Had to get up super early to clear out the hut dining room before breakfast. Made my own oatmeal with the hut’s hot water and we got under way as quickly as possible. It was a chilly morning deep in Carter Gap where the sun couldn’t reach until almost mid-day. We were heading up the east side of the gap too, in shade, another vertical ascent. No as bad as the initial climb into the Wildcats but still intense. It was nice to have the worst part of the day over in the first hour though. We made our way across the rest of the ridge, more Wildcat peaks, Carter Dome, and Mt. Moriah. Almost all of it was still rugged, rocky terrain. Some of the descents were very technical, more like an obstacle course than a trail. We had to navigate tricky rock formations often requiring hand usage, and sometimes sitting down to ease over otherwise dangerous steps. There were numerous bog boards today, planks of wood in the trail to keep the trail above water in marshy areas – the problem though is that the boards get super slippery. Unless they are in the sun they soak up and hold water and have been responsible for several slips and/or falls. We all made it out alive though, eventually descending toward Highway 2, and Gorham, NH. Basically it took us two full days of hiking on the trail to move about 9 miles as the crow flies. Instead of going back into town though, we are staying at the White Mountain Hiker Hostel right on the trail. It’s a nice place; but super crowded as most everywhere has been lately. The Whites seem to have created a nice bottleneck and grouped everyone up.
I’m excited to be done with this part of the trail and excited to soon be in Maine. The first day of Maine includes the single most difficult mile on the whole trail, but hopefully after that this huge group of hikers will spread back out a bit. Overall I’m definitely ready just to make it to Katahdin and be done too. Still some awesome trail and incredible sights, but the cumulative effect of 135 days is starting to grow. Gonna be nice going home.