Appalachian Trail: nature could care less

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Blissful leaves Baxter State Park to enter the 100-mile Wilderness, learning that "everything changes" including the weather.

1. Blissful is waiting a pathology report from breast surgery, unsure if she will get the all-clear or have to manage a cancer diagnosis.
2. Her surgeon encourages just to start hiking while she waits and here she is.
3. Lured into the lovely idyllic summer weather at the start of hiking the Appalachian Trail (AT) Blissful gives away her plastic waterproof backpack liner to pack her gear in compression sacks that fail completely.
4. The walk out of Baxter State Park is flat and easy, the trail lined with wildflowers and filled with bird song.
5. At Abol Bridge, she meets other hikers and they look back at Katahdin as the air turns black, lightnings strikes the summit and it begins pouring rain.
6. Maine rain is different in humid, saturated air and she's almost immediately soaked through.
7. At the warning sign, three miles ahead of the first shelter at Hurd Brook, it begins to hail.
8. She sets her tent with new friends who offer dry clothes and to share their tent if she gets too cold, but somehow she sleeps well through the night in a lumpy and clammy down quilt.

MUSIC:Poema del Pastor Coya by Angel Lasala as played by Alison Young, flute and Vicki Seldon, piano

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