Date: 2008-08-09
From: Bald Mountain Brook Lean-to ME

To: Campsite West Branch Piscataquis River ME
Miles today: 9.9

Day 174 Saturday August 9 ¢ Campsite West Branch Piscataquis River ME - Miles Today: 9.9 Total Miles: 2049.6Today was a bit of an eventful day. For the first time, I believe, on this trip, we did not make it to our destination. But more on that later.We had a little excitement that we did not really need today as we forded Bald Mountain Stream, which, by the way, was not listed as a ford in our guidebooks ¢ it¢s another stream that has swollen to ford conditions. The river was almost up to the road. The first 30 yards from the road is usually a trail through tall grass and shrub, but now is all submerged. But the real issue was at the very end of our tandem style ford when Grasshopper took her hand off of Brakeman's shoulder and knocked his glasses into the river. The next minute or two was anxiety filled as we searched for them. Grasshopper eventually spotted something sparkling in the water not far from her foot. She reached down and grabbed it, not really counting on them being his glasses, but they were! Whew. Drama over. It would have been a complete bummer to have lost them. Not only would he have to hike the remainder of the trail without good eyes, but they were also his brand new pair of glasses. On second thought, if he didn¢t wear his glasses, would that mean he wouldn¢t see how much mud he has walking through and have a better day? Speaking of mud, we took a picture of our shoes today as they were completely caked in mud. What a picture that should make! We still cannot even imagine what the 100 Mile Wilderness is going to be like, but I think if we had to bet on it, our shoes are going to look like that for the next week. Around 12:30 or 1:00 as we approached the West Branch of the Piscatiquis River, 5 Bags came walking up the trail towards us, with no pack on. We were surprised to see him. Then he shared the news with us ¢ the river is impassable. He tried to ford it yesterday at 4:00 and ended up taking a scary swim. He said the water got to be chest deep and before he knew it, he was swept off his feet and swimming, drenching his pack in the process. He was not even to the deepest part of the river yet. After that scary call, he found a flat spot on the knoll overlooking the river to pitch his tent, where he as been now for about 20 hours. Luckily his inner stuff sack kept his sleeping bag dry, but his cell phone, which was in the side pocket of his pack no longer works. He believes the water has gone down about a foot in the time that he's been here.We decided to go check it out for ourselves. We figured that everyone has their own swimming abilities and thus water comfort levels, and we needed to make our own decision. Our level of comfort is probably higher than some folks due to our competitive swimming background, so we went to the river with hope we could continue on.Two rivers come together to form the West Branch of the Piscataquis River. We called the one branch, the ¢main branch¢ and the minor branch the ¢side branch¢.   There was an island in the middle of the ¢main branch¢ before the rivers converged. We scoped out the river in two different places. The one area, past where the rivers joined, of course was too deep and too fast. We then tried the ¢side branch¢ and figured we could get across it, but were doubtful that we could get across the ¢main branch¢ to the island, and then who knew if we could get from the island, across the rest of the ¢main branch¢ to the other bank. Our minds kept telling us that Stilts got across this river yesterday, as did Squam, so there must be a passable section. Of course, Stilts has that trail name for a very good reason ¢ his legs are like stilts! But Squam on the other hand, is on the short side. We believe that Stilts passed through here around noon yesterday and we remember him saying he was able to get to the island, which meant he crossed the ¢main branch¢, before the rivers converged. We tried and tried to find a passable area, but failed. I guess the water has risen that much since their crossing, which would make sense, as a lot of the water continues to run off the mountainsides. Brakeman was convinced that this crossing was too difficult, and made the call that we're staying put for the night. Grasshopper of course, being the kind hearted person that she is, taunted him jokingly through the rest of the evening that ¢Squam made it across it, how come you can¢t.¢   The guidebook does say that this is supposed to be a knee-deep crossing but in times of high water ¢fording can be dangerous¢. I guess we found that out for ourselves.So up to the knoll above the rivers we went to pitch our tent near 5 Bags. We learned that he heard our hiking sticks clicking on rocks as we approached and went to the trail to see who was coming. We¢re the first people he¢s seen since 4:00 yesterday. We also leaned he was a competitive swimmer too! We would have loved to have past the afternoon chatting with 5 Bags, but the mosquitoes chased us to our tents.Food now became our top priority, as we did not know how long we would be stranded here and therefore how much we needed to ration our food. We¢re much better at being able to allocate food for a set number of days. But how many days would we be here, we did not know. Luckily earlier in the day, we had picked some blueberries at the top of Moxie Bald Mountain, where we actually enjoyed some blue sky, some sunshine and no rain. Wow, what a combination. We had a couple inches worth in a baggie and were going to save them for our oatmeal breakfast tomorrow, but given our situation, we decided the blueberries and our gorp would be our afternoon and evening meal for today.Around 5:00, Grasshopper got restless and decided to get out of the tent. Gosh, what timing. As she wandered away from the tent site, she saw humans! She quickly ran back to the tent to alert Brakeman, that HUMANS had been spotted and then retraced her steps, running back down the trail towards the HUMANS. HUMANS, who may know a way across this swollen river! The day hikers, a couple in their early 40s, had just completed the 100 Mile Wilderness, and were out exploring this area to see how bad the rivers were swollen. As they looked at it, they just shook their heads. They had the official AT map for this area and were able to show us a 7 mile detour via an old jeep road (1 mile), to a logging road (4.5 miles), to a paved road (.5 mile) that had a bridge over the Piscataquis River, to another paved road (Shirley-Blanchard Road ¢ 1 mile) that would take us back to the AT. Hot diggity-dog, we have a method around this madness, if necessary! If we take the 7-mile detour rather than the 6-mile AT path, we¢ll call it even and ¢official¢.The detour would get us around both the west branch and the east branch of this river. We're at the west branch, which is supposed to be more difficult than the east branch but everything is very flooded right now. The day hikers showed us a picture of him crossing the east branch, earlier in the day. The water was up to his chest, and he was a big guy, and he wasn¢t even in the middle of the river! He had his dog on his shoulders as he crossed the river, which did not appear to be flowing very fast.The other nice news is that the day hikers told us that everything in the 100 Mile Wilderness is passable! That is good to hear. This should be our last challenging ford (or detour).   5 Bags, who promised his mother yesterday during his call home to wish her happy birthday that he would not cross any unsafe rivers, is also pleased with the news. Gosh, what perfect timing on that call and promise!Once we realized we were ¢rescued¢, we decided we could eat our normal allotted dinner. We asked 5 Bags how he was doing food wise, as he has been out here 24 hours longer than anticipated and will be out here a total of 40 hours longer than anticipated by the time he hits town tomorrow. He said he only had one Lipton's side dish for all of today. We were able to give him a package and a third of graham crackers, a few tablespoons of peanut butter and a Snicker's bar. Hopefully that will hold him over and we will still have enough food for our 13-14 mile hike into Monson tomorrow. Of course we made 5 Bags work for his food, unintentionally though. As we sorted through our food bag and found something we could spare, we hollered over to his tent, ¢Hey 5 Bags, do you want some graham crackers?¢ To which he would respond, ¢Well, I¢m not going to say NO!¢ And then he¢d come running over to our tent to get his treasure. Then a few minutes later, we¢d holler, ¢Hey 5 Bags, do you want a Snickers bar?¢ to which we would get the same reply, ¢Well, I¢m not going to say NO!¢Our game plan is to get up around 5:00 tomorrow, both us and 5 Bags, take a look at a boulder in the middle of the ¢side branch¢ and make a go or detour decision. The boulder right now is about a foot out of water. It¢s been 5 Bags¢ benchmark for the past 24 hours. If we had to bet a dollar on our game plan for tomorrow, we'd bet that we will be taking the detour. Although we have seen the water go down a few inches in the past hour along the shoreline, we don't see how it's going to go down enough feet by tomorrow morning to make a ford possible. We need to rethink our options in Monson. We were going to hike 9-miles in and just take a nero. Now that we will be hiking 13-14 miles in, we are considering doing possibly a nero and a zero at Shaw's before heading into the 100 Mile Wilderness. One of the possible advantages of doing that is to allow the first day of the next low system, which is typically rain, to pass through. It would also give us rest, both mentally and physically, before that last big push. Despite our lack of game plan for tomorrow as well as Monson, we're looking forward to Shaw's, where we hear they have an all you can eat pancake and egg breakfast for $7. I sure hope they have a room for us!   We might just spend the next week there eating breakfasts. Goodnight from the party stranded along the swollen river, 3-miles shy of our intended campsite of Horseshoe Canyon Lean-to. As we lay in our tent, we can hear the river below us, which I would think under normal conditions, we shouldn't hear at all. Stay tuned for more drama tomorrow.