This section of trail was nice, it had some amazing scenic views especially over Saddleback. The trail itself was nice as well. The best part of this section was the information packet in the Poplur Ridge Lean-to. The caretaker started trail maintenance in 1956 and build the lean-to in 1961. He has compiled questions left in the trail register at the lean-to and answered them in a laminated booklet.
Apparently this one guy has maintained the lean-to and his section of trail virtually by himself for the last 45 years. It is amazing to think of the amount of time he must have spent on the 5-10 miles that he maintains. It is a bit hard to believe really. What makes it even harder to believe is that one of the questions is if he had ever hiked the trail. He hasn't even hiked all of the Maine section. It is amazing that someone has been so involved with the trail for so long but hasn't hiked most of the trail.
So during this section I made the decision to get off the trail. It just seemed like more time on the trail was no longer enhancing my enjoyment of the trail. I wanted to make sure to stop being on the trail while I still was having a great time but I could sense that that might change soon. If I hadn't had to jump ahead I would have definitely kept on to finish since I was still having fun; but, without that drive, I didn't want the trail to lose its greatness in my mind. I figured much of my sense of the trail would be made by the way I finished and I wanted it to be good.
As it is now, I think this summer has caused me to have a lifelong love of backpacking. After making this decision I have been thinking of what my future on the trail might look like. I was surprised to realize that I think I want to start at Springer Mountain again at some point. It won't be next year but this whole experience has been so good that doing it all again seems like it would be a ton of fun. In the closer future, I think I will just work on doing the sections that I skipped. I look forward to spending more time in the woods.
After getting off trail, UV was convinced by people she talked to that she should go back and do more of the trail. This didn't make sense to me since we weren't finishing everything so what does a few more miles mean. I think after contemplating why I felt this way it is partially due to the fact that I've already hiked Katahdin many times. I have also hiked a lot in Maine so I think it just didn't mean as much to me and didn't offer the sense of closure that doing Katahdin for the first time would. Originally I was going to drop her back off on trail Sunday morning but she kept pushing it back until I dropped her off on trail yesterday (Wednesday). She didn't seem like she was looking forward to it at all but she was convinced it was something she should do. Doesn't make sense to me but hopefully she enjoys herself doing the 100-mile wilderness.
The end of the trail will be me going up to Katahdin and meeting UV when she gets there and doing the mountain with her. It should be a great conclusion of the summer, if the weather is nice. That should happen in roughly a week. I will post something showing that hike and probably do a few entries as I adjust back to normal life. I am terrible at getting posts up in a timely manner, though, so we shall see.
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