Heather's Escape
150 miles on the Appalachian Trail in Maine
Mom decided to take her second summer vacation in 20 years, and head to Canada with Peter. They couldn't take our dog Zeke, so they left me in charge.

Just before they left, we got an email from one of our favorite AT hikers we had met down south...Radar. He wanted to know if we would be on the trail again this year. What a great idea!

Mom dropped off Zeke and I 14 miles after the Maine border, in Grafton Notch. We hit the trail in search of Radar, Hepcat, Mellow Yellow, Kodiak, and everybody else we had met earlier in the season.
Zeke got to wear his very own pack! He carried his own dog food, bowls, treats, leash, muzzle, and I snuck in my water filter.

Zeke would get VERY excited when I asked if he wanted to go for a walk. He never complained about how long the walks were. Sometimes though, it took a lot of effort to pry him out of bed in the morning....
One morning we got up at 4am to hike 2 miles up Saddleback Mountain and watch the sun rise.


The hike up Saddleback was fueled by yummy town food eaten the day before in Andover.

The diner in town has a pancake challenge. If you can eat every morsel of the challenge pancakes, they're free. If not, you have to pay for them. Only a few hikers each year manage to beat the challenge. The challenge consists of 3 pancakes made with 5 pounds of pancake mix!

I didn't dare try. Sheepstuff (pictured here), did.
I usually slept in a hammock and tied Zeke underneath me. Ocassionally we'd just cowboy camp it underneath the stars.

Zeke's favorite camp time activity was looking up at all of the pesky squirrels and chimpmunks. His all-time favorite night in camp was the one we spent near the shores of Sabbath Day Lake....
....Evidently we were camped in the middle of a moose highway. During the night, we saw 13 moose!

Moose hate dogs, and stomp on them if the dogs bark too much. I spent most of the night trying to keep Zeke from barking. When the moose would start to get close, I tried to look tall and intimidating by standing on top of a log next to my hammock.


The morning after the moose visits I measured how close the moose had gotten. The baby moose pictured here had gotten within 4 of my steps ... about 10 feet.

Two of the moose dropped by again the next morning. It's very disconcerting to prepare oatmeal while a moose is watching you only a few feet away.


From left to right ... Flash, Radar and Zeke.
It only rained once during the two weeks I was on the trail. That day Mellow Yellow, Hepcat, Kodiak, Radar, Mr and Mrs Schooner, Lightwalker and I hiked .3 miles to Pierce Pond fishing camp. Most of us had the delicious 12-pancake breakfast. Mmmmm.....

After letting breakfast settle we walked about 4 miles to the Kennebec River crossing. The official AT route is a canoe ride across. You can ford the Kennebec, but it's not reccomended.

The town of Caratunk is just a hop, skip and a jump away from the riverbanks. Zeke and I checked into the Caratunk house for the night. The Caratunk house is run by Paul...a former professional chef and long distance backpacker extraordinaire. After eating Paul's delicious homemade french toast and all of the trimmings the next morning, I decided not to hike out that day...mostly so I could eat breakfast there again the next morning. :-)
Zeke gives our trip 4 paws up!
Zeke and I headed out a day after the rest of the pack, who hadn't taken zero days. Imagine our surprise when we ran into Flash the next day! Flash looked as startled as we ... when he saw us he realized he had accidentally hiked 2+ miles the wrong way. Oops.

We camped with Flash, Shifty, Hopeful, Buckeye, and some others whose names are escaping me, at Moxie Pond lean to.

The next morning I let Zeke walk without his leash. He had been such a good dog the day before that I actually trusted him to be good again. HAH! 3 miles into our hike Zeke suddenly hightailed it southbound. I finally caught up with him all the way back at the shelter. Hopeful had caught and tied Zeke up. We got to see the same section of trail three times over...6 miles we didn't need to walk!
21 miles later we were at a paved road. I decided to take a shortcut and get off there instead of walking an extra 3 miles to the next road to Monson. We bumped into a nice lady hanging laundry on her porch. She was the cleaning lady for Shaw's Boarding House. She called up Mr Shaw, who swung by 10 minutes later to pick us up.

I ended up staying three nights at Shaw's and did work for stay/food. I had a blast hanging out with the Shaw family and all of the other hikers! Zeke enjoyed snoozing on a soft bed.

On the third day mom picked up Zeke and I and we headed home. Saying goodbye to the other hikers was kind of sad. After they leave Monson, they only have a little over 100 miles until the end of the trail on Mount Katahdin.