Maine is a tough place to hike – and many experienced backcountry explorers know that, but this week was exceptionally merciless. On Tuesday, two women and their dog were rescued at dusk on a backcountry trail at Roque Bluffs State Park, then as they headed home the true tragedy struck. The Kennebec Journal reports…
“Two women hikers who had been rescued after getting lost at Roque Bluffs State Park on Tuesday night drowned in their minivan a short while later apparently after taking a wrong turn while trying to leave the park and driving off a boat ramp into the ocean. The women were found in the back seat, probably because the van would have sunk front-end first, and the back would have been the last area to fill with water. The dog, a pit bull mix, also died. It’s possible the van’s electric windows and automatic door locks stopped working once the minivan was submerged.”
One of the women was five months pregnant, which makes this event especially tragic. 
View from Sugarloaf Mountain, near Carrabassett Valley, Maine
And if that isn’t enough … a 66 year old Appalachian Trail thru-hiker went missing near Sugarloaf Ski Resort in Maine and has yet to be found. A 130+ volunteer search party is currently combing the area looking for the missing women:
“Search crews spent Friday looking for a missing hiker behind Sugarloaf Mountain in Carrabassett Valley. Geraldine Largay 66 is missing along a stretch of Maine’s Appalachian Trail. Game Wardens believe she spent Tuesday night inside a trail-side shelter with another hiker but no one has seen nor heard from her since. Rangers in aircraft wardens and volunteers on foot spent a second straight day searching a roughly 25-square-mile section of the Appalachian Trail. They are pretty sure Largay of Brentwood Tenn. somehow veered off the trail. Largay’s husband George last saw his wife Sunday morning near Rangeley when he met her to drop off supplies. He had planned on meeting her along Route 27 near Carrabassett Valley Tuesday evening.” From WMTM News 8
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