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lobster
10-10-2005, 16:22
a positive or negative aspect of the AT?

Lone Wolf
10-10-2005, 16:24
A good thing. Burgers and beer.

the goat
10-10-2005, 16:36
the biggest burger i've ever been served, at any establishment, in my life. it was awesome. and few things beat cold beer after hiking all day.

i gotta give it the official goat seal of approval!

rickb
10-10-2005, 16:45
Sure changes the dynamic for a SOBO taking his first step into the WIlderness on the way to Monson, now.

Frankly, I think they are poorer for it.

Grampie
10-10-2005, 17:38
During my "01" Thru I stopped at White House Landing. I had flipped and was heading SOBO. Did a mail drop, I wasn't charged extra, ate a fine hamburger, had a great breakfast, took a swim in the lake and went for a conoe ride. During the canoe ride I saw an eagle take a fish from the water.
The bunk room was clean and spacious and I thought that the folkes, who own and run it were nice.
As far as I'm conserned,I'd stop again. :)

Mouse
10-10-2005, 17:41
I have the very fondest memories of wolfing down a delicious 1 lb cheeseburger, following it with a pint of Ben and Jerry's, then nearly going for another burger. And the resupply I mailed to myself there helped speed me on my way. A definite asset! :D

If one really wants to do the 100 miles without a break one is perfectly free to do so. Just like no one HAS to go to Gatlinburg.

DustyBoots
10-10-2005, 20:50
In 2000 I did the 100 Mile Wilderness with 3 Boy Scouts and a co-leader. When we got to White House the boys said they wanted to stop there for lunch. I told them that they could go; I would wait for them on the trail. After a little thought all decided to skip it. After our trek all of us stated that it was a personal accomplishment to hike the Wilderness the old fashioned way (with out re-supplying). Still today when we reminisce about the trek we comment that we are glad we skipped White House Landing. We re-supplied at <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" /><st1:place><st1:PlaceName>Abol</st1:PlaceName> <st1:PlaceType>Bridge</st1:PlaceType></st1:place> and went on to summit Katahdin. Not a bad section hike for three 16 year olds and two old guys. YOU’VE GOT TOO HIKE YOUR OWN HIKE!<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>

rickb
10-10-2005, 21:37
If one really wants to do the 100 miles without a break one is perfectly free to do so.

True. But walking up to the sign marking entry to the 100-Mile as a rookie hiker and knowing that you have to walk all the way to Monson, without a burger/roof and potential helping hand at a comfy lodge along the way, was a cool experience. An experience that today's hikers can't experience.

On the otherhand I hear the burger is tasty, and so today's hikers might come out ahead.

Moxie00
10-10-2005, 22:35
I love the place, actually it has been there for years, it's just in the last five or so years a tote road was cut to make it accessable so now it is a regular stop. When Walter Green first laid the trail out in Maine he went from sporting camp to sporting camp, Antlers campsite was one of those sporting camps and Pierce Pond still remains on the trail. In the 1930's there were alot more sporting camps in the 100 mile wilderness. Everyone has the option of stopping or not and it is well off the trail so it doesn't ruin the wilderness adventure. I loved a shower and a pizza two days from Abol Bridge and the folks running it, like most sporting camp operators, were real nice people. It has been a favorite with cold water fishermen, snowmobilers, cross country skiiers, and hunters long before the hikers found it, or it found the hikers. I give it four stars ****

ARambler
10-10-2005, 23:33
Note, this year they stopped accepting mail drops. I mailed one this year and last. This year they just returned it. I didn't have to buy much additional food at their store (especially after the burger) so it was a mixed blessing.

Are we really complaining about services that are over a mile from the trail?

rickb
10-11-2005, 07:36
Are we really complaining about services that are over a mile from the trail?

I am probably the only one in this thread that is coming close to complaining. I suppose my comments could be taken that way, but I prefer to think of them as an observation.

From my perspective,walking south past the warning sign which marked the northern end fo the 100-Mile was a very bid deal. I expect that it still is.

Knowing there is easy access to the White House Landing along the way has got to change that feeling some. At least I think so. So too, would knowing that there is easy access to an AMC facility, or roads that are well traveled by shuttle drives (if in fact either is the case, I don't know).

