Date: 2006-08-04
From: Full Goose Shelter

To: Gentian Pond Shelter
Miles today: 9.6
Weather: clear sky

Okay, two nights of sleeping in shelters with men who snore does not bode well for happy hiking. (And it seems that I have left my ear plugs in my town shorts that I bounced to Gorham. Erghhh!) Marta is feeling a head cold coming on, so we don't get on the trail until about 9:30. But, at least the sun is out!It is almost 10 miles to our next shelter which is supposed to be really nice with a fabulous view. But more importantly, it is only about 5 miles to our first state border crossing! Hooty Hoo! We are done with Maine! Marta and I, while hiking at different paces, would meet up with each other from time to time for snacks and for lunch. And of course, we met up with each other at the state line to toast the occasion with apricot brandy shots and photo ops. The terrain getting to the border was up and down over three peaks of Goose Mtn which had some interesting rock scrambles and bog log sections. I also passed a group of summer camp campers that were all in elementary school. I told them how impressed I was with them for being out here tackling these mountains. It's tough stuff and they were doing a fine job.After the state line, Marta took off. I stayed and had a snack and bid my farewell to the fine state of Maine in my own personal way. 281.4 miles completed. Wow!Well, the next 5 miles were really tough. For some reason my balance was all off today. I wasn't tripping or slipping and sliding, but I was teetotaling, falling in to trees and bushes randomly. It was odd. Actually, it probably isn't. There is probably a science to it all and if I had any energy left after hiking all day, I could probably run an experiment on what I am about to hypothsize about, but I'll leave that for the science students at my former schools. You see, I am carrying everything I have on my back. There is a base weight of some amount that includes things like my stove and sleeping bag, all the things whose weight does not change. In construction, we would call that the dead load (the steel and lumber, etc.) Then there is the weight that changes, like the weight of my food bag, water, and the weight of the gas in my fuel canister. This weight changes daily because I am consuming these things. In construction, this would be called the live load and would include things like snow or people. So every day my pack weighs a different amount and it also gets packed a little differently as the loads get smaller. Thus, my body and my equilibrium has to adjust to account for the change in the weight and distribution of the weight of my pack on my body. This is why I think some days I am more clumsy than others. But its just a hypothesis. I could just be a clutz. Afterall, when I was in high school, my orthopedist t! old me that I would always be a bit clumsy due to my "loosy goosy joints." Her medical terminology, not mine!Anyway, my knees and feet were really beginning to hurt, and Success Mtn had a lot of ups and steep slippery downs. I kept telling the mountain that the shelter "better be at the top of this hill, or else." Or else what? I'm just not gonna walk any more? Silly me. of course, I could hang my hammock, but I know that I am close to the shelter and it's on the AT, so I can walk to it tonight or in the morning. I keep walking hoping I make it before the sun totoally sets. I get to the shelter at 8:15 and learn that Marta had gotten there at 6:30. I am sooooo slow. Oh well. It's too late to cook and all I have left for dinners is bland instant potatoes. I make a peanut butter and nutella on english muffin sandwich for dinner (and one for lunch tomorrow) and eat the rest of my Cape Cod Sea Salt and Vinegar potato chips. (Even though at home, I have a major sweet tooth and hate salts, its totally reversed out here. I have consumed three bags or more of potato chips and only one Snickers bar!) I also head down to the pond and get water and clean up a bit. Then its time to read the shelter journal and go to bed. From rewady the journal entries, I can tell that the nobos consider the trail I am about to hike tomorrow some of the worst maintained. Great! But, I'll deal with that tomorrow. There is a nobo hiker in the second story of this shelter (my first two story shelter) and he says that once you get your hiking legs, completing the trail becomes a mental game.I ask him when you get the hiking legs as I feel like mine will never come. He tells me between 300-500 miles. Okay, I'm gonna hit 300 miles as soon as I leave Gorham. Perhaps I will get mine after the Whites?The nobos at the last shelter were right on the money about this shelter and I am so glad that I pressed on. The view is absolutely gorgeous. The almost full moon is rising above the mountains. The shelter, being two stories, gives the view a house-like shape frame. There is a waterfall below the pond and while you can't see it, it provides beautiful white noise. Can't wait to get to sleep and see what the view is like in the morning. But until then, I'll admire the fabulous stars that are beginning to shimmer now that the sun has set.