Mailing Address

We got a ride with the motel owner to the trail. He wanted to drop us at a trailhead a mile after the point we got off the trail. We convinced him to drop us at the trailhead where we left the trail. No skipping ahead for us. We told him we were going to Andover in just over 2 days. He said we would need at least that much time - that this was a very rugged section of the trail.

We had a beautiful hiking day today and saw our first moose of this hike at Dream Lake. We asked other hikers if they had seen it. After considering their answers, we think we missed a moose close to the trail an saw one on the other side of the lake.

We made several long climbs today. The last was over Mt Success. We wondered why a mountain was called Success. On the way down Mt Success the trail got steep and rocky. Several times we wondered if we had strayed off the trail. Finally we reached the NH/ME border.

Maine: 14th and last state! We left NH and entered ME late in the day and are spending our first cold night in ME.

We were. The Mahoosuc Notch didn't seem as hard as people made it sound, but it definitely was slow. We climbed over, under and around gigantic boulders. They had fallen from mountains on both sides of the notch. It took us 2 hours to negotiate the one mile stretch.

Next was the Mahoosuc Arm. the arm climbs steeply up the mountain for 1500 vertical feet. We felt lucky that the rocks were dry. The arm turned out to be the equivalent of a steep sidewalk formed from granite. We found we could quickly walk up the granite and made good time.

When we arrived at the shelter we were surprised by how close we were to East B Hill Road and Andover. We were tired and decided to call it a short day. There were 2 youth groups, a group from Colby College, a south bounder, 2 section hikers, and AWOL. Kate, an AMC caretaker whom we had met twice before, collected our fees.

We removed extra clothes as we warmed up and the day got warmer. I found my favorite place on the entire AT. The Bald Pates are granite domes that look like the Sierras above tree line. Plants are miniature and short trees twisted by wind. The trail was visible between the domes and we followed cairns on the rounded granite. All of this adds up to spectacular beauty and I was sorry to leave it.

Back in the trees we stopped at Baldpate Lean-to for afternoon snack with another group from Colby College.

Rain fell before we reached the road to Andover. It teased with a few false starts and then fell heavily. Marta and Bert were to meet us at the road and drive us to Andover in the morning but we decided to get out of the rain and go to Andover Guest House. Dinner was at Addie's.

We found the trail nicely graded and easy to hike until Hall Mtn Lean-to. Then as we started up Moody Mtn the trail turned very steep. The guide said we would climb 1200 feet in .8 mi. Ken's altimeter indicated that we were climbing 33 feet per minute. I could keep that up by putting my head down and working for 36 minutes. The trail got steeper and I was kicking steps into the damp dirt like I would for climbing in snow. The trail got steeper and we found vertical log ladders to ascend, then we graduated to heavy metal rods shaped into rungs and cemented into the rock face, and then finally stone steps. We rolled over the top and then went down 1000 feet almost as steeply, rock hopped a stream and were at the road. Temptation was too great as it was our 7 pm quitting time so we went back to Andover. We had carried our full packs all day so I cooked a trail dinner, then showered, and slept in a bed again tonight.

We hiked on to Sabbath Day Pond Shelter. We arrived at dusk to great sunset over the lake. As we arrived at the pond we found Bipolar & Timber sitting at picnic benches on beach watching the sunset and eating their supper. We hurried to the shelter and set up our tent on the tent platform beside a fire. It got dark before we finished eating.

We see many signs of moose. As we hike past the many ponds we try to walk quietly to see moose, but they are not cooperating.

Miles are not important as we wait for the PO to open Tuesday morning so we had a leisurely stroll on easy trail. We passed close to several beautiful ponds (actually lakes). AWOL, Timber, Bipolar and we seem to be on the same schedule so we see them at lunch stops or town. Nature Boy passed us south bound today and we last saw him 1800 miles ago in the Smokies. He had to get off the trail due to injury and then flipped to Mt Katahdin to begin hiking southbound. We hear from merchants that the number of hikers is lower this year. All of us are now counting miles to the end, 220.0 as of tonight. Many people are expressing their desire to get finished.