The Worst Day Ever

July 7, 2024

mile 380.9-394.5

After some amazing and restful zeroes (4 of them to be exact) at Henry's parents, we were back on trail around noon this morning after Jan dropped us off. Some pics from our multiple zeroes:

Ahh to start out on a road portage at the hottest hour of the day. It was only a mile or so though, I tried to drink my grape Olipop during it while getting swarmed by flies and sweat ran down by back. What a welcome back.

We put in at a boat launch down the road and I dipped in the water. We had bought a new portage cart at LL Bean in Freeport on one of our zeroes because Henry's dad accidentally ran over our other one with the car. It was probably for the best though because who knows how long our other one would've lasted before completely giving out on us.

We paddled 7 miles of beautiful, clear water and crossed into Maine- our final state! It doesn't feel real. Wow.

She is really showing off too, the change feels almost immediate, the beautiful pine trees and the absolute quiet of the wilderness.

We reached the Rapid River Carry where things quickly went downhill. It started off with a half mile non wheelable section where we carried the canoe with half the gear in it. This is something that is literally so hard for me and I don't know why we even try it. It feels like my wrists are going to snap in half, my back strains and my elbows are on fire, I am just not strong enough to do it. We made it though, dropped the canoe off at the gravel road and returned for the second load of gear. It was hot and muggy and buggy as we loaded the canoe onto the new cart and started off.

No matter what we tried the canoe would not stay on the cart. Going over one slight bump would cause the canoe to shift completely crooked no matter how tight we made the straps or how we adjusted the arms. This cart was just not made for our canoe. Terrible place to find this out really, on this specific portage which is just full of rocks and roots and ditches. We struggled on, trying to take our time and adjust the canoe almost every 50 feet or so. This portage is 4 miles. Fuck.

I fell behind trying to collect myself and heard Henry yell up ahead. I couldn't have heard him right... could I? It sure sounded like he said "There's a hole in the canoe".

I rushed forward and rounded a bend and down at the bottom of a hill he knelt beside the canoe like a fallen comrade which had tipped off of the portage cart completely and smashed into a rock.

We both started crying, plopping down in the dirt feeling defeated. Two holes were smashed into our canoe. Quite possibly the worst thing (besides injury) that could happen on a canoe trip. The flies and mosquitoes were out full force and did not help the situation. I pulled on my bug net and slathered myself in Deet as Henry started working on a patch with some gorilla glue and gorilla tape. We pushed on silently after reloading the canoe on the cart with 3 more miles to go.

I put on my audiobook to drown out the negative thoughts swarming my head and told myself "all that matters is we're making forward progress" and prayed to the NFCT gods that when we put the boat in the water it doesn't sink.

We finished our portage and Henry began walking around near the dam looking for somewhere we could stealth camp since we couldn't paddle until our glue cured. Our canoe sat by a house at the put in and when a few young (teenage??) guys came outside I approached them and asked if they minded if we camped somewhat in their yard because of our situation. They said they couldn't care less and that it was dam property so no one would really care. That was all I needed to hear before I started setting our tent up. Our moods improved as the evening wore on and we had some dinner and hydrated. We're really hoping our patches hold and we can make it to Rangeley tomorrow.