Hot hot hot

Took Monday as a day off from running and just tried to get caught back up at work! Tuesday was an early morning run on the cart paths. Very overcast and muggy. But on the plus side, the blackberries on the powerlines were delish! (7.0 miles)

Wednesday, it seemed a bit cooler out there, but I still finished up quite sweaty. Roads in the early morning light. (8.0 miles)

Thurdsay was another day off. Yes, I am very lucky and it seems like I've spent a lot of time out of the office since the end of June but really it will only equal 2 weeks off in total, just split up with a lot of extra long weekends 😂😉😊 The forecast for the late part of the week was not looking great at all, with temps in the 90s and high humidty, so I thought I'd see what I could do before we headed down to MA to visit with Irene and Dana. Started at 6:25 am and it was incredibly heavy out. Looped around Highland Green Road and then out into the Cathance to Head of Tides before returning via the roads. Lots of bugs, so.much.sweat, some neat mushrooms, and some good berry stops. (15.0 miles)

Got a few things done around the house and then around 2:30, we headed south. Temps were in the high 90s down there when we arrived. Man oh man, so toasty!

Ryan and Dana were scheduled to play golf on Friday morning, and I decided to head over to Bradley Palmer to see what kind of miles I could get in before I just flat out overheaded. 75 degrees to start at a little before 8:00 am but high humidity and by the time I finished up a little less than 2 hours later, it was up to high 80s with a feels like temp of 90. 💦💦 Soaked, soupy, steamy, soggy, sweaty and all other similar alliterations apply 😂😂 One deer, many bugs and a lot of poison ivy seen. Had hoped I might be able to manage another 15 to back up Thursday's run, but honestly what I did was enough. (10.0 miles)

Once everyone got home and showered and we all had some lunch, we set out in search of ice cream. Because if this was not a good day for ice cream, I don't know what was! Yum!

Saturday was another scorcher of the day, and I was most definitely tired out from the time outside the past few days, so I chose to skip the run. But even with the heat, we wanted to get off the couch and do something! So we headed over to Maudsley State Park in Newburyport. Dana and Irene had walked there previously but none of the rest of us had. It was a neat spot, and definitely someplace I'd like to go back to to explore a bit more. We wanded out through the open pasture and down to a pond with multiple large snapping turtles and some little painted turtles too, then into a large stretch of pines down along the edge of the Merrimack River, where there were some neat rock outcroppings. All in all, a nice, but very very toasty, walk and even if we all finished sweaty, it was good to get out! (2.3 miles walked)

There was one little baby painted turtle who climbed up onto the back of that big snapper!

Came across a garter snake who had caught a frog

And then a second garter came over and started to tussle with the first snake in a bid to get the frog away. We watched for a while but did not see the final outcome. A neat and unusual sighting!

Along the Merrimack

💗

Back up through the pasture

We did go out to get ice cream again after lunch, and then spent the rest of the afternoon inside, relaxing and playing pool. Fun was had by all, even if the caliber of games was not very high 😂😂 

Probably should have run on Saturday morning because by the time I headed out on Sunday around 7:15 am, it was already almost 80 degrees. Oy vey! So hot. So sweaty. So unnecessary! Wore my pack and tried to take it easy but it really didn't matter. It was just disgusting out there. Found one stretch of sprinklers in the final mile and ran back and forth through them a few times to cool off 😆 Just managed to eek out 50 miles for the week, and given the weather, I'm calling it good! (10.0 miles)

Doesn't it just look like a hot August day?

On the garden front, things are looking quite jungly out there but there are some lovely blooms happening! 🌸

Culver's root and globe thistle gone wild

Baxter Camping Trip: South Branch Edition

While we've been up and around Baxter the past two summers for camping trips, both times we have stayed outside the park. Which means, you know, important things like access to toilets and running water, and possibly electricity and cell phone service. This year, we decided we wanted to stay in the park. It's a more rustic experience as it means being truly off-grid, and while some may grumble at Baxter's very specific regulations, the rules do ensure that Baxter remains a very special and unique place to visit. So, following the camp's rolling reservations, four months in advance, we booked a site at South Branch Campground up in the northern part of the park for late July. We had been up there exploring when I was pregnant with Sam for a day hike, but have always stayed in the southern part of the park. This was going to be a new experience for all of us!

