Miles: 1,905.6 — Nervous energy marked my first full day back on trail after over a week off. Miles sped ahead, leaving me to hike alone and chat with Poppins and Peanut about the absurd “shrink it and pink it” world of women’s outdoor gear. I passed the 1,900-mile mark, carried extra water for miles, and finally found an unplanned stealth spot near a stream—pitching my tent in the dark after a mild panic about being alone.
We chose to slackpack the peaks of Kinsman. In the beginning, we were thinking we might not slackpack the rest of the whites because of how big (in mileage) the days would have to be to accomplish the other sections of these formidable mountains. This section was a little over 16 miles. The way up was great, the ridge between the peaks was beautiful, the weather was great, but the way down was strenuous. It was steep, wet and slippery. There was mud everywhere. I even fell in a huge mud puddle on the first peak.
On our way down the second peak, we could see a thunderstorm rolling in. The descent was steep, slippery and sketchy. At one point the trail literally was a waterfall.Much like Moosilauke, the way up was surprisingly easier than the way down. It took nearly twice as long as we had planned. We had estimated we would be at the trailhead by 7:30 or 8pm, but we were only a quarter of the way down the second peak by the time 8pm rolled around and darkness was imminent.
The descent intimidated Miles. On top of that, we were both hungry and tired. We slowly made our way down with me leading the way. By the time we got to Lonesome Lake Hut, the storm was audible but not visible. It wasn’t close enough to really affect us, as far as we could tell from the thunderclaps.
For a moment, we stood by the lake and took in its beauty. Until we realized how late it was getting! We scurried down the path toward our pickup location. Over rocks and floating swamp boards, we descended toward Franconia Notch.
We had planned to get picked up at a trailhead at the end of the day off of I-93 around Franconia Notch. In the dark, though, it was hard to see. Crossing the last stream with just our headlamps proved difficult because we couldn’t see the rocks beneath our feet under the silvery reflective water. We also couldn’t see the blazes on the other side of the stream. After that last stream, the trail leads us under I-93 along the side of the stream we had just crossed. The trailhead we were to be picked up was supposed to be off of a blue blaze right after the road crossing. Looking at the map on my phone in the dark, I couldn’t tell how long the blue blaze was or where it even started. Turns out, we were a quarter mile short of the blue blaze when we began to panic.
I called my mom, who was to be picking us up. We couldn’t find the blue blaze, I told her. Is it possible that she can just pick us up on the side of the road? I found our coordinates through Guthook because I couldn’t get enough service to use Google Maps. She manually inputted our location into her phone after a five-minute panic session of trying to find it. I couldn’t even tell from where I stood if we were on the Northbound or Southbound side of the highway. I could only read one sign, the name of the river we were standing next to. A river that this highway crossed twice and on both sides of the road.
Eventually, she found us as we flashed our headlamps on the side of the road. We quickly got into her car on the side of the highway and she drove us toward home. Not five minutes after we got into the car rain started falling. By the time we got to Route 302, the road home, it started to downpour so hard we could barely see ten feet in front of us. An hour and a half later, we made it home.