How important is the feeling that I am talking about? Depends on the person, I guess. My guess is that newbie SOBOs are the ones lucky enough to feel the emotions of walking into the 100 Miles most powerfully.

the goat
10-11-2005, 08:15
when i sobo'ed in '01, i didn't even know it was there. first heard a/b it when i was already in monson.

when i sobo'ed in '03 though, i definitely made a pit stop. the place is pretty sweet and the people that run it are extremely hiker-friendly. if you don't mind being eaten alive by mosquitoes for the 1.5 mile side trail, it's a worthy place to visit.

lobster
10-11-2005, 09:37
Sure does make a mental difference in planning and doing the "100 mile wilderness". It's not the same now. Of course in the "old" days, there were some places to bail.

Sort of reminds me of that 9 year old swimming from Alcatraz to the mainland yesterday. That rescue or support boat right beside the swimmer sure takes stress off the swimmer's mind.

The Old Fhart
10-11-2005, 10:30
lobster-"Sure does make a mental difference in planning and doing the "100 mile wilderness". It's not the same now."That is true but not in the way you think. My 1938 ME guidebook has the following section headings. Section 3-Rainbow Lake (Clifford's Camps) to Nahmakanta Lake (McDougall's camps); Section 4-Nahmakanta Lake (McDougall's camps) to Mahar Campground (Nahmakanta Stream); Section 5- Mahar Campground (Nahmakanta Stream) to Lower Joe Mary Lake (Potter's Antlers Camps); Section 6-Lower Joe Mary Lake (Potter's Antlers Camps) to Yoke Pond (Berry's Camps); Section 7-Yoke Pond (Berry's Camps) to Third West Branch Pond (also Chadwick's Outlying Camp).

The list goes on but you should get the point by now. There wasn't a day of hiking that you didn't pass at least one camp complex. A lot of the trail description in the guidebook mentions crossing roads, going thru lumber yards, and following along telephone wires. This area may have been wild when Thoreau visited Katahdin but it certainly wasn't wild when the A.T. was cut thru the area. It certainly has far fewer amenities than it did years ago.

Lone Wolf
10-11-2005, 10:33
The "wilderness" is a joke as far as it being wild. Roads everywhere. More beer and burger joints I say! :clap

alanthealan
10-11-2005, 10:58
L. wole is right. There is more than just the Whitehouse where you can get "out" of the hundred mile. I don't see how it would be bad you make the choice to cross the road and keep going or you go eat... most hikers want to eat. Is there somthing wrong with burgers? :)

rickb
10-11-2005, 11:03
The list goes on but you should get the point by now. There wasn't a day of hiking that you didn't pass at least one camp complex.

In the more recent past, a hiker would not pass any camps, and would have virtually no knowledge of where the odd logging road led to-- even if he carried the ATC strip maps.

Nor would he have any assurance that anyone would drive down a given road for a long time to come.

Is that good or bad? The answer is probably different for every individual. For a person who values a good burger and friendly lodge keeper, it is much better now.

The Old Fhart
10-11-2005, 11:13
Rickboudrie-"In the more recent past, a hiker would not pass any camps..."That is true but lobster said: "Of course in the "old" days.." which I didn't limit to the last couple of years. In the several trips I've taken thru the 100 mile wilderness, I have yet to stop for burgers or resupply. I think next time I'll have to try WL for a change of pace.

Mouth
10-11-2005, 12:09
When I was leaving Monson, I planned to hit white house landing and resupply, so I only carried enough food to get there, I wish I had just resupplied for the whole hundred mile and dealt with the extra weight.

The dock to white house landing is listed as .9 off the trail, but it seemed like a bit further to me. We got there shortly after lunch and blew the horn, the guy was quick to pick us up in the boat, everything seemed to go well.

On the boat ride over, we asked him if the camp store was open, and he said very gruffly "No, this is the time when we get stuff done around here". So, we got dropped off on the edge of his property and that was about the end of the hospitality. I was with some other hikers, who had planned to stay the night and they were in one of the bunk houses. After about an hour of sitting around doing nothing, I went over to visit them and talk about what miles we would do, since we wanted to summit together. The white house landing guy came in to the bunk area that they had paid for and told me I wasn't allowed to be in there. At this point I realized that this guy had never heard of the "you get more flies with honey..." expression.

