Author Archives: atsioneva

As you can tell from the title – today was an unusual day. No mountains! Four ponds, but zero mountains! My mind was free to wander in a way it has not in a long time, and wander it did… It came back with this:

On a dark Maine byway, cool wind in my hair
Dusty smell of old pine rising up through the air
Up ahead in the distance I saw a blueblazed sight
My pack grew heavy and the light grew dim
I had to stop for the night

There the shelter had no doorway, the water was from a well
Then I was thinking to myself this could be Heaven or this could be Hell

Then I lit up the headlamp and it showed me the way
There were loons down by the pond I thought I heard them say

“Welcome to the Trail Appalachia
Such a lovely place
(Such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face
Plenty of miles on the Trail Appalachia
Any time of year
(Any time of year)
You can find it here”

The trail is definitely twisted, it got the shapely wimmins
It got a lot of hairy, bearded boys that could be friends
How they hike in the mountains, sweet summer sweat
Some hike to remember, some hike to forget

So I called up the hostel, “Please save me a bunk”
He said, “We have space for you, but you can’t get drunk.”

And still those loons are calling from far away
They woke me up in the middle of the night just to hear them say

“Welcome to the Trail Appalachia
Such a lovely place
(Such a lovely place)
Such a lovely face
They’re living it up at the Trail Appalachia
What a nice surprise
(What a nice surprise)
Bring your alibis”

Spiders on the ceiling, the peppermint schnapps is nice
And she thought, “We are all just trekkers here of our own device”
And in the town restaurants, they gathered for the feast
They slice it with their steely knives, but the hunger just can’t be ceased.

Last thing I remember I was altered to the core
I had to find a way back to the person I was before
“Relax,” said my inner voice, “and this you must believe,
You can quit any time you like but your heart will never leave.”

I hike on!

So many options for where to camp tonight. Shelter 8.2 miles, campground 12.something, Rangeley 17.something, or stealth camping along the way. I am in the shelter now, but there was good reason for it!

I wanted to get to Rangeley on Friday, so I had two days to split 17 miles. I was going to do more than 8 today, but you see, .3 miles from this shelter is Long Pond – I’d actually classify it as a small lake. It had cool water, a sandy beach, and tiny waves. Not warm and stagnant like a pond. I dumped my gear at the shelter, changed into my lightest-weight clothing, and walked back to play in the water. Perfection!

Sadly, though I stood there in the water, holding aloft a hiking pole, no one came by to claim it from my hands and thus assert their right to the kingdom of Hikealot. Unless you count the lonely loon that kept calling. Eventually, my arm got tired, and clouds started rolling in, so I called it a day and took myself back to the shelter, hiking poles and all. So much for being Lady of the Lake!

Okay, I have to add a corollary to Ziptie’s Rule of Summoning… When you are changing your clothes out in the open after 3 hours of not seeing anyone, someone will be by within 30 seconds of finishing. I will not do that again! Close call. 

Tomorrow, as I said, Rangeley, where an actual grocery store may be found! Since I calculated my food down to where I have exactly one Knorr pasta dish, one serving of oatmeal, and just enough snacks for tomorrow, resupply is essential. Plus I need to hit the outfitters. But it will not even be a nearo. 9 miles tomorrow, stay overnight, hit the trail again early in the morning.  

Maine’s getting easier. Kinda. A little. For a few days anyway. Those spaghetti roots all over the trail though… Today was a lot of rock whalebacks, kinda sidewalky, easy to walk on. I did like that. 

I hike on!

Escape! I escaped! Andover is disappearing into the rearview mirror!

I will say this about Maine – it is very consistent! The trail, when not climbing mountains like Speck, is invariably some permutation of four traits: wet, muddy, rocky, and rooty. With an emphasis on the last two – think of tangles of roots across the path, studded liberally with rocks, and often with the water and thick or liquid mud to make it even more interesting.

Today was like that. The first part, though, was a nice walk in the woods, until the path up to Old Blue Mt. decided to get serious about the whole gaining altitude thing. Even so, it was nothing compared to previous mountains. Maine is getting a bit easier – for now anyway. The climb up was not bad, and the climb down merely tedious, trying to avoid the rocks, roots, water and mud (RRWM).

Bemis Mt. essentially was just a little bump on the map; all the elevation gain was going from South Arm Rd. to the top of Old Blue – after that, it stayed pretty level. A lot more RRWM.

Because I did not start hiking until 10 am (should have taken an earlier shuttle), I ran out of time to do the 12 miles I was planning; I ended the day at Bemis Shelter, 9.something miles in. But all is good, because I ran into some hikers I knew, staying at this shelter, too… And they have a huge bottle of Canadian Must they wanted to “lighten”. I was very happy to help them lighten their load! And gave them some chocolate in exchange.

