We had a lot of rain last night, so everything was super humid this morning. We stayed dry though. We lingered a bit late in the tarp this morning as the wind blew cold, raw air around us. Eventually, we hiked down towards Maine 27, the road that goes to the town of Stratton. It was slow hiking to get there, as the trail was very rooty and slick. We then started the long and challenging climb up to the Bigelow Range. The climb to get up to the range was pretty slow and rocky. We passed this guy near the way up. It was technically about a mile off from where our guide claimed it should be, but whatever, close enough!

There were some nice views of Horns Pond and the North and South Horn peaks from the ridge.

We climbed South Horn, which was a steep rocky half mile.

Then we descended and climbed back up to the open ridge of Bigelow West Peak. The views were outstanding.

Next up was a brief descent and climb right back up to the Bigelow Avery Peak, which had even more amazing views.

The weather was fantastic and the scenery was spectacular. We took a long snack break just sitting and marvelling at these views from Avery Peak. It’s very challenging here in Maine, but the reward for the hard work is awesome.

We then climbed down the steep 2 mile descent to the giant boulders down in Safford Notch. We hiked the extra 3/10 of a mile to the campsite here and called it a day around 5pm. Tomorrow we climb off the Bigelow Range. We also have no major mountains tomorrow, which is actually a nice break since these last 3 days have been tough.

Vital stats for Wednesday, September 3rd :
Milestone – we are officially 2000 milers
Mountains remaining – 5
Miles hiked today – 13.5
Mood – great
Physical state – same – tired, but ok
Smell – huge, terrible moose
Song stuck in my head – Dear Avery by The Decemberists