Zeacliff Pond to Crawford Notch

Day 12
Sunday, June 9, 2019
Zeacliff Pond to Crawford Notch
9.5 Miles

We slept lightly at Zeacliff Pond because we realized that it was a good bear habitat.  Surprisingly, we found the next morning that we had had no bear activity during the night.  We had pitched out tent between trees and I slept on a protruding tree root but all I felt was the bulge because of my wonderful sleeping pad, which I had borrowed from my son (Thermarest Neoair). 

On the way up to Zealand Falls Hut we passed some nice waterfalls.  We stopped at the hut for a free pastry.  After the hut, the trail got noticeably smoother running along an old railroad path. 

Before Ethan Pond Shelter the trail got rocky and west again with lots of bridges through the bogs.  We slowed down because we were tired by now. 

We reached Crawford Notch at 1:30, faster than we had thought we would.  The problem with Crawford Notch is that there is no cell service there.  We had previously contacted our shuttle driver to arrange for a pickup when we got there, but now we couldn’t call him to tell him we were there.  There was not a soul at their car when we entered the parking lot, but a lady going the up the trail as we came by told us that Wiley Place was a tenth of a mile up the road, so we started walking toward it.  It was NOT  tenth of a mile!  A half mile up the road we saw a sign saying the Wiley Place was a half mile further.  Not knowing if it was even open on Sunday, we turned around and went back to Crawford Notch, sticking out our thumb all the way back to no avail.  I don’t know why we didn’t think about looking in the guidebook to see if Wiley Place was listed and if it was open on Sunday  (it was).  At the Notch I asked a coupe that was just finishing up their hike if they could give us a ride and they graciously agreed to take us to the AMC Highland Center where we were finally able to call our shuttle driver.  He was there in 45 minutes, coming from Gorham.  He took us to Walmart in Gorham and then to the Top Notch Inn. 

Before we left home, we had looked at the AMC hiker shuttle service and had considered trying to catch it here at Crawford Notch to take us to Gorham so we could zero there.  We even purchased the family membership to the Appalachian Mountain Club so we could get discounted rates on the shuttle, thinking we would use it more than once.  However, the timing never worked out for us to catch the shuttle and our shuttle driver, Bruce, was much more accommodating anyway.  

YouTube of Zeacliff Pond to Crawford Notch