I arrived in good time to set up my tent, and cook dinner in the shelter before it got too dark – chatted with hikers Spongebob and… can’t remember the other man’s trail name, but nice guy. 🙂 All the frustration the tedious trail caused today flaked off pretty quickly – it is good to relax in my tent. It is good to be back on trail again. I do not intend to take another zero again for a good while. 

Rangeley on Friday – I will resupply just enough to get to Stratton, and may not even stay at a hostel. Just go into town to hit the IGA and an outfitter (socks!), then back out the same day, there is a shelter two miles north on the trail. We will see. 

I hike on!

Before I plunge into the tale of today, I just want to clarify the previous post – I wasn’t asking or expecting people to send money. 😦 It was an ill-considered thought to even include it as an option.

As you can tell from the title, I have not yet escaped Andover. Like Rutland, VT, this town has a certain blackholish quality that has me in an orbit that I am struggling to escape. Tisn’t easy!

I caught the 7 am shuttle out to the trailhead; well and good. As the shuttle van disappeared down the highway, I noticed that my Camelbak was swinging emptily as I slung the pack on. “Curses”, thought I, “I forgot to refill my water at the hostel.” So I reached for my large, secondary water bottle to refill the primary.

It was not there. It was happily sitting on the porch at the hostel where I had left it in anticipation of refilling it with good, purified water from the faucet. This was a serious problem; without adequate water storage, hiking is a very bad idea. You have to be able to carry sufficient water. In this case, the next source of water was over 4 miles away, over a major mountain.

So, I sighed, and settled down to wait… I had taken the 8 am shuttle, and I knew there was another one coming out to the trailhead at 9. I took that one back to the hostel to be reunited with my water bottle. I was happy to see it, even though it just had a plastic look to give me.

The next shuttle out was at noon. I could take that one, and at least get some miles in today. In the meanterim though, I was hungry, and went over at 10:30 for some delicious eggs Benedict.

Somehow, somewhere, thanks to an insidious nudge from NevaP, I suspect, sometime during that brunchy meal, thru-hiker Ziptie morphed back into geocacher Sioneva, and noon came and went sometime during the time I was out hunting down a geocache in Andover, Maine, a state not yet colored in in the map of states I have cached in. This has now been remedied. Maine is now red, and I may re-don the thru-hiker cap (literally speaking!) and continue on my way tomorrow. Assuming I have all my waterbottles, all my marbles, and can reach escape velocity. I still intend to reach Rangeley early Friday – I will just have to hike longer days tomorrow and Thursday.

I really was not hinting that people should send me money. Forgive me.

I hike on!

Someone who’s opinion matters has been suggesting I call it a hike after Katahdin. I’m not on board with that, but it kicked some gears loose, and so I am putting out an opinion poll.

If you were me, would you:

1. Hike until Katahdin and call it a hike?
2. Finish Maine, go back to Harper’s Ferry and hike until the money in the trip account runs out?
3. Same as #2, except tap into savings when the money runs out, and keep going?
4. Same as #2, except beg everyone shamelessly for money, aka a gohikeme appeal?
5. Hike until October 31 and call it a hike, wherever I am?
6. Other – fill in the blank.

Please respond with a number and any reasoning you want to add! Eagerly awaiting results. 🙂

Thank you! I hike on!

Twas a dark and rainy night. And rainy. And rainy. Somehow, the rain cover wasn’t quite right on my tent, and the foot part of my sleeping bag got wet – luckily I am small enough to scrunch up so it didn’t bother me much. But the rain drumming incessantly on the tent did. It drowned out my pleasantly bubbling brook, which turned into ye old ragin’ river by daybreak, but did not flood the tent as I was half afraid it would. A restless night!

The day was full of mental “I don’t want to do x”, followed by “you’ll do x anyway”. The first x was getting up. Didn’t want to. Stalled. Finally had to take care of business, so I got up and stuffed up a wet tent, wet sleeping bag, and picked up wet poles, after a quick breakfast of two Clif bars. So much for a huge breakfast! (The second x was “I don’t want to hike”.)

All the same, the first part of the day was a pleasant walk in the woods at a slight uphill angle, very enjoyable. I reached Surplus Pond, 1.9 miles in, in decent time; my energy level finally kicked in at that point, I think. 

The amount of water dropped last night was quite impressive, and very annoying. Climbing Mt. Wyman was an exercise in patience and wet boots. The trail was all mud, or streams flowing over and along the path, or both. A lot of slipping and sliding. Some very colorful language when a boot unexpectedly slipped into the mud. It slowed me down, but I was at Hall Mountain Shelter, 6 point something miles in, by 1 pm.

