Date: 2013-07-20
From: up to Stratton, ME

To: Katahdin
Miles today: 0.0

The worst of Southern Maine was done, and I had taken a refreshing zero in Stratton. There were only a few major mountains left until the end and the Bigelows were some of them. Although I got caught in a brief rainstorm, the sky gave way to warming sunshine, and I sat on Little Bigelow unable to move due to an abundance of wild blueberries. From there the terrain flattens out overall until Monson, the last town before Katahdin. My first two days in the 100 mile wilderness were spent in the cold rain and they were more difficult than I had expected. On my second night I huddled in the corner of a crowded 6-person shelter and succumbed to a fever and body aches. The illness had mostly gone away by morning but I was still left with a torn up stomach for the next few days. Being sick at home is no fun, being sick in the woods is awful, being sick in the 100-mile wilderness is just downright crap for a few different reasons. 1) the hiking is perfect and I was not able to really enjoy it and 2) I couldn't have just lied around, or taken it easy because I didn't have enough food to support that option. So I had to keep moving, and I did 3 20+ mile days that were pretty exhausting. Nevertheless, at several different spots on the trail, there are views to the mountain that we have walked towards for the past 5 months. I remember when I stepped out onto the rock in Pemadumcook Lake and turned to my left...the sight of that mountain stole my gaze and my mind for several minutes. The view of Katahdin stopped me in my tracks. All this time and there it was...the mountain that had stole my time, energy, and money for 5 months and it was just days away. I was excited to finally end the journey, but when I realized what that entailed I felt I still needed time in the woods.The weather was perfect through the 100 mile wilderness. Temperatures stayed cool and reminded me of Autumn back home. A few discolored leaves have already fallen, showing the soon change of seasons. I reach the Abol Campground; the end of the Wilderness and the last store on the trail. I am out of food and am eager to stuff my face. Unfortunately, the card machine is down and I only have 14$ on me and 10$ is needed to pay at the Katahdin Stream Campground. So I have enough to rehydrate with some Gatorade and to get a little pie for breakfast. I hike the remaining miles into Katahdin Stream Campgrounds where thru-hikers stay on their eve of summiting at two leantos in a campsite that are reserved. I have but a handful of trail mix for the rest of the day and the next, but I have comfort in my situation because I know that by the end of the day I will not be hungry. Sure enough, the trail provides with three very kind people whom I stop and talk to; a couple doing a Filp-Flop hike, and a man named Steve from Boston. I did not pry them for food, I didn't even ask them, they offered me more food than I needed and my situation was quickly solved. I heard numerous people say "there's no need to hurry, there's no trophy at the finish line". Indeed their words are right; there is no trophy, there are no entertainers, there are no flashy lights. There were but two leantos that sat in the misty rain where several other hikers and I spent our last day on the trail playing a game that involved throwing rocks at a trekking pole. Sleep that night was non-existent. And so at 6:30 in the morning Wiki, Hooker, and I are among the first thru hikers climbing Katahdin. We pass a number of day hikers. It felt like I was running, and with just a daypack, it probably looked like it. Climbing over the car sized boulders was fun; I had been conditioning for this climb for 5 months, otherwise it would have been pretty difficult. The fog limited the view, but when I saw the sign for Thoreau Springs and Tableland, I knew I was only a mile away from the summit. There were no views off the mountain, just a cold wind and mist. The summit sign became visible just as I was in front of it. There was not much that could have been said between us; we were all feeling the same thing but unable to express it. We took our pictures. And our visit was cut short as a cold, sideways rain iced up our bodies and made us move. The hardest mile on the trail is that mile walking away from the sign on Mt Katahdin.