Maine with some Rain and Pain

I seem to recall the Vermont Mafia saying they heard the phrase “No Rain, No Pain no Maine” last summer. The trend continues.

Dan and I started out from Gorham after the amazing and wonderful hospitality of Cousin Russ and co. of Beef’s family to discover a cache of trail magic courtesy of Sunbeam (SOBO ‘08). I greatly appreciated the little debbies and Dr. Pop!

Since then, however, we’ve had lots of fog, two days of rain and lots of mud, as Dan has gained his trail legs, endured the Mahoosac notch and learned everything about backpacking from how to poop in the woods to how to purify water. He’s been a great sport as my mood has fluctuated, and deserves this amazing hostel in which we now find ourselves.

We’re in East Andover staying at Mr. Earle’s “The Cabin. We met Earle at South Arm road. He was actually waiting for some NOBO’s behind us and was very generous in offering his services. Dan and I were originally going to resupply (holy shmoly skinny boys eat a lot!) at a nearby campground, but after being sorely disappointed at the nearly empty shelves, we hitched back to Earle at the trail and took him up on his offers!

I am now extraordinarily happy we did: I am showered, my saturated shoes are sitting by a wood stove, my mildewy clothes are in the washer, we are minutes away from a delicious homecooked meal including hamburgers and amazingness, and we’re slackpacking to Rangeley tomorrow to make up for lost time. We will sleep indoors tonight on happy happy bunks, and have joined Jolly Rancher and Panama Red, two NOBOs I met at Galehead hut in the whites before I was crazy and did some serious mileage. Jolly Rancher wants to summit the 18th, and I hope to do so only a few days after, so I’m going to try to hike close to him for a while.

Dan earned a trail name! He is now “Pirouette 180″ or just 180 for short, because he has mastered the hiking ability to do a 180 degree turn on the trail to get down off of slippery rocks/mud in a most graceful manner.

After our slackpack tomorrow, Dan and I will part ways. It turns out that my miles are the miles of a fiendish finishing Thru-hiker and are a bit ambitious for a first-time backpacker. The specifics are vague as of yet, but after Rangeley, we will part ways: I to make it to Katahdin around the 23, and Dan to either continue hiking or go his own way. We shall see where our lives of adventure take us next!

Happy Fourth of July, my friends, and I love receiving your comments, even if it’s just to say hi!

-EKG

Through the Whites!

Hello all! It is waaay past hiker bedtime but I am obliged to write an update of my journey of the last 6 days. It has been a week of amazing beauty and carefree joy mixed with high anxiety and stress.

On Tuesday, I flew in to Manchester airport and was greeted by my good friend, Marie from Middlebury. She drove me the 90 miles north to Franconia notch and dropped me off, raring to go. THANK YOU, MARIE!!!! I hiked up 2 miles to Liberty Springs and stayed the night there in my new tent amidst the tree-rain and fog.

Next morning I was off over Mt. Lafayette (still foggy) and headed into Galehead hut by about 2pm. In my initial excitement, I burned up all my energy so I just stayed there that night and rested up chatting with the guests and hut staff. Next day was a different story, as I schemed a plan to hike 21 miles. (This would be a fairly normal day if I weren’t in the White Mountains — people talk about how you’re doing a good pace if you do a mile an hour here.) But the weather was sunny and beautiful, so it seemed things were going my way.

As I discovered later, during my hike I was so dead-set that I managed to zoom right past Beef’s Cousin Russ, who actually happened to be doing a day hike that very same day near Zealand Falls. I was the only person he didn’t talk to that day, just because he was talking to somebody else as I passed, and I was MOVING. Craziness! I hiked down and out of Crawford notch, and then up Mt. Webster and Mt. Jackson. I was panic-struck for the very exposed bit between the two mountains, because I started hearing thunder. I don’t know that I’ve ever climbed that fast in my life — seeing as I not only had metal tent poles in my pack, but was also carrying two very attractive-to-lightning hiking poles as I clambered up and down jagged rocks, adrenaline pumping in my ears. Finally back amid the cover of trees, I trudged into Mizpah hut, exhausted and ecstatic that they offered me an empty bunk room all to myself in exchange for some chores.

