So I keep a journal into which I wrote a full trip report. Even though this ends up pretty redundant with Tramper Al's, I'll post it here for anyone who's interested. I took the mileages from my topo software, so they may be dead on or wildly inaccurate.
All great trips have a beginning. This trip to
Baxter State Park began with a very long drive. I met up with Meri at the Portsmouth park-and-ride, and we continued what would be over a 300 mile journey to Medway, Maine, where many of the group would be spending the night at the wonderful
Gateway Inn. We found Al D. already there, and after a dip in the indoor pool had an early dinner and crashed for the night, alarms set for bright and early the next morning.
Seema and Regular Brian arrived during the night, and in the morning we all packed our gear back into our cars, ready-to-go, and went over to the Appalachian Trail Cafe in Millinocket for a generous breakfast, during which Tramper Al, our leader for this expedition, met us. We finished eating, and started the 45-minute drive up the park access road to the Golden Road to the Abol Bridge parking area. Once there, we would find we needed to shovel out space in which to park, but this didn't prove to be much of a problem. GO and Valerie arrived, completing the group, and by 10am we were heading into the park on the Abol Stream Trail. This route was well-packed from snowmobile traffic, and under beautiful skies with fantastic views of the
massif of Katahdin, was a brilliant start to the trip.
After about 1-3/4 miles and a few turns I don't quite recollect, we came out on the park Tote Road. This was a perfect snack spot, so we stopped for a bit to eat and contemplate the 8.6 miles we would have to travel up the road before turning onto the Daicey Pond access road, which itself is almost a mile and a half long. The going on the Tote road was much more difficult that previous sections of the trip. There had been a significant storm just two days earlier that dropped over a foot of snow in places, and the snowmobile traffic on the Tote had not yet been enough to significantly pack it down. In fact, when a few snowmobiles did go by, they actually made it worse by churning up the soft surface. I had a very difficult time pulling my sled on the Tote - I couldn't seem to get a good herringbone going in the "channel" that had been broken out, and kept getting my ski tips stuck in the soft snow on the sides. As a result I barebooted most of the uphills, which fortunately ended with the crest at Abol Campground, where we took a more signficant lunch stop. As I am wont to do, I didn't eat enough here and would pay the price later.
Eventually we would turn the corner and come to the sign for Daicey Pond. The access road was completely unbroken - nobody had been down it since before the week's snowstorm - and so we had to break trail and pull our 50-70lb sleds through the soft snow. My failure to have eaten enough earlier would now catch up with me as my strength waned. The final cruelty would be a short, steep uphill just before the campground. But I made it, gliding the final yards to the two winter cabins for which we had reservations.
In short order, we had fires going in the wood stoves, dry clothing in, and a fantastic chicken tikka masala dinner prepared by Seema and Brian. The clouds had been coming in, and as the sun set, the snow started. We were forecast for a nor'easter: 10 to 20 inches of snow with 30mph winds. It would only be worse up high. We headed off to bed early with plans to get up at 4:30 in the morning to look at the weather and decide what we'd do.
Plenty of snow did fall overnight, and as the morning light rose we could see that it was not a day to be up high on the mountain. We might have considered it, but the knowledge that we'd be breaking trail for the miles up the Tote Road, plus both storm's worth of snow on the trails, just pushed it over the edge as too much, too risky. Instead, we had breakfast, threw on our snowshoes, and headed out to stay low and explore the ponds in the area. This would all be trailbreaking, especially where there was no trail, but since we had only small packs and no schedule, it was much more relaxed and enjoyable.
We broke out the A.T. southward from camp, taking in the scenery of Nesowadnehunk Stream at the Toll Dam, Little Niagara Falls, and Big Niagara Falls. We were looking for a crossing, so we could follow a portage trail on the western bank of the stream up to Lily Pad Pond. There was plenty of flowing water at the two falls, but at the Toll Dam we found a safe route across and began bushwhacking (or were we on the trail? hmm...) up the bank until we came out on the edge of the pond. After a brief discussion to determine our target, we headed left and out across the pond, seeking the next portage trail on the northern bank.
