Date: 2010-09-08
From: Stealth Site N of Goose Eye Mountain

To: Stealth Site in Mahoosic Notch
Miles today: 2.5

The rain stopped by morning but we all had to pack up wet tents and flies. In the light of day, I was amazed that Wild Poodle had found the two flat spots for her and Cahoda's tents among all the rocks, roots and saplings. At least they were completely off the trail. Part of my tent was ON the trail, which is a no-no.We started hiking about 8:30. About 100 yards down the trail is a 20' cliff with a ladder leading up to THE SHELTER!!! We thought we had hiked right by it last night. There's a couple lessons here. Although I DID hike right by and miss a shelter back in the Smokies, by this time I should have had enough self-confidence to realize there's no way I would have missed the shelter last night. Given that, I also should have known the shelter HAD to be right ahead and should have pressed on to it last night. Hindsight, of course, is always 20:20. We all had a good laugh over it.I was in the lead as we pressed on. It was cool and overcast and the dense forest was rather gloomy. Rounding a turn in the trail, I glanced ahead and there was a moose just standing there about 60' away looking at me. I involuntarily gasped and grabbed my camera¢and he was gone. It was a thrilling moment but even photoshopping the picture didn't help. All I got was an indiscernable moose butt going behind a boulder. So I settled for a photo of the moose hoofprint in the dirt (see photos).Difficult trail is taking on a whole new meaning here in Maine. It took us 2 hours to go only 112 miles up the trail and over Fulling Mountain. We stopped for first lunch and loaded up on water as we were about to head into the Mahoosic Notch which is known as the "toughest mile on the AT". It's a narrow notch between two soaring cliffs. Over the millennia, rocks have fallen off the cliffs and lay in a jumble in the notch. These are Volkswagen- to house-sized boulders and it's like an adult jungle gym as the Trail takes you over, around and sometimes even under these obstacles. We all like the challenge of bouldering but after an hour, it began to be tedious. There were times it took us 15 minutes to get the three of us over 20' of trail. Dangerous? Yes. There are crevasses where you can fall 10' or more. But any fall in here is dangerous because there's no soft spots to land¢it's all big rocks. We had to scoot under some of them on hands and knees, pushing our backpacks ahead of us and trying not to think of any critters or snakes that might be there. Sometimes we had to stand on our packs to reach a handhold and pull ourselves up a rock and dragging our packs up behind us. I would not have wanted to do this alone. Cahoda took a scary fall, drew blood on her knee and banged her head on a rock. She's okay but will get a black eye for sure.Time became meaningless. The notch is only one mile long but we seemed to only inch forward as the day wore on. We stopped for second lunch. We stopped for our afternoon break. Again, discouragement started to set in as the shadows started to get long. We were still in the notch and starting to run low on water. We could hear water running underneath the rock jumble, but couldn't get to it. So when we rounded a corner and found ourselves in a small grassy area, we were delighted to find a small stream coming out. There's an established campsite at the north end of the notch so I went up the trail a bit to find it but instead only found another jumble of big boulders. We were still in the notch.I reported back to the ladies. It was going to be dark in another hour and there was no way we wanted to try to do this by headlamp. The grassy area was soggy¢no good for camping. I looked around and saw a small game trail leading behind some big boulders. I went back there and found a large enough flat area to set up our tents.We made camp and cooked dinner. We had been in Mahoosic Notch 6 hours. We were discouraged and exhausted for a second night in a row. Maine is kicking our butts.