Date: 2021-06-08
From: Bald Mountain Brook Lean-to

To: ME 15 Trailhead 
Miles today: 22.0
Weather: light rain

22 miles to ME 15 trailhead Last night some ATV people were riding their ATVs up and down a nearby forest road until 10 pm. Not enjoyable for a tired hiker. Just after midnight I heard a creature creeping around my tent. It sounded like it was going to chew a hole in the tent so I turned on my flashlight and tried to see what it was. I laid there for awhile hoping that it would go away. As was worried that it might chew holes in my backpack that I had left hanging from a tree. So I shined my light around and saw something scurrying about with a hoping motion. At first I thought that it was a huge toad or a kangaroo rat. In town the next day I asked Uphill if any creatures were messing around his tent. He said that something actually jumped up on top of his tent and made the fabric bow in and hit him in the face. The birds woke me up before 4am. I didn¢t mind because I wanted to get the 2 mile climb up Moxie Bald Mountain done before it got to miserably hot. I started hiking at 5am, a record time on trail for me. The climb up had some steep sections and blowdowns but it was overall pretty. I especially enjoyed the above tree line section and the summit had great views. The rest of the day should have been the easiest and most enjoyable trail thus far in Maine but the weather was so steamy that my glasses would fog up if I stopped. The trail followed a drainage with a nice whitewater river that I could have stopped to collect water and cool off in but I would have had to bushwhack through poison ivy and other thick plants. It¢s so hot that some hikers were calling the hostel to try and get picked up in remote forest roads. The problem is (from bits and pieces that I¢ve heard) a lot of the roads are private and have fences. To prevent heat exhaustion I tried to keep my pace reasonable and timed the interval between taking in fluids. My water filters were getting clogged so they had a low flow rate. This was frustrating when you had to take several minutes to fill a water bottle when mosquitoes and biting flies were swarming around. Anyway I made it work and stayed just hydrated enough to avoid dehydration. The only time that the heat was affecting my pace was going uphill when I couldn¢t control my heart rate. I use heart rate as a measure of how exertion. I don¢t actually stop to measure my actual heart rate but after 40 years of endurance sports I can tell when I need to slow my heart rate down in the heat. Sweat would get into my eyes and I would have to take frequent short breaks to lower my heart rate. I was climbing up out of a stream bed and huge trees were blown down over the trail. As has become a daily occurrence for me I took what looked to be a logical way around the blowdowns but ended up a short distance off trail. I thought that it¢s too hot for this crap, wasting time, energy and fluids because of these dang blowdowns. I got my app out and bushwhacked back to the trail. At the end of the hike I was only 1.3 miles from the trailhead and I only had 2 swallows of water left. I passed a stream that had a trickle of water flowing into some small pools that were just deep enough to collect water from. I passed the stream thinking should I stop or push on. I decided that one more aggravating stop with a clogged water filter was better than getting severely dehydrated. I went back and felt better after downing some much needed fluids. My final misadventure came within eyesight of the highway. Another blowdown obscured the trail, I went the wrong way and lost the trail. I started to bushwhack back but finally I thought the heck with this mess I might as well bushwhack down to the road. I did and popped out about 100 yards from the trailhead. I was lucky because if I had started down to the road 20 yards to my left I would¢ve ran into a high rocky road embankment. I called the hostel and they picked me up. Nicest hostel and owners ever. Happy Trails, Silver StreakNote: I¢m finishing the last 346 miles that I have left from my 2019 thru hike attempt. The mileage includes a week that I hiked from Springer to the NOC.