There I took a good sized break, because the remaining miles contained Moody Mountain; not high on the scale of difficulty compared to the other mountains I have recently climbed, but it would not be a cakewalk either. It was a mixture of rock scrambles, rock steps, some muddy/watery trail, and the truly annoying trait of being seemingly topless. Eventually summited though, and started down. 

I am at a hostel in Andover tonight – not the same one, because that would feel like going backwards. I decided to hostel up so that my boots, tent, and sleeping bag could dry; because I was seriously craving a cheeseburger; because the nearest shelter was another six miles on; and because I wanted clean socks. Tomorrow will not be a zero, and today was not a nearo, since I covered 10 miles today as planned. 

Tomorrow, the terrain looks much easier on the map, and I plan to – hope to – cover more miles than 10! I need to start increasing my mileage again now that I am nearly through the tough area of southern Maine.

Oh! Almost forgot! I forded my first stream today! The rains raised the water level at Black Brook high enough that a lot of the usual rockhopping stones were underwater, so I ended up wading across. That water was /cold/. 

The wind was blowing like crazy today as well, but did not threaten my cap this time.

I hike on!

So, here’s the situation. I had a cow today. Actually, I had two. 

They were very tasty. 

Breakfast definitely had a touch of the whimsical about it – the waffle iron turned out waffles in the shapes of barns, farmhouses, piggies, and cows. With blueberry sauce… irresistible! Plus there were homefries with onion, biscuits, bananas and cantaloupe, bacon that sadly was too crispy for my taste, and assorted other tasty things that added up to a stomach nearly too food-heavy to consider hiking. 

Nearly. But hike I did, and no slacking. I didn’t make the twelve miles I wanted, but I did get in over ten, so I will settle for that. At least I broke double digits. 

The climb out of Grafton Notch was surprisingly easy, good trail, if a bit overgrown; I was at the Baldpate Shelter about 2.3 miles in before I knew it. I took a break there, because immediately after, the trail starts a steep ascent to the west Baldpate peak.

This one surprised me – no, or very few, rock scrambles. The trail maintainers had gone to considerable trouble to put in rock steps almost all the way, and believe me, it was very much appreciated! This peak was not a difficult one to climb, and Ziptie was relieved. 

Once at the top, you can look across at the east peak, and easily pick out the bare granite domes you will be climbing next. I could even see the white blazes! In between the two peaks lay the usual boggy area, bridged with wooden boards. 

The east peak was all grippy granite, with good traction – thank goodness for that, because there were no trees or roots to hang onto most of the time. In fact, sometimes I could just walk up it like a sidewalk. But not very often, because the wind was blowing like crazy up there, and staying upright was chancy. It nearly blew my cap off twice, and I took it off just in case… then my hair was whipping around everywhere. Couldn’t win! For all of that, this wasn’t nearly as bad or terrifying as Speck was, or as I had expected, so that was good. Getting up and down the peaks took longer than expected, of course. Always does.

I reached the next shelter, Frye Brook, about 3:45, watered up and snacked, but had no plans to stay. Only 6 miles in and way too early to stop. Thanks to the Wannabes!, and the power of the Guthook app, I knew there were stealth camping spots both by the Andover road 4 miles further on, and by Surplus Pond, 6 miles further on. So I furthered on. 

Somehow, I wasn’t anticipating a mini-mountain in between – more steps! It slowed me down again, though most of the remaining 4 miles was a pleasant walk in the woods near the golden hour. I hit the Andover road at 6:15 or so,  and found an adequate, if somewhat uneven, camping spot right by the brook. The water is bubbling cheerfully about twenty feet away, very soothing and peaceful. I was seriously considering going back to one of the Andover hostels, because there’s a possibility of heavy rain tonight, but I will take my chances – I did not want to spend more money.

Dinner tonight was quick and hurried – a leftover biscuit and waffle, some cheese, some pepperoni. I was losing daylight. I will compensate with a large breakfast tomorrow before I move on. My food bag is hanging about 200 feet uptrail, well away from the tent; who knows what animals use the brook as their water source as well?

I am glad I didn’t slackpack today, even if there is an immovable rock under the small of my back. The ever versatile fleece jacket is serving as a pillow tonight.

I hike on!

Zerozerozerozero

Yes, I know, I took a shelter zero only a few days ago, but that was on account of weather. This one was on account of having had little sleep last night – my foot just would not stop cramping, no matter what I did – rub it, walk around (at 2 am), whatever, it kept me up most of the night. When I nearly fell asleep in the maple syrup at breakfast, even after 3 cups of coffee, I knew that taking a zero was probably a good idea.

I read some today, resupplied, watched Apollo 13 – sorry to report that the spacecraft did indeed hit the iceberg again, but everyone survived, even the shark. Rested up.

