Racing Irene

We're spending a soggy day at Northern Outdoors near Caratunk, ME, riding out the hurricane. Three days ago, we stopped for lunch on the roadside near Stratton, when our friends Swift, Deja, and Who Knows appeared and informed us of the impending landfall of Irene. The stretch between Stratton and Caratunk is either above treeline or boggy areas along ponds. Not good when the forecast calls for significant rainfall and high winds. So the five of us decided to push to Caratunk by Saturday night, in advance of Irene's predicted Sunday arrival.
One small hitch: crossing the Kennebec. All of the AT guidebooks stress the need to take the ferry across the river and the danger of fording it. The dam upstream releases unpredictably, which means the water levels can rise dramatically and quickly. Several hikers have died attempting the crossing, so now, the official AT route is the ferry.
Now, you need to keep in mind that when I say "ferry," I'm not talking about Staten Island. I'm talking about a guy and a canoe. Hillbilly Dave takes you two at a time across. And we witnessed firsthand the issues with the Kennebec. It was pretty innocuous when Pancho and I went across. By the time our buddies came across, the water had come up more than a foot and the current picked up enough to make it difficult to land the canoe. The ferry only operates two hours each morning and afternoon, so making it in time for the ferry was an issue. On the heels of two long days, we busted out thirteen miles over relatively flat terrain to get to the river crossing. By the last three miles, we were exhausted, driven only by the promise of hot showers and reputedly awesome nachos.
So now, we're waiting on a weather window to head out for our last 150 miles. Hopefully, we'll leave here tomorrow, but at the moment, we're drinking some great microbrews, playing Ms. Pacman, and listening to lots of 80s tunes.
We'll keep y'all posted. Hope everyone in the storm zone stays safe and well.