Thompson Brook

We were pretty exhausted by the time we made camp last night, so I took my time a little this morning and didn't hit the Trail until about 9:30. I found myself falling into a bastardized version of an old familiar marching/running cadence, which will only be familiar to those of you who were in the Army: "He he here we go again, same ole shit again, marching down the avenue, 16 miles and I'll be through... the hundred mile wilderness."

A little later we came to another rock scramble before the crest of a mountain. It was raining, my glasses were soaked and I couldn't see, but the black flies were swarming and biting; we had to get to the top of the rocks to where the breeze would keep the flies at bay. The climb was a little more dangerous than I typically care to tackle. In places, I had to lift Forest, so my back will pay the price later. We certainly earned the view that greeted us at the summit, looking out over the clouds.

Forest and I were both tired, so we took a break for a bit. My first thought was that I stink, a common enough occurrence on the Trail, but not any easier on the nose.

At that point, my current total mileage was 791. I had to remind myself that we needed to get up andu forge ahead if we were to make the 800-mile mark today. I took just a minute more to look at the weather for the area and saw that thunderstorms were expected for tomorrow. We were past the highest peaks, so we just needed to move slowly and steadily to our next maildrop in Monson (probably tomorrow).

About four hours later, we stopped for another break. If you look at the following elevation profile, we were the blue bubble at the top left. If we were a rollercoaster, this would be the part where the chain makes its last noise and the front car is about to go over. "Please hold on to the bar." People who don't hike would look at this profile and think, "Oh, easy! It's all downhill." What they don't realize is that it is the downhill hikes that put the most pressure on the knees, often leading to intense pain which becomes the reason people have to leave the Trail.

We crossed Big Wilson Stream and Thompson Brook. Knowing that we would be headed into town tomorrow, I took advantage and set up a little mountain laundry to at least rinse some of the smell out of my clothes. Sitting by the sound of the rushing water was so peaceful.

We finally stopped for the night at about 6:15 p.m., a bit past Thompson Brook at about Mile Marker 107.5. This leaves about 2 miles to my 800 milestone, and 7 miles to the ME 15 Trailhead, where we will catch a shuttle to Monson, Maine, tomorrow.