Date: 2005-08-23
From: Harrison's Pierce Pond Camps

To: Bald Mountain Brook Lean-to
Miles today: 18.3

9:30 a.m.I just crossed the Kinnebeck River on the ferry. A guy named Eric took me across.I walked this morning from Harrison Camps to here. In my book it rates one of the prettiest darn walks I have ever done. Just that section. Walking along all the cascades and falls and running water of the Pond stream with some really magnificent woods. An easy walk. Of course, it helped out a lot that the sun was also magnificent.I had a real good sleep last night and the breakfast this morning that Tim made me certainly made it worth while to stay there. A huge stack of 12 pancakes filled with blueberries, raspberries, all kinds of fruit. Really moist, served with 8 ounces of real maple syrup and I poured the entire amount on there. I had a couple of eggs, three sausage links, and a cup of coffee. True to his word, he served it at exactly 7:30 sharp and by 8:00 I was on the Trail.I didn¢t know what to do with myself for a while, getting in early yesterday. I managed to do okay. I pulled out an Ellory Queen magazine. Read a few stories in there.151 miles left to go and I¢m walking at least 15 more off of that today.The countdown continues. From here, I have 136 12 miles to go. I¢m in the shelter alone so far. I think I¢m probably going to be alone. I¢ve been reading the shelter register and it seems like this is not a popular shelter to go to, which is mainly surrounded by beautiful cascades, waterfalls. And it is right close to the Trail. I¢m just thinking that it¢s dead between two towns and people don¢t generally make it out this far. Anyway, also in the shelter register, as I was reading in here, is a couple of entries about a pack of wolves bothering people in the shelter in the middle of the night. It could end up being an interesting night. I don¢t know what to make of that but we¢ll see what happens when it gets here.Just before I got here, there was a beaver pond all dammed up. I was walking pretty rapidly with my headphones on, so I didn¢t hear anything. As I turned the corner, there were two huge moose in the middle of the beaver pond. One of them that saw me immediately got spooked and took off. The other one, whose butt was to me and didn¢t see me, because I immediately froze and stood still when I saw them, didn¢t know what to make of his buddy taking off. So he just kind of hung out there, looking around for a while, decided to try and take off, and then he stopped and then drank some more. He finally took off. Big guys, man. Moose are big, big animals.I¢ve been leaving out a lot of details today.Boots and Blue Light were in Stratton the day that I left. So it¢s good to see they¢re still on the trail. The Kennebec River is about 70 yards wide. When I got there, the water was especially low. Eric, the guy who was doing the ferrying this morning, had quite a bit of trouble trying to beach the canoe on the rocks and then get back off again when I was in it. However, as we went across the river, it is clear to see that it is at least 6 feet deep. From all the literature, and from what Eric was telling me, and everything that people have told me, is because there¢s a hydroelectric plant upstream that opens it¢s gates and releases water when it needs more electricity, that the water can rise extremely rapidly. Like feet within minutes and achieve speeds up to 18 knots. They repeatedly warn you to not to try to ford this river. People have died trying. And that the official Trail is to be on the ferry, not to walk across it.I¢ve been pretty lucky so far with rivers. I have not had to ford a river yet, although there are 3 or 4 that I have crossed, rock hopped, that you normally would have to ford but the water's been low. Specifically the Carrabassett River, which I managed to rock hop the other day coming down off of the Bigelows. The following day after that, it rained like hell and hikers going over it were met by a raging torrent of water shooting down the mountain. Susan told me that she had gone down to check it out and ended up having to pull a rope out of the car to lend to some hikers who was trying to cross for a rope assist because it was so wicked. So far, my feet have not gotten wet. I came awful close today but I managed to do it okay. Also the last two days, the trail have been ridulously easy. I, once again, brushed off the temptation to run another six or seven miles or whatever it is to the next shelter, the Moxie Bald Lean-to. I had already done 18.3 when I got in here at 3:15, and I didn¢t start til 8:00 this morning. I would say this Trail is the easiest since southern Pennsylvania, although there¢s plenty of rocks and roots still. It¢s all relative.That¢s it for now.