Thursday

We were on the road by 9:00 am and stopped in Patten for lunch at Debbie's - delish! - before continuing on out into the wilderness until we reached the park entrance. From there, we still had a ways to go on the dirt road until we hit the turn-off for the campground. You really are out there!!

Gabe, the very friendly park ranger, met us to discuss the rules and regulations and check us in. He also cheerily asked us all about ourselves and proceeded to remember Sam's name for the rest of our stay there. Impressive! We got ourselves settled into site 31 and got everything set up, but realized while doing so, that the fuel regulator arm of the stove was broken and the propane tanks would not attach, which meant no stove and no cooking of anything. Aie. Ryan may have had a bit of a panic attack over this but I managed to convince him that we would be able to cook (almost) everything over the fire and no one would die or starve. And so with that settled, we set out to wander around the campground and down to check out the pond. (0.6 miles walked)

We had to get a new mat for the tent entrance. This one cracked us up 😂

Such a pretty view!

💕

I think this is water lobelia. It was so pretty right at the water's edge

We then drove a short ways back up the road and headed out on the trail down to South Branch Falls. Definitely not a lot of usage on this trail, and we should have worn our swim suits, as the pools sure looked inviting and it was hot! Lots of bunchberries. (1.0 miles walked)

The water looked so nice!

After dinner of Otto's pizza reheated over the campfire - yum! - we headed back down to the pond for another look before returning to relax and play some cribbage back at the campsite before bed. (0.55 miles walked)

Resident snowshoe hare

Swamp candle along the edge of the pond

A fair number of little frogs and minnows flitting about in the shallows

Friday

It rained hard overnight but we awoke to clearing skies. We headed down to the pond to check the bulletin board for the weather report (gotta go old school here with no internet access, and yes I just stopped logging the campground walks on Strava, but I'm guessing we added at least a few extra miles over the course of our time there just walking to and from the pond!) and then went back to camp to get ourselves organized for the day.

We set out around 8:45 am to hike the loop over South Branch and Black Cat Mountains. We did this hike when I was pregnant with Sam, but I honestly don't remember the hike at all! I do remember coming out to the pond though. And all I could think of while we were hiking on Friday was, what were we thinking? 😂 I guess we were 13 years younger then. Aie. In any event, this was a really fun loop and a very rugged one at that. 

You start right off the bat by crossing the outlet at the end of South Branch Pond. We all got wet feet 😉😆

Then it was a nice meander through some pretty forest, with lots of wet branches and leaves on the side of the thin ribbon of trail and many slick rocks underfoot. Bunchberries, ghost pipe, blue bead lilies and lots of neat moss and lichen to be seen. 

Love all the moss

After a little bit, the trail started to climb in earnest, with some seriously steep pitches too! We were rewarded with a few views along the edge of the ridge, but South Branch Mountain summit was treed in. Along the way, we saw many piles of moose poop and a lot of stretches of hobble bush and ferns that seemed like prime moose habitat, but all we ended up seeing the whole hike was one grouse, one garter snake and two toads 😅😆

This was one very fat toad!

Eventually, we got to the open summit of Black Cat Mountain, with some amazing views out over the pond and farther out into the park, where were could see the clouds gathered atop Katahdin. Also some lovely bunchberry, blueberries and fire pink in bloom. Oh yes, and more moose poop! Apparently, the moose like the summit vistas too 😉😊

So pretty!

💖

Looking out to Katahdin in the distance

From atop the ridge, we followed the edge of the mountain down through a scree field and into the woods, where we continued to drop towards the pond. 