Friday was wonderful because the sun was shining and I headed up and over Mt. Washington! The second highest peak on the AT, Mt. Washington is renowned for having the worst weather in the world. As cross-training cross-country-skier teams passed me up and down, the breeze blew and the sun shone, I happily hiked to the 6000 some elevation feet to the top. There was a bit more of a thunderstorm scare as I ate lunch at the top, but I headed down without any trouble and made it safely to Madison Hut that night. I loved Madison most of all the huts, because not only did they have two Middkids working there, but we had strawberry-rhubarb crisp and my chore was cleaning and re-organizing their freezer! (This totally played to my EKG-tendencies and strengths

Saturday was crazy — not only because I mixed up Saturday and Sunday thinking I was supposed to meet Dan (when I wasn’t) — but because for the two hours I waited and freaked out at Franconia notch visitor center (which is really quite nice) it rained. Hard. With thunder and lightning. So I wasn’t exactly keen to hike up Wildcat — another notorious and very difficult climb. However, once I’d called mom from the pay phone (no cell service) and gotten myself straightened out, things were looking up. The sun was out and shining and there were still enough hours in the day to hike 5 crazy miles. So I did. I got soaked even so — since there were lots of puddles and tree-branches were heavy with raindrops reaching across the trail.

By the way — Wildcat? FREAKING HARD. The mafia are my heroes for doing that in the pouring rain last year. Holy shmoly. I was basically rock-climbing the whole way. On slick rock. With deadly drop-offs and all alone. Can’t say I cherish the thought of doing that again. I’m glad it’s behind me.

Carter Hut welcomed me with open arms and I slept a nice dry night with a full belly amid friendly SOBOs. Next morning was wet wet wet, foggy foggy foggy for the hike over Carter dome and down, out of the whites to Rt. 2 where I was hoping to meet Cousin Russ.

We met up finally and went to pick up Dan and all made it home safely to Tamworth, where I peeled out of my wet stuff, bathed in the joy of no longer having to hike alone and the new energy and enthusiasm Dan brought. I slept in THE most comfortable bed known to man in COTTON clothes and woke up late to a beautiful, fabulous zero day today.

Now, as I type, Dan is trained in the art of pack packing, we’re resupplied, laundered, showered, extremely well-fed and basking in the warmth and love of Beef’s Cousins Russ, Jim and Aunt Jude (and even Juliet!). Life is looking good as we head into Maine in the next couple of days. Wish us luck and pray for dry weather, the forecast is calling for more rain (mixed with showers for variety) and there are sadly no more huts to shelter us in the days ahead.

Lots of love to you all!

-ekg

A Long-Awaited Post Script

Training with ABQ friends in the Sandias (altitude training!)

Hello friends!  EKG here, blogging from Albuquerque, NM a week before my flight to New Hampshire. I will be utilizing our blog for this little post script of the Journey.

The down low: I joined the Mafia last year in August, at Franconia Notch in New Hampshire. I didn’t begin with them in June because I wanted to  finish up my volunteer year program in New Orleans.

So I hiked 1800 some odd miles in four months, finishing with the Vermont Mafia at Mt. Springer in Georgia on December 15th to all the glory, hiked-in family, photographs, friends and champagne.

. . . yet the moment was bittersweet . . .

I was not a true Thru-Hiker. I hadn’t truly finished the trail. I still had 375 miles left — the hardest part: Maine and New Hampshire. Not only are these states home to the 100 mile wilderness and the White Mountains, but you may recall that it rained for almost 40 days when the Vermont Mafia hiked these miles last Summer. The weather, to say the least, can be unpredictable (can we say Mt. Washington!!!?).

Yet true Thru-Hiker status beckons, and I don’t like to leave things unfinished.  Therefore, praying for dry(er) weather, and in the company of my plucky New Orleans community member, Mr. Dan T., I will FINISH THE TRAIL!!!

. . . and I had better do it on time, because I’ve got to get to a wedding on time in upstate New York! Else the music will be short my violin!

Wish us luck!

EKG

Presenting: AT SOBO ‘08 Song

At long last, I finally got on top of things and copied our beloved AT hiker song. It was collaboratively written. The tune is to that of “Poor Wayfaring Stranger.” We made up fun verses for most of the people we know (in fact, there may be some verses out there — FLAMEBO? — that I have forgotten, but it gets to be quite the litany, as I’m sure you can tell.) The animal references are from a game of “Essences” the Mafia played while hiking along somewhere in Vermont or New York, I believe.

Beef and I Jamming in PA

By the way, I (ekg) WILL in fact be finishing my remaining 370 miles this year! I will hike from Franconia Notch, NH to Katahdin, ME beginning June 24, 2009, which is only about 4 weeks away! Joining me will be Mr. Dan T, my beloved JVC Henriette Delille House roommate from New Orleans.

Here’s the song:

We are all Appalachian Hikers
We live our lives the way we want
We’re goin’ south from Maine to Georgia,
And all the way it’s bon vivant.