Crossing the pond was a challenge. The winds were gusting with plenty of strength, snow was still falling, and our snowshoes were breaking anywhere from a few inches to a few feet of snow cover. On top of that, we didn't really know where we were going - we just knew that somewhere on the northern tree bank would be the trail. Since Lily Pad Pond is surrounded by wet areas and swamp, it stood out like a sore thumb when we suddenly crossed a perfectly straight white line of snow cover. This was obviously the portage trail from the pond bank to the trees, and when we got close enough we could see the blue blazes and the corridor through the woods. Our first mission successfully accomplished, we continued, crossing the Sentinel Mountain Trail (some thought was given to an ascent but we needed lunch and hadn't brought it with us) and coming to a completely greyish-white Kidney Pond.
We targetted another portage trail, working our way back to the Sentinel Mountain Trail, and back to Daicey Pond. The cabin was warm and dry and after lunch people separated to do their own thing. I would head up to the other cabin to keep its fire going and end up falling asleep on a pull-out cot right next to the woodstove while my clothes dried on the line. It was the most relaxed I've been in a long time. Some of the group also napped, while others went out on their skis to explore the area as the clouds broke up and the weather cleared. We all regrouped at suppertime to enjoy the incredibly good turkey chili that Al D. had brought. The winds had so calmed down that it was beautiful out, and inside the cabin was too warm, so several of us sat out on the porch to eat and enjoy the incomparable view of the massif of Mt. Katahdin across the frozen pond.
Sunday dawned clear, calm, and beautiful. It would be difficult to say good-bye to this beautiful location.
We repacked our pulks, shut down the wood stoves, and cleaned out the cabins. By 8am we were skiing, dragging our sleds southward on the A.T., the first portion of which we had broken out the previous day. It was beautiful out, the trees all coated with snow, white everywhere, but as the day warmed up the sun-drenched snow became very soft. I had a difficult time skiing the tight trail, at one point taking a disastrous tumble that shattered the arms of my sled. That was the last straw as I switched to snowshoes for the numerous ups and downs as the trail continued to follow Nesowadnehunk Stream. I was generally in third position in the line, behind Valerie (who had no sled) and GO, who broke out most of our route home. Recall that there we now had two storms worth of snow to break trail through, to drag our pulks on. It was very difficult for those 3-1/2 miles until we encountered a set of waterfalls that both GO and I recognized as being a "waterslide" where whitewater rafting companies take their clients for a swim.
We were at the West Branch of the Penobscot River. From here we still had almost 4 miles to go, but it would be all flat and open, following the riverbank. I put my skis back on, in spite of the snow now being not only soft but so sticky that we couldn't even glide; we had huge clumps of snow sticking to our skis. It was the most difficult level-ground pulk-pull I'd ever done, but the views of the river were so beautiful I put much of the work out of my mind. I also made sure to eat very well on the route, keeping my energy up.
Just where the A.T. would turn in away from the river, we took a lengthy break. It was a great spot, with sun, water, and views. Once the group was back together, I took the lead and was able to break fresh trail for probably two tenths of a mile before I had to let someone else take the lead. The snow was so resistant and sticky that it took everything I had just to make the slightest uphills, much less head down the flats. Fortunately, there was only a mile or so left before a nice little downhill opened back up onto the snowmobile trails, just a short way from Abol Bridge and the parking lot.
And it was done. We packed our cars, headed to Margaritas in Augusta to inhale huge Mexican dinners, and drove home. Three days, around 20 miles of sled-pulling plus the other hiking we did, no summits, a snowstorm, great friends, cozy cabins, 674 miles of driving, and an experience unlike I have ever had in my life. I will be returning to Baxter hopefully many times in the future, and look forward to hiking again with Seema, Regular Brian, Tramper Al, Al D., GO, Valerie, and Meri.
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