Dan and Kara Hike the Appalachian Trail: Views from the White Mountains!

Pigpen is relaxing in a super nice hostel in Gorham NH this evening after completing his journey through the White Mountains. He's currently at mile 1888 and only has 298 left. Anticipated arrival at Katahdin is now approximately August 12.

The Whites were beautiful and he says the pictures don't do them justice. Dan spent a lot of time above the tree line and suffered through a little bad weather. Had several falls and 2 (hopefully) minor injuries - one to his knee and one to his wrist where he fell on it. He's been wearing a wrist brace the last few days and it seems to be getting better. The summit of Mt Washington was a little anticlimatic because the tourists who drove up in their cars were standing in such a long line to have their photos made at the summit that Dan couldn't even get up to it. Oh well.....

The White Mtns get a lot of tourist traffic and many stay at "huts" which are like B&B's for tourist hikers. They run from $125 to $150 per night and they get a comfortable place to sleep and a couple of meals. They also let the first 2 thru hikers that pass through each stay "work for stay". They get to stay and eat in exchange for washing dishes, cleaning, etc. Dan got to do this twice and he said it was great.

Unfortunately, there is sad news on the trail as of today. A 66 year old female hiker going by the trail name of
"Inchworm" is missing in Maine. She was supposed to meet her husband on Tuesday and has not shown up. There is a large search effort going on right now but so far no luck. Dan had met her but was several days behind her on the trail. The weather was severe on Tues and right now foul play is not suspected. Here is a link to a current article :

http://www.pressherald.com/news/Maine-investigators-look-for-fellow-hikers-in-search.html

Back to Dan's news. Here are some of his pic's from the White Mountains: