The 100 mile Wilderness

Sorry that last post got cut off before I got to any stories.

So I spent a lot of the last few weeks/months prepping for this hike: buying supplies when I saw they went on sale, prepping the aforementioned boxes. I spent little time actually prepping for MAINE. DAY 1. One of those "forest for the trees" types of errors.

I deinitely got tired. I'm quite skinny but actually put on 20 lbs in the weeks leading up to this hike, purposely fattening myself up for when I'd run out of food before reaching the next town. I discovered some supplies I needed I had put in boxes to be shipped months from now and others I brought but have no use for until later down the trail. So it goes. But want to know the worst part about hiking in Maine in June? Blackflies. Billions of them. And mixed in the swarm, waiting to bomb away are the proverbial Y-wings behind the blackflies' X-wings: mosquitoes. I had heard that there were a lot of bugs up here, but I didn't realize they'd be this relentless. I didn't bring bug spray. Or a face mosuito net. Anyone who's ever been here knows the brevity of that statement. You Nevadas (where there is no living creatures) may not know. I hopefully will post of picture soon that shows just how many bug bites I got. They never stop. They are immobilizing in the evenings and even other parts of the day they're still around. I'm saying these bugs have been gnawing on me for the past 253 hours strait. But the bug bites actually aren't the worst. I had a snakebite on the middle finger of my left hand. Not poisonous, but it did get infected. We perormed surgery in a lean-to, and a girl names natalie actually filmed in on her camera and hopefully will send it to me eventually. It was excruciating.

                       (My legs after 24 hours. Yes, just one day into it, with over 150 days to go. They're actually much worse now).

               (1. What kind of snake is this? 2. Is it poisonous? 3. What kind of idiot would get this close to take a picture of a snake when he doesn't know the answer to questions 1 & 2?)

The answer to #2 is, thankfully, No. I was biten and it got infected, but wasn't poisonous. And to answer #3, THIS snake was not the one that bit me (same kind though, I think). I was bitten while napping. I'm not so idiotic as to go snapping photos away and then see if a snake can fit my whole finger in its mouth.

Though it was awesome to spend that night with her and her male friend (note: I did not say boyfriend). I often went days without seeing a woman. And I would pass people and stop to chat for a few minutes, but there was definitely a stretch there where, out of 100 hours, I spent well over 99 of them completely and utterly alone.

That said I've done too much typing. I'll trying to get pics up scenery and injuries up soon as I can, and will hopefully post again in less time than this last gap.

Cheers,
Cameron Bynum