Friday, 9\/25<\/p>\n
AT Miles = 13.4 \/ 2173.1
\nOther Miles = 0 \/ 63.1
\nTotal Miles = 13.4 \/ 2236.2<\/p>\n
Miles to Katahdin = 5.2<\/p>\n
See that? Only 5.2 miles left. Who would have thought I would ever be
\nthis close?!<\/p>\n
From the moment I woke up this morning, I was in a giddy mood. It
\nrained overnight and was still raining a bit when I got up, but that
\ndidn’t dampen my spirits a bit. It usually takes a bit longer to break
\ncamp in the rain as I have to do everything underneath my little tarp,
\nbut somehow this morning it didn’t, and I was on the trail a few
\nminutes after 7:00. From the shelter the trail climbs a bit on the way
\nto meeting the Golden Road at Abol Bridge. After cresting the first
\nlittle rise I saw a bull moose in the trail ahead of me. He sauntered
\noff into the woods 30 or 40 feet, then stood and watched me for a bit
\nto make sure I wasn’t any kind of threat. I pulled my camera out to
\ntake a photo or two of him, and when I turned it on I was met with a
\n“Lens error!” message, and the lens refused to open. Damn! Well, I
\nfigured that was just due to the battery getting low, and figured once
\nI charged up the battery when in town, everything would be fine.<\/p>\n
I continued on, whistling and sauntering through the woods, until I
\ncame out on the Golden Road about 8:30. A few minutes walking brought
\nme across the bridge over the Penobscot River and to the small camp
\nstore there. I was still craving orange juice, and was disappointed to
\nfind they did not have any. The best I could do was a bottle of orange
\nflavored Gatorade, which I accompanied with a packaged danish. I
\nwatched a few logging trucks go barreling down the road while I stood
\noutside the store eating my snack. Boy, they stack ’em high!<\/p>\n
By 9:00 I had crossed the boundary into Baxter State Park and had
\nreached the kiosk where the daily weather reports are posted, and
\nwhere thru-hikers can sign in for a spot at The Birches, which is a
\nsmall camping area set aside for hikers only. When I got there a
\nranger was just finishing writing up today’s weather report, and I
\nspent a half hour standing there chatting with him. I also enjoyed a
\nfew minutes of minor celebrity when a group from a local school hiked
\npast and the ranger told them that I had hiked all the way from
\nGeorgia. That was kind of fun.<\/p>\n
I was getting chilled standing still, so I soon left and continued on.
\nThe trail follows the left bank of the Penobscot River upstream for a
\nnumber of miles before finally turning northeast to make its way to
\nDaicey Pond. On the way it crosses a couple of tributary streams, and
\nwhile crossing one of these my foot slipped off a wet rock and I got a
\nbootful of water. I hiked the last 4 or 5 miles with one wet, cold
\nfoot and one dry, warm foot.<\/p>\n
I reached the parking area at Katahdin Stream Campground a few minutes
\nbefore 1:00. I knew Jodi wouldn’t be getting there until about 2:00,
\nso I put on some warm clothes, changed my boots for my sandals, and
\nsettled down on a picnic table to wait. A couple of minutes later I
\nsaw Gator and Tiger walking towards me. What a great surprise! I had
\nbeen expecting to catch up with them ever since I saw them back in
\nAndover, but had finally figured it was not to be. It turns out they
\nwere only about 3 1\/2 miles ahead of me when I camped last night, as
\nthey stayed at the commercial campground at Abol Bridge. We had a
\ngreat visit while I was waiting for Jodi, and I told them we would
\nbring them some hot breakfast sandwiches from town tomorrow morning,
\nsince they will be camping in the Park tonight.<\/p>\n
Once Jodi showed up we were off to town for a hot lunch, a shower, and
\na nice meal out. It will be early to bed tonight so we can be up and in
\ntown at the diner when it opens at 5:00, then off to Baxter to climb
\nKatahdin!<\/p>\n
— Friday, 9\/25 AT Miles = 13.4 \/ 2173.1 Other Miles = 0 \/ 63.1 Total Miles = 13.4 \/ 2236.2 Miles to Katahdin = 5.2 See that? Only 5.2 miles left. Who would have thought I would ever be this close?! From the moment I woke up this morning, I was in a giddy mood. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-at_thru_hike"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/allenf.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/allenf.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/allenf.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/allenf.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/allenf.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=255"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/allenf.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":283,"href":"http:\/\/allenf.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255\/revisions\/283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/allenf.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/allenf.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/allenf.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n~~~~~
\nMonkeywrench
\nAllen F. Freeman
\nallen@allenf.com<\/a>
\nwww.allenf.com<\/a>
\nallenf.blogspot.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"