August 30, 2007
Knowing it can be tough to get into Baxter State Park at times, I got to the gatehouse at 4:30 in the morning. I made sure I was first in line. It looks like I was a little over cautious. When the gate opened at 5:00, I was the only one in line.
I was originally going to climb Katahdin today with Brent. With rain in the forecast, Brent headed back. Plan B was to find Ed Hawkins and climb North Brother. North Brother was the first mountain Ed planned to hike for this trip. The only problem was, I hadn't planned to climb it today, so I never asked what time. I went to the trailhead and waited. I had a big day planned. North Brother is a 4,000 footer, and there are 3 other nearby mountains that make the New England 100 highest list (South Brother, Fort Mountain, and Mount Coe). I was hoping to bag them all. About 8:30 I figured I could wait no longer if I wanted to bag all 4 peaks. As you can see from today's track, I wasn't able to get all four.
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I started off on the Marston Trail.
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I had lots of elevation gain today.
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After following white blazes for the past five days, it was a little odd following blue ones.
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I reached the lower Coe Trail Junction.
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I passed an unnamed pond.
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Looking over to Doubletop Mountain
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The trail got even steeper
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Looking over to South Brother (left) and Mount Coe (right)
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The trail levelled off for awhile.
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I reached the upper Coe Trail Junction and continued on the Marston Trail.
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Nearing Treeline
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Nearing the summit
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At 4,143 feet, North Brother is my 60th New England 4,000 footer. Just 7 to go!
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Looking over to South Brother and Coe
For a rainy day, I was surprised I could see as well as I could.
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Looking over to Fort Mountain, my next objective.
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I set out after Fort. It was less than a mile away, but there was one little problem. Fort doesn't have an official trail. It does however, have a herd path. I've heard it is pretty obvious. Lets see. There were a couple of cairns marking the way down the north side of North Brother. After a couple of minutes of searching, I found the path. The more I dropped into the col, the more obvious the trail became. The herd path was completely overgrown. The key was to look at your feet and push through the branches. It started to rain. I had to put my camera inside my pack to keep it from getting wet. The herd path was pretty easy to follow, but I set several GPS waypoints as insurance. I emerged on Fort Mountain. How about that! I tagged the cairn on the left of the mountain even though it wasn't the official summit. I then turned to the right and walked for a couple of minutes. There's the summit!
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At 3,861 feet, Fort makes the New England 100 highest list. It's my 71st completed peak. There was a plane crash on this mountain. I believe during World War II. Someone had carried the radio carcass up from the plane wreck and left it next to the cairn at the summit. I looked over to North Brother which was now completely socked in with clouds. I decided that I better get back. There were a couple very short renegade trails off the herd path that left me scratching my head a couple times. I retraced my steps and found the path. As I neared the summit of North Brother (again), thunderstorms began to roll in. This made me quite nervous as someone was just killed in the park a few days ago by lightning. With this in mind, I made the climb up and over North Brother as quick as possible. By the time I reached the upper Coe Trail Junction, it was pouring. My hopes of hitting South Brother and Coe were gone. Now I just wanted to get back to my car as quick as possible. I made my way down the mountain. The rain finally stopped, and I saw someone just ahead of me.
"Ed, is that you?" I asked.
"Hello, Eric!" replied Ed.
Ed was only after North Brother today. He's already done the New England 100 highest in summer and winter. However, he does rehike the 67 New England 4,000 footers EVERY year. After reaching our vehicles, I followed Ed down to Abol Pond where we rinsed off and put on dry clothes. Then I followed him up to the group tentsite at Bear Brook.
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