Running from the hills of Unity to the Belfast waterfront, Ryan Howes, 34, of Belfast followed the recently completed Hills to Sea Trail on Saturday, Nov. 5, for a 46-mile journey supported by a team of family and friends. A health coach and registered Maine Guide, Howes may be the first person to essentially run the entire length of the new trail in one day.
“While running, I couldn’t help but think about how cool this trail system is,” Howes said. “It’s just a great place-based education for Waldo County and people close by to have a trail system that connects rural Maine to the ocean.”
Howes was unable to run on a few sections of the Hills to Sea Trail because of closures for hunting season. He detoured around those closed sections, running on nearby roads so that his run would be continuous and would total the trail’s full length: 46 miles.
“My mother was the logistical backbone of the whole effort,” Howes said. “She came up from New Hampshire and basically had all of my gear — my first aid and changes of shoes and socks, trekking poles for hills, my food and water — and met me at places along the trail.”
The Hills to Sea Trail, officially completed in September, is a continuous walking trail that spans from Route 9 in Unity east to the new Belfast Rail Trail, traveling through the towns of Unity, Thorndike, Knox, Freedom, Montville, Morrill, Waldo and Belfast. Marked with blue blazes and wooden signs, this 46-mile trail was created by the Waldo County Trails Coalition, a group of 10 local organizations with the mission to raise environmental awareness and education, as well as support community wellness and local businesses by attracting recreation-based tourism.
The trail travels through conserved land and the properties of more than 60 private landowners who’ve allowed the trail on their property through handshake agreements.
“We’re one of the few states that that’s a possibility in because we have strong landowner liability protections here built in by our legislature,” Cloe Chunn, a volunteer heavily involved in the creation of the trail, said.
Construction of the Hills to Sea Trail began in 2013, with the first section completely between Unity Village and the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association Common Ground Education Center in Thorndike. Over the years, the Waldo County Trails Coalition has continued to lengthen the trail from both directions. In September of this year, the two sides of the trail were linked, when the last trail segment was completed between Route 131 in Belfast and Frye Mountain Wildlife Management Area in Knox.
Celebrations for the trail’s completion are being planned for spring 2017, but when Howes learned the trail had been completed this fall, he didn’t want to wait to experience the trail in its entirety.
“The trail for me is sort of rooted in my past,” Howes said. “I was a student at Unity College, and I’ve lived in those towns, and now I’ve set roots in Belfast as a business owner.”
Originally from the Augusta area, Howes graduated from Unity College in 2007 with a bachelor’s degree in adventure education leadership and adventure therapy. Now living in Belfast, he works as a health coach and is the owner and operator of Northern Vertical, a guiding business that offers guided rock and ice climbing trips, mountaineering trips and summer camps for rock climbing.
While Howes has always been an athletic person, he’s never completed a marathon — 26.2 miles — let alone an ultramarathon, which is any footrace longer than a marathon. His decision to attempt running the entire 46-mile Hills to Sea Trail came to him while running on the easternmost section of the trail this fall.
“I knew this was certainly the longest aerobic endeavor of my career, and I felt I was in good shape and I was ready for it,” Howes said. “I knew as an athlete I could do this. And if I had to, I’d just walk if I couldn’t run any longer.”
He completed the 46-mile run in approximately 13½ hours, starting at 7:30 a.m. in Unity and ending by headlamp light at 9 p.m. at City Point Station in Belfast. He then ran to Three Tides to celebrate with friends and family.
“I had a great time,” Howes said. “I want to train so I can potentially go back next year and run the trail from start to finish in the time that I had originally proposed.”
Initially, Howes thought he might be able to complete the trail in about 10½ hours. But with winter on the horizon, he didn’t have much time to train before hitting the trail and much of his time preparing was spent figuring out how to re-route around sections of the trail that were closed for hunting season.
“It was kind of a bummer,” he said. “I had to drive several days in advance to take a look at where all these trailheads and roads met and figure out exactly which trials were closed.”
Looking toward the future, the Waldo County Trails Coalition is already considering ways to improve the new trail, possibly be re-routing sections so they remain open year-round.
“Any time you have a trail based on handshake agreements, it’s subject to changes,” Cloe Chunn, a volunteer heavily involved in the creation of the Hills to Sea Trail, said.
“We definitely want the trail to be as useful as possible to the community,” Maury Hepner, volunteer and chairman of the trail committee for the Hills to Sea Trail, said. “So we’re open for suggestions and open to possibilities.”
Howes worked with Hills to Sea Trail mapmaker Margot Carpenter to plan out his run and the detours. In the end, Howe ran about 33 miles on the trail and 13 miles on the road.
“I kept my pace perfectly until the marathon marker, then I hike Frye Mountain, which was just a massive leaf pile,” Howes said. “I could barely run anymore because it was basically leaves on top of acorns on the mountain.”
While Howes enjoyed the run, he said he wouldn’t necessarily recommend people run it during this time of year. The fresh-fallen leaves not only made it slippery, it made the new trail more difficult to detect, even though the route is marked with blue blazes and signs. He also cautions runners that much of the trail is filled with exposed tree roots, which makes footing tricky.
Originally, Howes planned to run the trail independent of any help, stashing supplies at different spots along the way. But he changed his mind when a number of people expressed their enthusiasm to help him in the endeavor. Three friends took turns running with him on the trail while his mother, Tina Rollins, shuttled supplies.
Three friends took turns running with him for sections of the trail, and his mother, Tina Rollins, supported him throughout the run by meeting him at different locations with food, water and other supplies.
“I might not have finished the trail if I hadn’t had the accountability of all these people, their smiling faces to help me through everything,” Howes said.
Howes, along with other trail runners in the Belfast area, have been talking with members of the Waldo County Trails Coalition about the possibility of an organized ultramarathon on the trail next year. While there’s no event planned yet, when it comes to the Hills to Sea Trail, the future is full of possibilities.
For information about the Hills to Sea Trail, including maps, visit waldotrails.org.