Day 123 Into Baxter

Today we hiked out of the 100 Mile Wilderness and entered Baxter State Park, the home to Mt Katahdin.


I did not sleep well last night. I’m not sure why, but I had a hard time getting comfortable given the heat. Fortunately the rain held off until after we packed up our tents, so we were able to keep everything dry. We started hiking at around 7:45. 


The rain didn’t hold off forever. It started pouring just after we started hiking. We missed a couple views in the morning but nothing major. We passed a few lakes and had very minimal elevation change. 



We hiked over Rainbow Ledges, a short climb up where we would have had good views of Katahdin on a clear day. Throughout the day we passed signs that showed the distance to the main peak of Katahdin, Baxter peak. 




Maine has a lot of roots and mud. We were so soaked by the rain that we just splashed through the puddles, it’s not like our feet could get any more wet. 



Before noon we exited the 100 Mile Wilderness. Overall the 100 Mile Wilderness was not difficult, mostly flat with a few short climbs. The hardest part was having to carry 4 days of food. The northern end of the wilderness was marked by a sign warning southbound hikers of the 100 mile wilderness, a copy of the sign we saw at the southern end.



Abol Bridge goes over a branch of the Penobscot River and has a famous overlook of Katahdin. Unfortunately our view was fogged out, but we will be able to see it when we come back on Tuesday to summit Katahdin. There is also a general store that sells some basic food. We crossed the bridge and bought some premade sandwiches, chocolate milk, doughnuts, and some other snacks. It was incredible eating a variety of food again after having only trail food for the last 4.5 days. 




After Abol we officially entered Baxter State Park. We hiked through Baxter for about 9 miles to finish off the day. We passed streams and hiked through flat forests. We hiked very quickly to make it to the base of Katahdin by 4PM. In total we hiked 21.5 miles today.







We arrived at Katahdin Stream Campground just after 4. From here we have about 5 miles until the end of the AT and the top of Katahdin. 




Ashley and Brooke arrived to pick us up from the campground at around 4:45. We drove to my parents’ lakehouse which is about 2 hours away. On the way we stopped for dinner. We will spend tomorrow hanging out inside, then go back to Katahdin Stream Campground to summit Katahdin on Tuesday.


Goodnight,

Walker 

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