MAINE AT IN WINTER
2.7 DONE, 279.3 TO GO

When I originally put the advertisement in our Chapter newsletter seeking people to do the Maine AT in winter with me, I knew two things for certain about the experience. Winter in the Maine woods is a mystical wonderland beyond compare. Winter offers a time when a highly used natural resource goes all but unused. Sort of like doing the Saco River between Fryeburg and Brownfield in October rather than August. 

The surprises started when I only got five responses and only two were serious enough to embark on a trial run this year. An additional four said they would be interested in doing some sections of the trail but couldn't spare the time it would take to do the whole thing.
Of those four, one, Eric, was willing to join Kathryn, Peter and I to see first hand what the experience might be like. Thank you Eric since I didn't want to do even a trial run with less than four. My original thought of twelve is too many. Six is probably the ideal number for such a venture. It was clear to me from the initial correspondence that it would be difficult to do our planning together via letter and phone since it seemed like we all had a somewhat different perception of what to expect. Sort of like the five blind men in a room all holding on to a part of an elephant and saying yes, I know what this is. I chose the section between Carlo Col on the New Hampshire state line and Grafton Notch twenty miles to the north as a satisfactory test section because I was most familiar with it in winter and I knew it would reify the experience for us since it is probably one of the toughest sections of the whole trail. Since they were not cutting from the Success Pond Road this year, we did not have reasonable access from either the East or the West and using the Austin Brook Trail to access the AT at the Gentian Pond Camp Site would have added seven miles to the trek which seemed doable but I thought keeping to five miles per day was the prudent thing to do. So we decided to do the section between Grafton Notch and South Arm Road which offered adequate parking on each end and Peter is very familiar with the section over the Bald Pates where he is the maintainer.

So we met as a team for the first time at 8:00 AM Sunday morning 3/24/02 and spotted a car at Grafton Notch. We are all experienced hikers and our planning up until that point was via correspondence and phone, of which there was considerable. Eric, coming on board last, did not have the pleasure of all the previous planning but we did our best to bring him up to speed. 

The AT comes down to South Arm Road from Old Blue to the north and the first thing we had to do was cross Black Brook before starting up Moody Mountain. One of the things Mother Nature contributed to the experience was a peculiar winter which left Black Brook more open than usual on this fifth day of spring. The stepping stones were clearly visible but covered with a few inches of ice. Three of us had some difficulty getting across leaving one with wet felt liners to start the trip. As long as you keep moving wet felt like all wool gives adequate protection and we decided to press on. Mother Nature had also contributed a foot of nice dry powder which made me wonder why I was snow shoeing up the north side of Moody Mountain when I could be tele skiing at Wildcat. It also made it difficult to maintain purchase since there was hard pack and ice under that blanket of fluffy snow. We took fifteen minute shifts breaking trail. My new mountaineering boots allowed just enough play in the heal to form beginning blisters as the snow shoes strained to give way to the angle of the terrain with every second step. How does one find mountaineering boots that fit comfortably? I had tried them out on the Blue Berry Ridge Trail on Speckled Mountain a few weeks before thinking the section of the trail up from Bickford Brook to the Ridge would be an adequate test run. My feet seem to require different layering of socks for each quarter mile of trail. Fortunately my Scarpa tele boots fit great so I used the liners from those in the new boots. Not a good idea. 

We made the summit of Moody with the realization we were making a mile in two hours instead of the 1 1/2 miles per hour we were hoping for and the real challenge of the day lay just ahead. We knew to expect it but still were not fully prepared for the decent which bordered on being technical. The sun had softened the snow at the summit which made it heavier and better to grip but even that didn't hold the shoes in place. The angle of decent was severe. Kathryn had the best cleats for the task, Tuckerman model, on her snow shoes but she also had more than her share of the weight. We should have gotten together the night before to distribute the weight more evenly which is difficult to do at the trail head. This is not to say the rest of us had light packs. One of the challenges of backpacking in winter is finding a way to lighten the load. We hadn't all weighed our packs but those who had were between 45 and 50 lbs. which probably doesn't sound like much for you hardened backpackers but is about twenty pounds heavier than I like to carry, especially in winter. The weight and the angle of decent and the ice a foot under that soft powder made being in control something to strive for but never quite reach. One never knew for sure whether the slide you were in was actually going to be arrested by the tree you were aiming for. We considered getting out the ice axes but thought better of it since there were already too many potential hazards flailing around. What is a rigorous decent three seasons of the year was a near technical descent in winter. One of my snow shoes came off near the bottom which gave me a chance to get a breath, tend to the cramping of my inner thighs (the tele skiing I had rationalized as adequate physical preparation for the trek, was not) and reassess the risk level we had embarked upon. It was 4:30 PM by the time we got across Sawyer Brook and it was very tempting to pitch the tents on the nice flat section on the south side of the brook 1 1/2 miles short of the first day destination of the shelter near the summit of Hall Mountain. 

