Summit Katahdin!

Day Fifty-Two
Friday, July 19, 2019
Summit Day

Well, the final day has finally arrived.  We woke up early, excited to begin the day.  We knew we needed to start before our buddies if we were going to make it to the top about the same time.  So after a quick breakfast, Wait-up and I took off.  We first went to the Ranger Station to leave our big packs.   We had borrowed a day pack from them the evening before and had it packed with food for the day.  Then we went to find the re-routed beginning of the Hunt Trail--re-routed due to  the collapse of the bridge across Katahdin Stream some time back.

YouTube of Katadin

 

Our buddies, Jurassic, Ferrel and Flickertails at The Birches Campsite on summit morning.  

Oops, this buddy Torch got left out of the first picture.  

At 5:30, we signed in at the hiker kiosk.  The first ones of the day signing in here.   We were at least half way up before the first couple of guys passed us on the way up.

Katahdin Stream Falls - Bridge Out!

Katahdin Stream Falls

Katahdin Stream Falls

The trail was fairly easy for awhile but got harder and harder as we got about half way up.  When we came out of the trees, the views were breathtaking.

The boulders got bigger and bigger and more numerous.  It was busy hands and feet at this point.

The infamous rebar pull-up. 

We had heard so much about how hard the Hunt Trail is, especially the rebar places.  We only found one.  But, yes, it was hard--had to grab hold of the rebar to pull yourself up, place your foot in a rebar hook on the side which was too high up for  me to reach comfortably, and get over the edge to the ledge above.  I made it up without help though!! However, as I progressed and the boulders became more and more challenging, I began to worry about the descent, almost to the point of panic.  I really didn't want to come back down the Hunt Trail.  Going up was bad enough!

The tableland.

We finally reached the tableland.   We thought we would be to the summit shortly, but no!  Our buddies had passed us back on the boulders and we heard them rejoicing at the top long before we reached it.  

As we neared the top of the mountain, we began to see lots of people!  Wait a minute - we didn't have that many people pass us - where did all those people come from?  Then we saw that other trails were coming in to meet ours.  I asked one group who was coming up the Abol Trail about the difficulty of that particular trail.  A young lady said, "Ask my mom, she's not a hiker."  Mom said the trail was not that difficult and had no scary places in it (like  the rebar!).  That's when I decided that's the trail we would be taking down.  

 

The well-worn trail is clearly defined with string at this point.

Our first glimpse of the summit  

At 10:30 a.m. we reached the summit!!  Woop woop!  It was surreal.  The weather, although allowing some views on the way up, was now foggy and we couldn't see a thing below us.  We celebrated with our buddies Jurassic, Torch and Flickertail, who were still here.  Rested awhile, ate lunch, took lots of pictures.  We knew this was our one and only time being at this spot.  

Time to descend via the Abol Trail.  We found it to be steep and rocky.  Not too difficult though, since I mostly scooted down on my backside.   We saw Brightside and Squeaks (we made their acquaintance in the 100-Mile Wilderness) going up as we were coming down.

At about 3:30 we came out at the bottom of the Abol Trail into a campground. We were out of water by now and needing some pretty badly.  We asked some fellows at a campsite about a water source since we could hear the stream running behind their site.  They offered us a Propel -- oh my, was that good!  

We then started the walk back to the Katahdin Stream campground where we had left our pack --about 2 miles.  We quickly got tired of the road walk and I started sticking out my thumb.  Soon a nice bird-watching couple stopped and picked us up.  Yahoo!

 We left our day pack at the Ranger Station and picked up our backpacks.  We were hoping to find someone in the parking area that we could hitch a ride with, but no one was around, so we went on out to the road to try to catch a ride there.  Soon Brightside and Squeaks came out to also hitch a ride.  As we were standing there,  a small car came out of the campsite parking area with Jurassic!  He had come down from the mountain just in time to find someone leaving the parking area.  You should have seen the grin on his face as he went by and waved, lol.

So Wait-up, Brightside, Squeaks and I were left standing beside the road hoping someone would come by on their way out of the park.  The Ranger had warned us that the later it gets, the chances of catching a ride became slimmer.  Also we knew that the chances of 4 people getting a ride were pretty slim, not to mention there were two women on the other side of the road that we thought were also hitching --come to find out they had a ride coming for them.

Soon I saw a truck coming, so I stepped up to the side of the road and stuck out my thumb.  Low and behold, he stopped!  It was an extended cab truck.  I said, "I know you probably can't take four people, but can you give two of us a ride into  Millinocket?"  He said, "I think if I clear my back seat, I can get you all in there."  So we threw our packs in the back of the truck and all four of us jammed into the back seat.  It didn't bother us to be close, we were use to the smell  by now, but I felt for the driver and his wife.

They were just out driving around the park since they had the day off from their kids -- how timely was that!  They delivered Brightside and Squeaks to their B & B and then took us to Katahdin Inn and Suites.  It was conveniently located in town.

In the same parking lot with the hotel was a pizza place.  I walked over to it and picked up a pizza for our dinner.  The next morning we walked to the McDonald's down the street for their big breakfast, then came back to the hotel for their breakfast.  :-)  Poor Wait-up couldn't seem to get enough food -- he was looking and feeling very thin.  Next on the agenda was a trip across the street to the Dollar General and Dollar Tree to buy makeup  (it's been TOO LONG)   and some sandals (my feet are ready for a break from boots!)