Mountain Meditation

There is something truly exhilarating about that moment when you hit the summit of a peak and can pause to take in your surroundings, especially if there is a wide expansive view to reward your eyes. This is my favorite moment, that moment when my blood rushes back to my brain, no longer needed to transport as much oxygen to my legs, and my brain runs to meet the oxygen like two young lovers reunited after a forced isolation, passionately embracing one another and forgetting all that surrounds them. The brain soaks up the view like it has always been ravenous for the beauty before it, and their passionate exuberance overflows into expostulations of love and exhortations of the other. The harder the climb, the more passionate this embrace. It takes a few minutes to get past this furious embracing, but soon the two can settle down into a sort of quiet ecstatic gaze. This is where I like to find a spot to sit and meditate on my surroundings, drink in the gaze of my mountain lover and reset the quietness of my soul. This is my mountain meditation.

I pretty much lose track of time at this point, and sometimes lose track of my limbs and other physical stimuli. (Of course, this may be the oxygen deprivation.)  It is in this moment that the reset happens, where every ephemeral thing is put in the proper place by the permanence of the mountain, this pile of rocks that I sit on, built by same creator that put in me a yearning to sit on its summit.  Every other thing gets measured against the peaceful resolution of that yearning and the momentary anxieties and stresses are washed away in the flood of that effervescent mountain stream of consciousness that takes over the seemingly jumbled up thoughts and resets them into their proper place in my mountain mind-palace.  There everything is where it is for a reason, though I may not know that reason myself. But the mountain knows.

This was the meditation I sought as I went to climb a mountain in Evans Notch on a weekday during the COVID19 quarantine. The trailhead is ninety minutes away and exceeds the sixty-minute limit I had self-imposed, but I needed a mountain. I took off a weekday, so that I would hopefully find a trailhead that was not full. I planned alternatives in case the trailhead was inaccessible or full. I double-checked my pack for the 10 essentials and added in late winter gear. I posted to Facebook to find out about conditions to be more prepared. And then… I slept in! So much for an early start! It would mean that I did not try to summit Speckled Mountain, just Blueberry Mountain, still a peak, but quite a bit shorter.

I learned to respect that little peak.

I ignored the hand painted “Go Home” sign at the New Hampshire State line and noticed the Baldface Circle Trail Trailhead was not yet full. Not quite half-way into Shell Pond Road, I pulled my Ram 1500 4WD off the side, because it did not look easily passable, and I did not want to risk needing help during quarantine. As I walked the road into Stone House, I met a small Colorado pickup on his way out and was later passed by a Subaru. There was a Honda Civic in the parking area. I felt shamed, and figured I was just being too cautious.

In any case, I shortly began to go up the White Cairn trail to Blueberry Mountain, and very quickly started doffing layers. The trail is well worn, and many stone stairs are there to help lift you up the hillside. At one point a particularly beautiful spot of hemlock and fir covered a mountain stream crossing and filled my nostrils with sweet mountain aromas.

Further up the trail I was met by a Swanson’s Thrush as he paused to watch me catch my breath. Then he flitted off to the left, causing me to notice the perfect lunch spot—a sunny glade on a rock dominated by a stunted Jack Pine. I sat there and ate one of the best ham sandwiches ever, thinking I had perhaps come half-way. (Oh, how wrong I was!)  I had reception, so I Facebook bragged about my lunch spot to those less fortunate than I. I was passed by some a group of three college-aged youth as I ate. The lunch-in-glade moment is one of my favorite mountain moments as well.

Next came the stairs. They are not long, but you gain a lot of elevation fast as they are steep, and I stopped a few times to ensure I did not lack too much oxygen to keep my balance, and to soak in the view as it began to change drastically.

Then there is the scurry across open ledges, following the cairns until you get to the boundary marker for the Caribou Speckled Mountain Wilderness, and then more scrambling across ledges following cairns nearly straight up until the trail begins to wind around the western face of the summit through spruce and fir.  Here there was some ice and snow, eventually leading me to put on my microspikes, though they may not have been entirely necessary. Over exposed stone and through water-logged glades the trail wound its way to the summit, though not nearly as steep as the rock face scramble earlier.

From the Summit there is a lookout loop that must be taken to really appreciate this hike. My mountain mediation moment was found where that loop hits the southern face with a wide rock to sit on and mellow. I spent some time there and took more photos and video. Then I forgot time for a while.

As I sat there an older man emerged from the trees to the right where he was having his own mountain moment and we discussed the steepness of the trails up this mountain and the chilliness of the weather. He came up from Brickell House, though the gate on 113 was still closed. You can park at the Basin Pond gate and walk in, he said. We traded well-wishes and he walked slowly back.

Soon, I was able to stir myself from my mountain meditation back to reality. I did not have enough time to try to summit Speckled Mountain, but I had my fix, and I could save Speckled Mountain for another time. I went round the rest of the lookout loop, but none of the view was as spectacular as the first exposure. I found the Stone House Trail and began to descend. That trail follows a muddier, leaf covered path down the eastern side of the mountain and was harder to pick out. It had more switchbacks than the White Cairn trail, so I surmise it might be more modern.

Traditional Main trails seem to have the aversion to switchbacks, like they seem non-pragmatic, and so cannot be tolerated by Mainers. “If you are intending to summit a mountain, why wouldn’t you take the shortest trail to get there?” seems to be the modus operandi of Maine Trails. Erosion issues? Install a stone staircase and it will last for eons! Even when I thought the White Cairns trail was going to use a switchback, it was just to move laterally from one stone staircase to another! Switchbacks may also prove to offend the Maine approach of “less is more” to trail building. On my first trip through the 100-mile Wilderness, my wife and I thought that it was amazing how much trail could be “built” by a single can of white paint and a few piles of rocks (of course we spent some time lost there, leading to that commentary).  My time in the Midwest led me to believe that most trails are carved out of the woods, where Maine trails are simply marked for your convenience.

In any case the trail led inexorably downhill, and I left my microspikes on for traction in the mud until I got on more level ground. I met many people with dogs, most not on leashes (It is hard to leash a dog on a mountain trail), but all under verbal control.

I almost missed the sign for Rattlesnake Pool, I went past it and turned around and saw it, because it was facing so only people going uphill on the trail could see it. Do not miss it, it is a small raging waterfall that cascades into a deep green pool and is well worth the side-excursion. When I was there a Labrador Retriever was trying to retrieve several small trees from the pool and having the time of his life. He was with a couple holding a small child getting a picture in front of the waterfall. As they were hiking out, I heard his wife call his name saying, “Don’t you dare!” Turning, I could see him holding the child over the waterfall. We dads are all so alike!

From here the trail widens out and a little farther on there is a bride over a gorge created by that same stream that is worth a quick look. Bearing to the right, you come out near Stone House and can walk back to the gate on Shell Pond road. The scene with the mountains (Baldface especially) in the background and the old wagon wheels under the tree in the foreground was a great final moment to the day before I had to drive back home.

I drove my truck up to the gate to turn around, and had no trouble making it down the road. Then I drove home feeling a little melancholy that I had to leave my mountain moment behind but feeling so much better for having been there. During or after quarantine, I will return to Blueberry mountain, and plan on many trips when the blueberries are ripe!