Bigelows

Felt sluggish after my zero yesterday, town food and beer are the likely culprits, though momentum may be a factor as well. I easily could have spent another day lounging around Stratton, though I already experienced all it had to offer. I’ve seen a lot of small town Appalachia life on this trip, and though the accents changed, from the southern drawl to the New England… I don’t know what to call it, but the nasal A sound and the weak R that sounds like an H. I never thought about it before, but in the south the A goes lower in the throat but up here it goes up towards the nose. Accents are fascinating. My digressions maybe less so.

Got over the Bigelows today, looks like things calm way down from here. No more big climbs until Katahdin, but there are new challenges ahead. Namely, rivers to ford. I’ve crossed a couple that were low enough to rock hop but I don’t think I’ll be so lucky going forward. The move seems to be to take off your socks, remove your insoles and hope your boots dry quickly. The rain that was supposed to hit last night passed over and the forecast calls for clear skies the next few days at least, so the waters shouldn’t be too high. I’m still a few days out from that, so we’ll cross that lack of bridge when we come to it.

I started this journal talking about my love of maps, and there was a great, hand drawn map at the Bigelow Col campsite today. I’m tenting at the Little Bigelow lean-to (-172.9)