PISCATAQUIS COUNTY, Maine — With a little over a month before the start of fall, there’s still time for summer adventures. Meteorologist Mallory Brooke has taken us on a west to east journey over the last few months, beginning with hiking and rock climbing in New Hampshire, mountain biking in western Maine, schooler sailing, and birding and sea kayaking along the southern coast and Midcoast.
The series would not be complete without a summit of Maine’s most iconic mountain, and Mallory's first summit of Katahdin.
The day starts early, with a departure of the cabin at the New England Outdoor Center at 5:15 a.m., heading to the River Drivers Restaurant to meet up with our registered Maine guide, Tallie Martin. Martin works in marketing at NEOC and guides numerous activities at the center. For first-timers of Katahdin, Martin recommends Abol for the ascent and descent.
“It’s just on the shorter side of things, it doesn’t make for such a long day, and you kind of get a little bit of everything," Martin explains. You have a small portion of switchback, you have the first part where you start off and it’s a slow incline, and then you have some scrabbling and a touch of bouldering.”
Having a registered Maine guide for the first climb of Katahdin adds a level of security. NEOC provides all the nutrition for the day, along with extra hydration, but a guide helps you take the necessary stops and breaks for the endurance Katahdin requires. Not only is it physical, but the attitude and mentality of each individual change throughout the hike as the intensity can take its toll.
“Katahdin is a climb, it’s not a hike," Martin says. "And so the endurance piece is really difficult, the physicality of that is really difficult and so when you have someone with you that knows the way and knows where you’re going it's just another level of comfort."
The journey began just before 7 a.m. with roughly three liters of water each, our lunch and snacks from NEOC, and multiple layers. The landscape rapidly changes after the elevation steepens, from large pines providing shade to alpine plants, and then complete exposure to the elements as the rock scrambling and bouldering commenced. Clouds rolled over the summit, obscuring it intermittently, but it was over four hours to summit Maine’s highest peak and the terminus of the Appalachian Trail, with a total hike time of eight hours. The difficulty of hiking Katahdin at a young age is what inspired Martin to become a guide.
“After growing older and hiking this so many times, I realized that it’s like this for literally everybody," Martin says. "So to be able to hike this and have this in my backyard, it makes perfect sense to become a guide, so I can continue to help myself get up there, and help people get up there.”
We asked Martin what Katahdin meant to her and the ability to guide up here each year.
“It’s something much bigger than me, and there’s stuff out there that’s much bigger than us that we don’t have to necessarily conquer all the time. Sometimes you have to give it what’s going on and just let it be," explains Martin. "So sometimes you don’t summit. Sometimes you get to Thoreau Springs, sometimes you get to the tree line, but Katahdin is always that bigger…element out there than what we are.”
Guided hikes are available from NEOC until trails are closed for the season, which is usually in mid-October.
Our final episode of the summer series takes us Downeast just ahead of Labor Day weekend.