Date: 2005-09-25
From: Monson

To: 100 mile wilderness
Miles today: 0.0

Woa, the 100 mile wilderness. Hmm, this must be a mystique thing cause we saw cars at some point on 5 of the 6 days we were out there. First day, 15 miles out to the shelter and BAM, Mice Fever...there were mice everywhere. Jumping on us and obviously not caring that we were trying to eat...so, we killed 7 of them. The Stomp Method works well, though violent when I am the person wheilding the shoes. But Stilts' Leki Spear Method is very convincing and quite impressive if you ever see him do it. He is amazingly accurate. The one I got by this method had to be pure luck. Anyway, Iwe somehow missed some because the next day, as I approached my food bag that I hung WAY OUT in the woods, I could see the hole. Man, was I PISSED(excuse my french fries)! I layed the slain out on a slate rock at the fire pit as a reminder top the others that a gruesome fate can come from stealing food. Thus began one of my top 5 worse days on the AT, day 2 of the 100 mile wilderness.Rain, cold rain. Mtns too, no the 100 mile Wilderness is NOT flat, well at least in the begininng. And Roots, oh, and Rocks. Relentless. Oh, and people dont hike on these days, except for us, because when we got to the shelter, it was FULL. Ah, setting up a tent in a downpour, always thilling. The bottle of Champagne I waa carrying for katahdin, well, I popped the top and said to HEY with it. Later, after falling to sleep at 7PM, I awoke to a waterbed as the tent literally floated on the water escaping the woods under it. Guess what, I awoke because something was amiss, wrong, different at 10:30PM(same night), What the ...... my Big Agnes Air Pad had deflated. HoLE. Yes and hole near the valve that seems to be because of a poor desing there. Anyway, the day was still dealing me some bad Karma. "Must have been the mice slaughter," I thought. Anyway, no patch wopuld hold, I tied it up with a shoelace(YES, TIED) and did the best I could, tommorrow, all would be better after all, I killed no mice today.the next day was absolutley fantastic as would be the remainder o fthe journey. Even Thursdays rain(deluge) didnt bother me for we were about DONE! We decided to crank out some MILES to Summitt on Saturday. There was a huge croup in the woods and we wanted to choose a day that had the least so that we were assured one o fthe 12 spots at the Birches Base Lean-To's. Abol Bridge was a nice place to feel that you had made it for Katahdin loomed ove rit in the NEAR distance and the lakes and river there are magical. The Dead Moose, however, were not. It was the weight station for the Moose check-in. There are pics, maybe I'll post them later. we did see my only "In the Wild" Moose sighting the morning we hiked into Abol(which was also my earliest morning on the Whole Trail). A Mom and calf...pretty darned cool to see. Wish I could have seen many more....many track, much poop, mot much moose in my line of site.The approach to Katahdin Stream at the base was awesome and we spent the day taking in the sites and being thankfull for being there after the long journey. Also, in SURVIVOR style tradition, I made sure to mention the names out loud of all those that we met out here on the journey that could not make it for one reason or the other. I felt it fitting for Katahdin to hear their names and know that they too were committed to the dream in their own ways. I am proud of everyone that put their life aside and their dreams first and then found a way to step foot on Springer. Hikers are really incredible people. Or, better yet, hiking makes people more incredible. SOmething like that.When we got to the Birches, many of the folks there were surprised to see us, they didnt know we would push. Doc Narley, GQ, Treetops, Spitfire, Guideless, Nomad, me Stilts, some section hikers and others were there to share our last night, out last Thru-Hike campfire. Thanks to the section guys for buying and toating the wood. It was really cool when Treetops showed up after having pushed himself so that he could summitt with us.We were up and out last that morning, 8AM, but we were ready, Stilts, Treetops and myself. Katahdin was AWESOME, challenging, beautiful and everything that the end of the journey should be. It kicked my butt, went easy on me, made my smile, made me cry, showed me friendship and finalized this dream, this accomplishment. I was amazed at the energy we recieved from the day and section hikers whom graciously shared the mountain with us and joined in in our celebration by clapping, congradualting and snapping photos for us. Thanks.The BEST magic of the trail came while we were going up. As we passed a group of folks taking a break, a dapper Aussie named Katahdin Mike let us know he would gladly give us a ride to Millinocket when we got finsihed if we waited for them to get down(more on this soon).So we celebrated up to with Schlitz(in hope that they will put Stilts and I on their website) and had lunch. The views were special, the mood was undescribable. I was in a daze and crying 100 yards from the sign. A Sign? can you imagine? I just grabbed it and gave it a big kiss to the sound of a loud roar of cheers from other thru-hikers and day folks up there already. many pictures later, it started to get colder and more windy to we started down. The down was sort of mind numbing, just fantastic and surreal all at once. When we hit the bottom, Spitfire and Guidless were there with their gracious parents who had brought beer, food and good cheer. They offered us a ride to town and we were in millinicket by 5pm. Nice.Oh, the MAGIC, welllllllll, I hope I can do it justice with words....see my Summitt entry to find out what happened. I'll give you a hint, yesterday was Monday, Oct.3 and I had a mail drop in Millinocket, Maine at 9AM. I was in Hanover, NH for Lunch.On On. Live your dreams."Dont need to know who, may help you make it come true, just say 'someday I will...someday!'" Jimmy Buffett SOMEDAY I WILLDrop me line if you have read this far.