CHORUS

We’re goin’ south to hike Mt. Springer!
We’re goin’ there, no more to roam,
The trail is long,
But we’re determined
To make it there
And then go home.

Verses:

There’s the Beef
She’s like a zebra
She’s got the flair and appetite
She comes from all over New England
And her guitar is a delight.

CHORUS

Then there’s Default
She’s like a golden
She’s as loyal as can be
She comes from Houston in Southern Texas
From the mid-town community.

CHORUS

There’s EKG
From Albuquerque
She’s like an owl, or a mountain lion.
She’ll pack your food in pretty patterns
And she will hike Maine in the Spring of ‘09.

CHORUS

Then there’s Flamebo
She’s from Chicago
We’ve decided she’s a giraffe
She’s got the height and grace of that mammal
Just make sure you don’t get in her path!

CHORUS

There’s Cardshark
Like a coyote
Always cunning in his own way
He hikes so fast, he might miss Georgia
And end up in old Floriday

CHORUS

Then there’s D-Wreck
Who’s like the black bear
We crossed paths with along the trail
We like to call him the mayor of Manville
Cuz he’s the guru of all things male.

CHORUS

There’s also Mousetrap
Who, like the beaver
Likes to keep his body warm
But the beaver knows that panty-hose
Will not flatter his furry form

CHORUS

Now there’s Bookworm
Who’s from Ohio
Been friends with Mousetrap since they were wee
He likes to journal and gets the last laugh
Whether out-loud or silently

CHORUS

There’s Slot Machine
And Stretch
Who we started with way back in Maine
They hiked 3 1/2 marathons
Just to watch a football game

CHORUS

Then there’s Eilene
Who goes by Rumbles
Though that’s just one of her many names
Always friendly and quite social
But if you cross her, she won’t play games.

CHORUS

There’s also Bearwalker
Also a truck-driver
Grew up in Cali, lives in PA
Art is his passion, so when he’s finished
He’ll paint the AT all in landscapes

CHORUS

Repeat first verse.

Our Hike By The Numbers

We have been encouraged by others to give a by-the-numbers account of our hike, so without further ado, here it is!

2,176.2 miles

14 states

168 days/5.5 months

35 days of rain in the first 42 days

3 major blizzards (in TN, NC & GA)

43.5 miles & 4 states in longest day

20,000,000 steps (exactly!)

17 pairs of shoes/boots

9 packs

7 sleeping bags

4 pairs down booties

1 backpacker guitar

2 harmonicas

1 recorder

1 shaky egg

2 cameras

2 stoves

1 roll of TP at a time

1 cheap LOVE necklace from Walmart

446 frogs

129 red eft newts

5 black bears

4 moose

2 box turtles

20 snakes

1 porcupine

2 pileated woodpeckers

lots! of deer, mosquitoes, black flies, slugs…

1 loon swooped on by 1 bald eagle

1 evil squirrel and 2 evil mice who chewed our stuff

1300 french fries consumed in one sitting! (that’s 9800 calories and 530 grams of fat)

9 items each off McDonald’s dollar menu in one sitting

1/2 gallon of ice cream each in one sitting

300 snickers bars

100 lbs of GORP (trail mix)

2 grocery carts of food in every town

3 blueberry pies from Beef’s cousins

4 food flops: “Think Thin” bars, mysterious rotten vegetable from CO, habanero cheddar cheese, pickled sausages

2 bee stings (1 near-deadly)

1 bad ankle sprain

3 vomiting incidents

2 frostbitten toes

4 different personality types on the Enneagram

6 books/stories read aloud

1 song composed for the trail (lyrics coming soon)

1 celtic festival attended

1 movie theater visit (Mamma Mia! in Hanover)

20 songs on the VT Mafia Greatest Hits list

16 movies on our post-trail film festival list

59.32 dollars in Flamebo’s combined bank accounts after final reckoning

11 lbs net weight gain

125+ trail angels & mafia connections

12 days apart before our first reunion!

New Trail Angels Page

Check out the new Trail Angels tab to see what is probably an incomplete list of all those who provided us magic along the way.  We love you all and can’t thank you enough!

We did it!!

SOBOs on Springer: (top) Bookworm, One Gallon, Default, Beef, D-wreck, EKG, Flamebo; (bottom) Mountain Goat, Timber, Bearwalker [photo courtesy of Bookworm]

In case you hadn’t heard, the Vermont Mafia reached the summit of Springer Mountain in Georgia on Monday, December 15th, completing their southbound thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail. That means we walked 2,176 miles over a period of five and a half months. And what an adventure it was…

I will apologize on behalf of all of us for being the worst team of bloggers ever – we have so many things to say that the task of a thorough update was often too daunting for our limited computer time. We do want to share our stories, though, and hopefully this blog will continue to fill with all the tales that never made it to print the first time around.