We came out into the open to an overgrown bog bridge section traversing the upper stream into the pond, where the joe pye weed was in full bloom. So pretty. 

The final few miles of the hike were along the far edge of the pond, although we meandered up into the woods and along some cliffs before dropping down to the pond edge and then finished up with a final flat one mile stretch back to the campsite. It was a full day, but a great hike and even better, we all had fun! (6.7 miles walked)

We spent the afternoon relaxing at the campsite, where Sam ensconced herself in her hammock, I took up my book and Ryan took a nap 😴, before cooking up some sausages over the fire and playing a few rounds of cribbage. We took one final walk down to the pond as the light faded and then called it a night. 

Evening light on the pond

Saturday

Saturday morning we headed up the road to Trout Brook Farm to hike Trout Brook Mountain. Another beautiful day and another lovely hike, this time just a bit shorter! It was a fun loop with some great views, rocky ledges and lots of blueberries, but also being at lower elevation, it meant a lot of bugs too. (3.3 miles walked)

Lots of wall hawkweed in the lower wooded areas

So many pretty bunches of bunchberries!

And lots of blueberries to snack on!

Such pretty views. So many ponds and so much wilderness!

We drove down into the campground to have lunch after our hike and then picked up life preservers, paddles and a canoe and headed out onto Trout Brook for an afternoon canoe, which had been suggested by Gabe the ranger as a fun and different spot to get out on the water. The fields down near the water were filled with joe pye weed, meadowsweet, aster, goldenrod and were just magical. 

😍

We paddled out through a short tributary onto the river and then into a large inlet, which almost looked like a separate pond and canoed along the edge a bit before turning around to paddle back. In theory we could have paddled all the way out into Great Lake Matagamom, but let's face it, I am happiest when I am exploring on my own two feet and while I am a reasonable swimmer and like water (or at least looking at water 😄), I am not a strong paddler and coming back to the put-in spot going upstream and with a very stiff headwind was reasonably unnerving! However, it was a fun exploration, just not my chosen mode of travel 😆😉 (2.0 miles canoed)

So much blue and green

When we got back to South Branch, Ryan headed out for a run while Sam and I relaxed at the campsite. It had gotten pretty warm out so when Ryan came back, he was ready for a dip in the pond, although he could not convince Sam to get in any farther than her knees 😉 

Quite the setting for a dip!

Evening view

Sunday

Got up before the sun rose and headed out for a run at 5:15 once there was a bit of light. I headed up the Middle Fowler Pond Trail to Barrel Ridge. It was nice, reasonably runnable, if slightly overgrown (which was the theme of the trip for all the trails we went on!), terrain for a few miles, then it became more of a run/hike. Passed over a few open ledges and then dropped down into a dip before the final steep hike up to the rocky summit of Barrel Ridge. Beautiful early morning light and some good blueberries to snack on too! From there, I backtracked the way I came in and got back to camp before anyone else was out of bed. A nice way to start the day. (6.1 miles)

Morning light

Trailside snacks! 😋

After breakfast and coffee, we packed up camp, said our goodbyes to Gabe and then headed towards the park gate, stopping at Horse Mountain for one final hike. A reasonably mellow hike through some reasonably benign woods up to a wooded in summit and then out a long spur trail to a ledgy overlook. Lots of mosquitos, and no horses, seen. (3.3 miles walked)

Stiff clubmoss. Saw a lot of this in the woods.

East spur overlook

Goodbye, Baxter! Until next time.

We stopped just outside the park along the lake for some lunch, and then a little ways down the road for an ice cream at Shin Pond Village before making the long trip home. It was a really fun camping trip, filled with some great hikes, lots of blueberries, some good games of cribbage and a lot of time together enjoying the outdoors 💗

And because it's the end of yet another month, here's the running tally...

July wrap-up:
207.3 miles run
27.0 miles walked
4 full zero days

YTD:
1,249.2 miles run
175.01 miles walked
9.3 miles xc skied
30 full zero days