Homeward Bound

   Where is home, anyway? Have I mentioned that? I can't remember. It's Bedford, Indiana, located in the south-central part of the state. Yea, we're Hoosiers.
   Rolling hills and cornfields. Limestone and caves. In fact, Bedford calls itself the 'Limestone Capital of the World'. A thick, dense layer known as Salem Limestone can be found here in better quality than anywhere else in the U.S. It has been used in such places as the Empire State Building and the Pentagon. But I digress...
   Just how were we planning on getting home from Maine? Well, for one, we never really had a plan since we didn't expect to make it this far in the first place. We'll cross that bridge when we get to it, we would say, rolling our eyes. Well, here we are.
   Several friends and/or family had offered to come and get us, but when push came to shove the practicality of that fell through. They seemed to be much more concerned about how we were getting home than we were. From our perspective, after walking here almost 2200 miles all the way from Georgia, we figured we could find a way.
   As I said in an earlier post, we left Baxter State Park on 10/5 in a shuttle headed for Millinocket, the closest town. All thru-hikers pass through here when they are done. The local hostel, the AT Lodge, was full for the night, so we got a room at a motel, found some Chinese food, and went to sleep. The following day was Wander's birthday, and we planned to spend the day in town before heading home the next day. One final zero day. We needed to find some clothes that didn't stink, say goodbye to our AT friends one last time, and get some rest before our long (well, relatively) journey home. We got a room at the AT Lodge that night and had a good time staying immersed in the AT culture for just a little bit longer.
   The following morning the Lodge drove us a short distance to Medway, where we caught a bus to Portland. Long, long ago we had promised ourselves a lobster dinner in Maine, and this was our chance to make that happen. We spent the night in Portland and explored a little bit of the waterfront, bought some souvenirs, and ate our Lobsters.
   We had decided to try traveling home by train, and so the next morning we caught one headed for Boston out of Portland. Once in Boston we had to take a subway to a different train station where we got on a train headed for Chicago. We will get off early in Elkhart, IN, where Wander's brother lives and can take us home from there. All in all, about 24 hours onboard a train, which is where we are now. Somewhere in the middle of New York State, in the middle of the night, we creep along, inching our way closer to home.