I was considering – still am considering – slackpacking tomorrow, but it would be more expensive than I expected, with cost of shuttle, food, night stay, etc, so I very well may not. I have packed up my backpack again, just in case. I think, with the resupply, I have enough food to last until Rangeley, 60 miles north.

I will probably make the final decision on the morning. I’m told I shouldn’t fret too much about Baldpate Mountain, that I’ve been over worse. I hope they are right! I will tackle it tomorrow, in predicted good weather; Monday it is supposed to rain, but not tomorrow. And once I get past Andover, the trail gets easier, if not easy.

We will see.

I hike on!

It was a day of serious contrasts. It was…

Speck Pond is beautiful. I made a point of seeing it again before heading out. Very peaceful and refreshing. I was aiming for Frye Notch Shelter, 10 miles further on.

I never made it.

The first thing I noticed was just how tired my legs were. The second thing I noticed was just how steep Speck Mountain was. Neither condition changed, except to get worse… 

I have climbed many mountains along the way, and I am not exaggerating when I say that Speck was the most terrifying. I was not at all prepared for it. This was not hiking, this was freehand rock climbing, almost straight up, clinging to cracks in the rock, trees, roots, pine branches, anything within reach, literally crying in fear, begging God to not let me die. There was nothing below me that could remotely stop my fall if I slipped, except the ground far below, and I was utterly terrified. Once I gained the top, I had to sit for about 30 minutes until I stopped shaking. It was like that. This was far worse than the Mahoosuc Arm, which was long and annoying, but not all that technically difficult.

Sitting up on top, I knew I needed to make a short day of it. I’d done a lot of climbing and scrambling the past few days, and it was telling. Plus, I am running low on food and need to resupply. I had cell service on top of the mountain, and contacted the hostel I was planning to stay at tomorrow; they had space available, and could pick me up at Grafton Notch, about 4 miles down. So that was settled.

In contrast to the ascent, the descent down Speck evoked a fairyland – all golden sunlight and green moss, with tall, spindly pines. I got some good pictures. The trail was still rocky, but on a scale of ‘there are large rocks in the path’, not ‘the path is one large rock’. All the same, my legs refused to go fast at all, and it took literally hours to reach the Eyebrow Trail, 2.3 miles down, and make the cell call to the hostel for the shuttle to come as arranged. At one point, I lay down on a horizontal slab of stone, ate a snack, then pulled my rain jacket over my face to keep the flies off and relaxed. I think I even dozed off. It did wonders for my energy level though.

A lot of rock steps later, and the trail paralleled a stream with waterfalls for a while, I reached the road at Grafton Notch – ME 26, I think. My ride was waiting, and I was off to the Cabin – a wonderful hostel run by hikers Bear and Honey.

As my luck turned, they are also hosting famous AT legend Warren Doyle and his Expedition group – he holds the record for most thru-hikes of the AT. 13, I think. With a celebrity such as this at the table… Tonight was steak and lobster night! 

Now, I am not fond of lobster (bad experience from early adulthood), but I had been daydreaming just this morning about the steak my sister-in-law had served me. STEAK. I ate two, plus potato salad, corn on the cob, hot rolls, salad… And peanut butter cup ice cream over a hot brownie for dessert. Indeed, I picked a perfect night for a nearo!

McGyver/Scott was also here – he was the one who hiked with me in the rain and wind over Goose Eye Mt., and I was glad to see him again. Technically, he is two days ahead of me, but there are three possible connection points to Andover. He is at the one farthest north, I am at the one farthest south.

So tomorrow, after breakfast, which I eagerly anticipate, I will slackpack from the Andover connection furthest south to the one on the middle, a 10 mile chunk of trail, then return to the hostel. I will possibly repeat this between the middle and farthest north for another 10 mile stretch, but I am not sure. Tomorrow I want to, because I will be climbing the east and west peaks of Baldpate Mt., which will be another tough mountain, and I want minimal weight when I do. 

Seldom has a shower been so welcome. Aside from the utter drenching three days ago, who c h was bad enough (my socks NEVER dried), all the scrambling around Mahoosuc Notch, the Arm, and Speck ground dirt into my hands and under my fingernails. And as for the rest of me… I kept thinking back to the Star Trek episode where some red shirt dies because he got bruised or something. If that had been me, I would be dead about twelve times over, counting bruises, and about eighteen, counting scrapes. Yeah… Kneeling on sharp, unyielding rock and using that kneeling position to pull yourself up leaves a mark.

For some reason my left foot has decided cramping up is a wonderful thing to do tonight. I don’t agree. And the medication I had in a supposedly waterproof plastic bag is mush; fortunately I have another bottle that is still good, so no real harm done.

I have a camper to myself tonight instead of a bunk in the common bunkroom. Ah, comfort AND privacy. Bliss!

I hike on!