For now, you’ll have to be content to know that our journey has ended happily, and thanks to all those who contributed to the amazing mountaintop festivities on Springer! Once again, the magic of trail angels has been at the heart of what makes the AT experience all that it is. I’m still in shock that it’s over, but I feel SO blessed to have taken this little walk.

PHOTO UPDATE: Check our usual photo page for a few more Virginia Part 2 pictures and maybe additional captions if I ever get around to it. We ran out of space there, though, so the final album is here: http://picasaweb.google.com/devon.parish/ATThruHikeTNNCGA. Check it out!

Let it Snow, Let it Snow??!

Hey friends,

It’s Default here checking in from our trail friend Doc’s house in Lenoir, NC.   That’s right, we’re in North Carolina now!!   It’s pretty exciting.   We now swing back and forth between Tennessee and North Carolina on a minute-by-minute basis, with one foot literally in each state.

The big news around here is (well, you guessed it):  SNOW.   Lots of it.   On the mountaintops there is at least a foot, and we have encountered thigh-to-waist high drifts.   It’s pretty crazy!   We have heard that it has not snowed this much here at this time of year in several decades.  It has also regularly been in the 0 to 10 degree range at night, and not above 30 during the day.  We have decided that 2008 is trying to become a year for the record books in terms of weather on the AT.

We had a scary day yesterday after a night spent in the shelter on top on Roan Mountain.   It’s over 6000 feet up there and it snowed all night, both outside and inside the shelter.    We were our own human snow machines, with the warmth and moisture from our breath going up to the tin roof, freezing, and snowing back down upon us.   We headed out into a near blizzard in our frozen shoes and didn’t make it more than 3 miles before we reached a road and realized we needed to get off the trail.   It was no longer safe for us to hike, especially since several of us were having some serious issues with freezing toes.

We got rescued by a family of complete strangers a few miles down the mountain road, people who we now consider great friends and the world’s best trail angels.   I’ll let one of my compadres tell yuns (that’s what they say down here) about them, but to sum it up, they saved our lives, and our toes!

Today we hiked a half day and then got picked up by Doc and headed to Boone to buy lots of waterproof shoes and new socks and gaiters.  Our toes are very thankful.

We’ve gotten a bit off schedule with the weather, but we’ll make the time up and should be in Hot Springs, North Carolina for a little Thanksgiving fiesta on Thursday.   Join us in praying for a heat wave- we are expecting more snow on Monday and Tuesday.

much love, and warm feet,

Default

holla from the hollows

Okay, so I was elected to write something “eloquent,” but instead I’m staring like a zombie at the computer screen.  It’s WAY past my bedtime.  Here’s the deal, no eloquence:

-Calendar and photos have been updated!  If you are planning on sending a package, keep checking the calendar as we adjust our town dates.  Our finish date is now officially fixed as December 15th!

-Today we finished Virginia.  We have less than 500 miles left!

-Default’s parents came and rescued us from the trail.  We are staying at a gorgeous cabin on a lake in Tennessee, eating amazing food, slack-packing, and chilling in the hot tub.  Needless to say, life is good, and we feel very, very loved.

-The end is in sight! And so is the end of my consciousness…

Headin’ down south to Roanoke

Hello faithful blog readers!  This is Beef, reporting from Roanoke, VA- somewhere between 2/3 and 3/4 of the way. The Vermont Mafia is alive and well, currently asleep after eating copious amounts of amazing food at The Homeplace- the best restaurant on the AT.  We were met yesterday by Cousin Jim (another one of my NH cousins) at McAfee Knob, the incredibly photogenic ledge just north of Roanoke.  We enjoyed blueberry muffins and blueberry pie which he had baked, driven from NH and then hiked in.  Yes, some people love us that much.  He took us home to of one of his lifelong friends who happens to live just 15 miles from the trail.  The house is completely gorgeous and luxurious, complete with heated toilet seats!!  We even got to go through the haunted house in their garage that their son puts together.  Good thing we were holding hands.  We will use this as a slack-packing base for the next few days.  Ah the glories of being in the mafia…

