! how awesome is that? (It also was filled with Capt'n Mo Tattoo!!!) Like I said I am so lucky to have some of the most amazing friends! We stayed at the summit for a very long time. It is hard to leave, it was the end. We took zillions more photos, and took part in some crazy filming for National Geographic. It was a beautiful day.. but as a quote I like says, "You cannot stay on the summit forever, eventually you must come back down." It was time to begin my transformation back into the real world. I had played and enjoyed life for 6 and a half months... 199 days, and it was time to start a new passage.