My notion of leadership is that it is a characteristic that moves from one member of a group to another depending on the function at hand. For example Peter had familiarized himself with a GPS and entered the "way points" so he was the logical person to say where we were at any given time. No one person in any group has all the information he/she needs to make the best decisions. On the other hand, the designated leader has to make those decisions that should not be made by default and therefore has to know which they are. We started out for the summit of Hall mountain knowing the pace we were making would get us there, barring any unexpected variables, around 8:00 PM. We had a nearly full moon, a clear sky and forecast, and head lamps; we rationalized. The white blazes would be easy to see. It is fascinating how ones judgment can be blurred by wanting to reach the goal of the day. As soon as we left the flat and started the incline, I knew it was a bad choice. I apologized for my indecision and turned us back to the brook to pitch for the night. That decision was met with some relief and some disappointment but by the time we stumbled into our sleeping bags around 8:00 we all acknowledged it was the right decision. 

Setting up camp gives a group an opportunity to wonder together about all sorts of things. Does Leave No Trace apply as readily in winter as it does in the other seasons when sheer volume of users may require more rigid expectations? What is the best food to carry given weight, calorie needs, taste and fuel necessary to do the cooking? What are the best boots and snow shoes for winter hiking? What is survival anyhow? Kathryn shared she had recently told her husband the TV survival shows should use a winter setting in order to demonstrate what survival is really all about. He replied it wouldn't have any following since everyone couldn't run around in bikinis. Is it better to stay fully hydrated or cut down on liquids late in the day in order to not have to get up and pea quite so often? What is the best stove for winter camping?

Morning always brings a fresh look at things with getting that first hot drink ingested high on the list of priorities. I suggested we enjoy breakfast and then discuss where we are in the hoped for process and what we do next. My inclination was to head for the shelter on Hall Mountain for the night which would then give us two days to make the five miles to East B Hill Road which would be just about half of the original distance we set out to achieve in the four days we had allotted. The additional variables included one of our down bags and some boot liners were wet, some boots were frozen and some of our joints, muscles and feet were making the point that getting old ain't for sissys. The alternative was to follow the snow mobile trail that runs through Sawyer Notch to South Arm Pond back toward Andover which we estimated to be about eight miles or to go back over Moody Mountain to our start point. No body wanted the Moody Mountain option and we probably could have made it out to East B Hill Road but the prudent decision was to hike out on the snow mobile trail which is what I opted for. We had set out to do a trial run in order to have a better sense of what we were getting into doing sections of the AT in winter and how well we would work together. We had achieved those goals and also learned a number of other things including how over ambitious distance or summiting type goals need to be secondary to safety and even comfort. We also learned that even though the temperature never got below zero, negative twenty sleeping bags enhanced the comfort. Weighing the functionality of down vs synthetic fibers is still up in the air. 

We set out on the snow mobile trail and after about three miles saw a sign saying Andover 8 miles. All four of us had the Appalachian Trail Guide to Maine, Thirteenth Edition but none of us had a map of the snow mobile trails that are usually available for a small donation from the local snow mobile clubs. Probably a good thing to have. If we were going to stay another night in tents we would need to dry the wet down bag and since it was already mid afternoon that would have to be done soon while solar drying power was available. We opted to pitch our tents for a second night and had begun that process when a couple who had yesterday celebrated their fiftieth wedding anniversary came down a side trail we would never seen as an option. A little puzzled to see us out there, but friendly as rural Maine folk are they said yes the sign is right and it is eight miles if you follow the snow mobile trail right ahead but it is only a half a mile to town if you went out the way they had come in. That we did arriving soon thereafter at the saw mill at the corner of Wentzell St. in Andover.

We called Margie (honey) Towne at the CABIN in East Andover and yes they would be happy to shuttle us back to our vehicles on the South Arm Road. They provide that and other services routinely to thru hikers during the season and why don't we stay for dinner while we're at it? Earl (bear) Towne soon arrived with a van which is the way in which those packs should be carried, and shuttled Eric, Peter and I to South Arm Road and Kathryn, who had a five hour drive facing her, back around to Grafton Notch.

Dinner included all the chicken, gravy, vegetables, salad, roles and condiments you would ever want to eat followed by apple crisp to die for with two flavors of ice cream. The piece de resistance, however, was the hospitality and the opportunity to meet Jamie, trail name Mr. Clean, who is the only person I know of who has done the Maine AT in winter. He is sort of a resident in transit at the Cabin as he "fattens up there", as he put it, between stints on the trail. After our experience in the past two days, it was hard to believe anyone had done the trail in winter but soon one gets the sense that if anyone could do it, it would be he. He said the learning curve was initially as steep as the summit of Hall Mountain from Sawyer brook but if you survive that things get easier. Comfortable warm boots are a must. He shared some clues about lightening his pack and said the preferred meal is fried suet because the crispy part is delicious and the remainder makes an excellent and nutritious base for the noodle and vegetable dish. Earl and Margie bill their place as "A friendly Hostel for Outdoors People" and a friendlier atmosphere couldn't be found nor the price more reasonable.

So, my original vision was a bit grandiose but we may well be able to do more than we expected. Peter suggested doing the section between routes 17 & 4, a 13 mile stretch with no major elevation. I look forward to planning that for next winter. Folks at the Hike, Bike and Ski shop in Gorham New Hampshire were helpful by sharing their knowledge of the Mahoosuc Range and our appreciation goes to Red Oak Sports in Farmington for lending us a GPS. Only 279.3 miles to go. 

Jim Tierney, trip leader