Today was our first day on the trail knowing that Linda would not return. On the hike into Rangeley we'd expected her to have recovered and join us again. It was obvious from the pain she was in, that hiking would not be on her agenda. Now there really is a hole in our team. Over the next couple weeks I know I'll miss her. We are eternally grateful to Tumbles' parents for taking her into their home in Bangor until she can fly home.

Last night after dark the rest of the gang arrived from their stint in Rangeley. Thankfully for us they were too drunk to find our shelter and disturb us. I could hear them stumbling around in the dark down at the tent platforms trying to set up camp. When I went down to check them out this morning, they still had quite a hangover. Lone Wolf had been so drunk he had no idea how he got there. Apparently he was half dragged there by Cowboy. In the two miles to the shelter, he'd fallen some fifty times, taking out small trees, and hurting his ankle in the process. Needless to say the whole group was quite a mess. I'm glad Brandon and I left town early.

Brandon and I soon left the shelter and the bad influences of the drunken thru-hikers. Atop Saddleback Mountain we were treated with bright blue skies and 360-degree views. We could look back and see Rangeley in the distance. We stopped at Popular Ridge Lean-to for lunch. It was one of the ones we stayed at in '77 and I remembered it well. Unlike many things on the trail, it had not changed. It still had the old sapling floor and a small stream ran in front of the shelter. I have a picture from '77 of all of our boots sitting on a rock by the creek in the sun trying to dry them out.

Minty Fresh had caught up with us at Popular Ridge. He had skipped going into Rangeley and was in still in good hiking shape. The others were still stumbling down the trail. When we got to Orbeton Stream, Minty was there, preparing to take a swim. Since it was still early, I thought it would be a good place to rest for awhile. So while I laid back soaking up some sun while Brandon and Minty took a swim in the stream. We hung around an hour before starting the 5-mile hike to Spaulding Mountain.

About forty five minutes before we left, a group of kids Brandon's age took off up the mountain in the same direction we were traveling. We'd passed most of them before we hit the top of the ridge. Later they came dragging into the shelter. When they found out how far Brandon had hiked today they were really impressed. He'd hiked over twice as far as they had. For the rest of the evening they followed Brandon around like a hiker god. I know it was a big boost to his ego.

Lone Wolf, Virginia Creeper, Whispering Pine, Minty Fresh and Old Crow arrived later. Lone Wolf is still showing signs of his day of debauchery.

We woke up and realized that the crew had managed to drag themselves into camp last night. They were lucky it didn’t rain because they were all spread out and they would have gotten soaked. We left before any one and got a great start. The climb up Saddleback was long and steep but the view was rewarding. We could see views from all three summits. After climbing all three summits we headed down to Poplar Ridge Lean-to where Minty was sitting eating lunch. Heading on the trail suddenly got very steep and we had to grab on to things to get down. At the bottom there was a group of people and Minty who was about to go for a swim in the river. I decided to join him and I changed then jumped in. The water was very cold. I soon got used to the temperature and sat completely in the water. Before lont, it was time to get out so I put my shirt back on and put on my pack and started hiking. On the way up the hill we passed several of the people from the group that had left 45 minutes before us. We finally got to the shelter and there were two people from the group already there. We ate dinner and I talked to the people form the group and they were amazed that I had hiked 17 miles today when there longest day was nine.

Linda "Red Rainbow" - from Bangor