Trail Notes – September 5 (Monson, ME)

A body at rest will remain at rest, unless acted upon by an outside force.

This body is definitely at rest.

I woke at 5:30 am as usual, but let myself lie around until 6:30. I was not in a major hurry – I had already decided to get off trail at the nearer of the Monson trailheads, only 5.7 miles up, instead of the nearly 9 mile one further on. So I took it easy.

I am staying today and tomorrow at Shaw’s Hostel. Tenting, which is about 1/2 the cost of staying in the bunkrooms, but the ground is soft and grassy, free of rocks and roots, very comfortable. When my shuttle let me out, the first thing he asked was if I wanted a complimentary soda, or a complimentary beer. I picked the beer. 🙂 

There are about thirty other hikers here.I’ve talked about black holes? Monson is the true black hole. Every single northbound hiker stops here, and most of the southbound ones, too. It is a final “catching of the breath” spot before the plunge into the 100 mile wilderness. 

After eating lunch (including blueberry pie – how could I resist?), I walked over to the ATC office in Monson to register my planned date for summitting Katahdin. After giving it some thought, I have decided to try to make an average of 12 miles a day through the 100 MW, meaning 7-8 days. So I set the summit date to September 16, a week from Friday. That gives me a bit of leeway if I am slower than meant. The ATC employee was very knowledgeable, and answered a lot of questions I had. I left with better confidence in my ability to make it up.

I spent a lot of the afternoon just relaxing in the tent with the rainfly off. The mesh walls of the inner tent let in the breeze and kept out the bugs; I napped some and read some. And today is Labor Day, so the hostel owners celebrated in fine traditional fashion – $5 apiece for a barbecue with hot dogs, fresh corn on the cob, potato chips, watermelon, giant chocolate chip cookies, beer, the works! My stomach is very happy. 

From where my tent is, I can hear sounds of happy conversation from around the corner, and through the open window, Han just told Luke to blow up this thing so they can go home. I have a whole southern section to blow up before I can go home. 

I pause.