So, that is where we are currently.  Now to sum up the last 500 miles…

The Shenendoahs were completely beautiful, just as everyone said they would be.  For us, they were also very social; it seemed we had visitors meeting us every other time we crossed Skyline drive.  Default’s brother, Musicman (SOBO ‘07) joined us at Harper’s Ferry and we enjoyed his musical stylings and good company.  He taught us the SOBO ‘07 theme-song “Wagon Wheel” from which the title of this post is taken.  Boo Boo, another ‘07, had organized an ‘07 SOBO reunion which we also got to be a part of- including s’mores, hot dogs roasted over an open fire and other wonders.  Boo Boo also met us on two other occasions to provide awesome trail magic.  During this stretch we felt like we were hiking in a pack of SOBOs.  There were eight of us (VT Mafia, D-Wreck, Cardshark, Honey and Duster) at the same shelter one night.  I think that is the most we’ve seen together since Maine.

After bidding farewell to the ’07 crowd we were joined by our Texan friends, Sam and Liv, Default’s housemates, who took us to visit delightful friends, Ryan and Janie, living in Harrisonburg, VA.  They were smart enough to take us directly to all-you-can-eat Ethiopian food.  WOW!  We loved hearing about Ryan’s graduate work in conflict reconciliation and visited their very awesome Mennonite church on the Eastern Mennonite University campus.  It was an especially well-timed break for me, as I was about half covered in poison ivy at this point.  Never have I appreciated a shower more!

We hit the trail as a group of six, joined by Liv and Anne.  Anne is Default’s friend who had a week off during her third year at medical school in Kansas.  It honestly felt like a party, hiking in a relatively big group through such a beautiful park with generally easy and very rewarding trails.  Having friends along was even more fun that I expected.  They were totally able to keep up with us and were full of that initial excitement, which kept our spirits high.  It was also fun to share our trail knowledge and culture with them.

We bid farewell to the Texans, Boo Boo and Shenendoah National Park at a totally awesome restaurant called The Purple Foot in Waynesboro, VA.  Anne kept on trekking with us and put in some long, tough days over The Priest, including a 22-mile day.  We were very impressed!  They didn’t nickname her “hoss” at Philmont for nothing.

Our next stop was Buena Vista, which for all its other charms, will forever be remembered as the place where we ate 1300 french fries.  If you are curious, that is 16 biggie fries at Burger King, which created something of a stir in this small town and even attracted an unsolicited donation to our cause!  I admit the idea was mine, building off our tradition of marking each 100-mile increment with a picture and our tendency to constantly think and talk about food.  The 1300 fries were not all that difficult to consume between six people (VT Mafia plus Anne and D-Wreck) although there is some debate over whether this challenge was more or less difficult than the half-gallon of ice cream.  I certainly preferred the fries myself.

Leaving Buena Vista and Anne, we headed into a surprisingly difficult and cold section of trail.  We found ourselves exhuasted after just 18-mile days and the freezing winds and snow didn’t help.  We had our first “breakfast in bed”, meaning cooking and eating breakfast while still in our sleeping bags.  This weather has been unseasonably cold, but it has provided us with a preview of what we should expect later on down the trail and spurred those of us without winter bags to get those sent. 

D-Wreck, aka the Mayor of Manville, once again fell into step with the Mafia and we have begun a new read-aloud book together, Twilight.  It is a true gem of literature, well, at least of the teenage vampire romance genre.  We are all, embarrassingly enough, hooked on it.  What can I say?  We were also excited to meet and briefly hike with Foxtrot, an accomplished hiker, or as he calls himself “complete hiker trash”  who has thru-hiked the AT twice as well as the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT), the Continental Divide Trail (CDT) and spent the last eight summers in the Brooks Range in Alaska.  His fond descriptions of the PCT encouraged some of us to add it to our “to-do lists”.  D-Wreck has certainly got PCT fever and is already thinking seriously about an ‘09 hike.  I am also very intrigued, but think I might have to take a year off or so before doing it.  We’ll see.

We stopped in for a quick resupply and overnight in Daleville, VA.  We got our fill our political analysis and all-you-can-eat breakfast and stayed up late to watch Obama on the Jon Stewart show and then talk politics (again!).  We spent the next night in a mice-infested shelter.  It was the first time I actually saw a mouse in a shelter, although we’ve seen evidence of them earlier.  Luckily the handy mouse-deflecting hanging devices (string with an upside-down can rigged up), which are common to all shelters, work remarkably well at protecting food from hungry rodents. 

Well, Cousin Jim is now awake here and starting to whip up some blueberry pancakes and sausage.  He bought us twelve quarts of frozen berries along with the various baked goods, so we will be rich in anti-oxidants by the time we leave here.  Mmmmm.  Much love!