Pushing our limits

Last week we took a good but inadvertently arduous hike…

We were up to the Maine house to open it for the year and we set aside Wednesday in the middle of the week that was forecast to be good weather.

After the normal game of parking lot bingo we parked in a small lot above Jordan Pond.

Next we hiked down to the east side of Jordan Pond to the bridge at the bubble end where the trail to Sargent began.

One of Gail’s distant cousins?

Fishy’s!

It’s always a bit of work for me on the way up. 

Your guys are slow-pokes!

A carriage trail bridge built in 1925

Puppy break!

Jordan Pond from Sargent Summit.

Not my fault.

Eventually we summitted Sargent and ate lunch. 

As usual the views were spectacular. 

The Trenton Peninsula is entering
the picture on the right hand side.
Blue Hill is the small mountain in the distance.
In between them both this Newberry neck.

After eating and hydrating we proceeded to Penobscot 

where we planned to climb back down to Jorden Pond.

Please, don’t make rockpeople from the directional cairns.

The view doesn’t get better than this! ;)

Actually, with some cropping it does! Lol!

Panoramic Jordan Pond.

Jordan Pond end to end.

On a water break I noticed these ants farming the blueberry blooms. ❤️

Blueberry blooms! 💙🫐

Busy little farmers! Can’t wait to return in
July/August for some trailside trail mix!

Almost down the steepest part we had a first. There is a sort of corkscrew we have previously climbed up but never down. Lets just say it’s a lot more scary going down than it is going up. 

Anyway, for the first time I can remember in his hiking career Lem baulked. Would not could not. So we honored his feelings and turned around. 

The result however was that we had to climb Penobscot twice. Does this make it a three-bagger?

After resummiting Penobscot we descended to the Deerbrook trail.

It was at about this time that my phone went kapoot so I slipped it in my backpack and focused on the trail.

Gail tends to slow down on the return trip from the impact of descent. Fortunately for all of us this section was straight forward steps down with some rock scramble over the creek-bed.

Although we have accented from here before it’s generally not a challenge but to my mind in our tired condition it was the best possible way down.

Eventually, the three of us tuckered old trail warriors stumbled down Deerpath trail to the western portion of the Jordan Pond trail, wobbled around the pond till we made it to our “last car in the empty lot” and drove home. 

“Parting the Jordon.”

Where we were met with yet another award winning sunset! 

Sunset across the Union River Bay.

I assume I will get better at doing this in the future. My reason for doing so is to be more intentional with my journaling rather than simply throwing them on Facebook and adding to the scroll patrol. 

~

Mark W. Ó Brien

03June2024