The Best For Last!

To see our full blog with pictures go to http://www.hikestrong2010.blogspot.com/.
New pics uploaded at http://picasaweb.google.com/HikeStrong2010/ in the first two albums.
  
I’ve often wondered why more people don’t hike the AT south from Maine to Georgia. My rationale for supporting hiking south is because the weather is way more friendly if you start in the cool summer breezes of Maine and then work your way to Georgia after the heat wave of summer is gone. Having hiked this far now, I realize that people choose to do it from GA-ME like Jeff & I because of New Hampshire and Maine…period. Not only are they by far the most beautiful sections of trail, but they are also the hardest. I’m sure that you need the practice of hiking the first 1,800 miles to get ready for them. I honestly can’t imagine hiking the trail from ME to GA now because if it didn’t physically kill me, after seeing what I’ve seen here, the rest of the trail probably would have bored me to death!
  
Since we’ve last blogged…
  

  Our first “Welcome to NH” was Mt. Moosilauke, a 4,800 foot beast that takes you directly up the mountain and down the even steeper and more slippery north face back down to 1,000 feet in under 4 miles. The actual “welcome” was in the form of a sign that read “This trail is extremely tough. If you lack experience, please use another trail.“ And they weren’t kidding! The north face was a treat with cascades right next to the trail for over a mile heading downhill. This part of the hike reminded me of a journal entry I had read in a shelter register back in New York (Jeff’s re-creation of it shown here), which talked about how the trail used to have a lot of “switchbacks” that would wind around mountains to help you go up them in a less steep manner, and now the trail just seems to go straight up and over the highest peaks it can find.
  

Going into the White Mountains we saw an inordinate amount of day hikers and French Canadians! It was actually pretty weird being around so many people during the day, and even weirder having to talk to them… lol. I remember very clearly coming down one stretch of the presidential range. The hike was pretty intense, with huge rock steps going down, down, down. We were tired of hiking at this point, so we started going faster and faster, but still stopping to enjoy some waterfalls on the way. At one point we saw three kids hiking and asked them how much further. One kid said 2 miles. We were stunned! The trail to the bottom was only 2.7 miles, and we had been hiking for a while, surely we had not only gone .7 miles! We decided they didn’t know what they were talking about and asked for a second opinion. The next people we came across was a mother and daughter who were taking a break by a footbridge. We asked how much further and the girl said it had taken them an hour and a half to get there, so we definitely had an hour left. We were disheartened, wanting so bad to be at the end. Eight minutes later we were at the bottom. We then vowed to never ask a day-hiker a question… ever!
  

The White Mountains of New Hampshire are officially one of my favorite places I have ever been -- definitely check out the pics. We climbed Mt. Washington, the second highest mountain on the trail, for my birthday and enjoyed the clearest, most beautiful views from the top. The 60-80 MPH winds were a little crazy, but its not called the “home of the worlds worst weather” for nothing! The sign as you approach the summit reads “STOP. The area ahead has the worst weather in America. Many have died there from exposure, even in the summer. Turn back now if the weather is bad.” Yikes… what are they trying to say here? Double-yikes to the teenager that soon walked past me with no shirt on. It was an amazing birthday.
  

After the presidentials our next mental milestone was reaching the border of Maine, and MAN we were glad to see it! I was so excited! I took a picture hugging the sign and Jeff picked it up and played it like a Rockstar jamming on a guitar -- it was awesome. After the border, the thing Jeff & I had been looking forward to most was “Mahoosuc Notch.” They call this one-mile stretch of trail either the most fun one mile or the hardest one mile of the entire Appalachian Trail. Jeff & I definitely call it the most fun -- so much fun we thought about doing it twice. We posted a lot of videos on our Facebook   page and have a bunch of photos in our picasa album if you want to see for yourself. This area is a massive jumble of boulders and rocks that you have to scramble over, climb under and jump across to get to the other side. In one spot I had to use the roots of a tree like a rope to climb up a rock wall to the top! Jeff always seemed to make it look easier than me, but I still made it and had a ton of fun. My pack finally received some battle damage though, as I scraped a couple holes in the side as I squeezed myself between two boulders.
  

We only have a couple hundred miles left now! Its so crazy to know we’ve come this far and have raised over $10K to fight cancer! Thank you to everyone who has donated, and if you still want to donate you can do so by going to http://www.hikestrong2010.com/ and clicking the “donate online” button. Our phones are supposed to be turning into useless paperweights any day now, so you probably won’t hear from us until the end!  If you need to find us, leave a voicemail or send an email and hopefully we'll get it! :0)

  
See ya in a couple weeks!
~Styx & Bones