Start: Full Goose Shelter
End: Frye Notch Lean-to
Mileage: 15.5
So the original plan for the day was to see how we felt and either go 12.0 to Baldpate Lean-to or the 15.5 to Frye Notch Lean-to. Towanda started a few minutes after me but needed to go back for her rain jacket so I didn’t see her until maybe 11am after I left the shelter at 6:45am. We hiked together until we hit Maine 26, when we met up with Stretch, who is a thru hiker who stayed at Full Goose last night. All three of us agreed we were exhausted and would stay at Baldpate Lean-to. Towanda took the lead after the road crossing, heading for the shelter. Unfortunately, she missed the sign and ended up over the next large mountain before realized the mistake. She ended up continuing on the Frye Notch Lean-to. Stretch and I were confused;we had dinner at the shelter and decided to push on to Frye Notch. We made the two peaks by 7:15pm and hoped to make the shelter by 8pm. Unfortunately, we thought we’d missed the side trail to the shelter so we ended up backtracking quite a ways and then had to turn back around again and continue onward. We made the shelter by 9pm. Thankfully, there was just enough space in the shelter for us.
Today, we hiked over Fulling Mill Mountain (3,395′), through Mahoosuc Notch, up Mahoosuc Arm (3,770′), Old Speck [just shy of peak] (3,985′), Baldpate Mountain West Peak (3,662′), and Baldpate Mountain East Peak (3,810′).
On my way down Fulling Mill Mountain, I fell quite hard. There were two folks watching and they were frightened for me. I was surprisingly alright, despite slipping on a log ladder and plummeting ~15 feet down into a crevasse with a sharp rock ridge sticking up in it. I strained my knee and bruised my leg but overall, it turned out shockingly well!
Transcending Mountains 