Onward and Southward

Uncle Pauly summited Mt. Katahdin this past Friday, completing the northern 65% of the Appalachian Trail and climbing the highest mountain in Maine (5,267 feet).  Now he'll return to Harpers Ferry, West Virginia and become a Southbounder.  In honor of this momentous occasion, Ben and I, my dad, and Andrea joined the bandwagon and succeeded in slowing him down tremendously reaching the summit with him.  The stars aligned for a perfect hike - stunning September weather with zero humidity and the bluest of skies,  a successful eleventh hour scramble for babysitting (thanks Grandma!), and a collection of people who made spending ten hours going up and down a mountain a lot of fun.  Paul said he felt like we were surrounded by paparazzi on our way up, as three cameramen amongst us five couldn't help but stop and capture the experience and the views.  Oh the views!  180+ pictures later (don't worry, we've edited those down...sort of), I'll let the photos speak for themselves. 

 Magyars representing

 What have we gotten ourselves into?

 Oh this is easy!  Just a walk in the woods.

 With some pretty falls.

Huh, these are some big rocks.

 Rocks, rocks and more rocks.

Yay Dad!

 Yup, that's what the blaze says.  Straight up.

 Did we miss the memo about needing rock-climbing gear?

 Things start getting silly at 3,000 feet up.

Paparazzi - they're everywhere!

Snack break before the last climb to Tabletop.

 The summit blanketed by a lone cloud.  

Objects at this altitude may appear closer than they actually are...

 Dad making his way across the Tabletop.

 Our reward: Views from the summit.

One happy hiker.

 Knife's Edge.  We decided to skip that slice of fun.

We did it!  Now only 5 more miles down...

 Lone picture from the  less climactic trip back down.

There's us!  Five in and five out.  Ten hours later.  Success!