At around five we were allowed to order food, that was the bright spot on my wh landing experience, The burgers were big, but you paid a pretty penny for it, and you had no choice of how you wanted your burger, well done, or well done. So it took a while for the burgers to be cooked and you could resupply in the nowhere near reasonable selection (regular sized candy bars were $.95, ramen $.50, most everything was about three times what you would pay for it in any other remote store (like abol bridge)). After picking out resupply food and eating half the burger, the guy again spoke to us very gruffly, "I hate to tell you but the last ferry across is in ten minutes". So we choked down the rest of our burgers and at record breaking speed crammed everything into our food bags while this guy shot us irritated looks. Basically everything was done by their schedule, which meant you could do nothing for several hours and then had to do everything in less than one. After all of this, the guy had the nerve to then try and give us the hard sell on staying the night, by this point even if I had planned on staying I wouldn't have.

My friends that did stay pointed out that they paid something like $30 for a room with no electricity, no running water, no laundry facilities (save for a tub and washboard), etc. We agreed we probably wouldn't go back.

Moxie00
10-11-2005, 18:37
Walter Green was a Selectman in my home town and he died just a few years ago. I had the honor of talking with him before he passed away.Walter was the one who laid the origional AT in Maine, especially the 100 mile wilderness. Read The Old Fharts post. Myron Avery was anxious to have the trail end at Kathadin and Benton McKey wanted it to finish at Mount Washington. Walter Green got directions from Avery to lay out the trail ASAP. It was a wilderness then but the economy was different and rather than lumbering the economy of the area depended on hunters and fishermen and there were many remote camps to accomidate the sports. Walter took a map and an ax and simply blazed a trail from sporting camp to sporting camp. He followed camp roads, tote roads, game trails, fire wardens phone wires and in many places just bushwacked with his map and compass. The task he accomplished was monumental and the trail went camp to camp for many years. That is the trail that Earl Schaffer found on his first thru hike. In Walking With Spring Earl tells of eating turkey dinners in what is today the 100 mile wilderness. Without Walter Green's work the trail would have ended at Mount Washington and the best State on the trail would have been missed. By the 1950's the economy of Maine was changing. With the invention of the chain saw and the skidder logging got more extensive and one by one the camps went out of business, The Maine Applachian Trail Club, under the leadership of Dave Field started re-locating the trail off the game trails and logging roads and onto the mountaintops and ridges. Today over half the trail in Maine has moved from where it was in 1938 and is much harder and more beautiful. If you hiked the 1938 trail today you better bring flippers because you would have to walk miles on the bottom of Flagstaff Lake. My point is that if you stop at White House Landing you are doing no different than Earl Schaffer did in 1947. In Walking With Spring Earl walked right by many sporting camps and we all have that option today. However stopping for a burger is no different that Earl stopping for turkey dinner a half century ago. By the way, I don't know what happened to Mouth at White House. I found the owners accomidating, friendly, and very helpful. May have been a bad day for either Mouth or them.

Mouth
10-11-2005, 18:58
I suppose I could have shortened my entry by saying just this in the first place, but my sentiments were echoed by many a thru-hiker this year, especially the 6 others who visited the same day I did.

The general feeling that was expressed to me before I hit it was that White House Landing was a "hit or miss" place, and that your odds were better for a "hit" if you were staying the night. We got a "miss", take from it what you will.

SalParadise
10-11-2005, 19:14
Same sorta thing happened to me when I was there. Personally I had a great time and enjoyed myself, as did the four other thru-hikers who stayed there. He even went up in the attic to give a hiker a pair of shoes. We all left with vrey positive impressions.

Another couple who just resupplied there didn't get such a great impression, so it would seem that the kindness relates to staying there.

As for the food pricing and selection, it ain't an IGA and it is expensive, but considering how far they have to go to get to town and the remoteness of their place, the prices were reasonable.

Moxie00
10-16-2005, 11:02
In the winter White House Landing is easy to reach by snowmobile or by driving a four wheel drive truck across two lakes if there isn't too much snow. During the hiking season the owners have to cross not one but two lakes by boat, then get in their car at the boat landing and drive several miles to Millinocket for mail or supplies. Millinocket is a small island of civilization in a sea of wildrness so due to transportantion costs everything has to be expensive there. There are no phone or electric lines within miles of White House Landing. Yes food is expensive there and mail drops are not really easily available but try to appreciate what they do. I met several owners and managers of places hikers stay on the AT that were difficult to get along with but everyone isn't as perfect as we like. These folks do a pretty good job and everyone has a bad day and the pressures of making a living can be hard on anyone. Cut them some slack, If you had a problem with them or with any other host on the AT don't you think maby something you said or did may have rubbed them the wrong way?