Appalachian Trail (day 84) - Barn Hostel Gorham to Full Goose Shelter / mile 1921

Back on trail and out of New Hampshire to the last state on the AT, Maine.

It was only me, Tum Tum and Iceman going back to trail today, everybody else in the hostel was taking the zero day. Paul packed us into his white Cadillac at 7:10 AM and off we went. Fifteen minutes later we were climbing our first hill, we got joined by Treadmill who came yesterday to the brewery but was staying at the different hostel. Me and Tum Tum were a bit faster than other two guys and so we left them behind, we talked about all the trail gossip and news until my Achilles tendon started to hurt and I had to slow down. Before that happened Tum Tum said that if it was up to him to give me a trail name, he would call me "Steinbeck" which I really liked (I was carrying Steinbeck's book in my backpack for a long time now and was mentioning him frequently on the trail), perhaps I could change it for the next thru hike!

Terrain was still very demanding, the only difference was that it wasn't that high so the climbs up and down were shorter. Weather held up well but it was supposed to be raining tomorrow, the views were still amazing and plentiful as the trail went quite often above the treeline.

We finally started to see Southbound Thru hikers, people who started in Kathadin few weeks ago and were heading all the way to Georgia, because the way seasons worked over here, they couldn't start earlier as there was still a lot of snow in the North even a month ago, it could still potentially snow on us at any moment if it got cold enough.

Tomorrow trail was passing through "the hardest mile" and "the steepest mile" on AT, so we were expecting a slower day, especially if the weather was going to be bad. At his point everyone was prepared for most of the surprises Appalachia had in stock for us.

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