Day 9: 8/19/17

Terrible nights sleep. Actually, no sleep at all. The windows in the shelter were out and we were in the thick clouds. When the wind would blow, the clouds would roll into the shelter through the windows. It was awesome to watch, but miserably wet. Only 3 of us were in the shelter. Caitlin and I were on a double bottom bunk and a young guy was on the top bunk. He tossed and turned all night and he slept on the noisiest pad I’ve ever heard. I couldn’t wait until daylight.

When morning arrived, I realized I had to get out of my dry, warm clothes and put my wet, cold clothes back on. The forest was still very wet even though the rain had stopped. You MUST keep one set of dry clothes, so that meant the freezing, soaked ones had to go back on. Brrr. It was excruciating, but it had to be done.

Once dressed in the miserable, freezing cold, smelly clothes, we moved quickly down the mountain. We hiked to The Inn at Long Trail where we had our second food resupplies waiting. We weren’t staying overnight, but the very nice people let us do laundry to dry everything out. What a treat! Also, while our clothes washed, we were able to get a burger in the restaurant there. Double treat!! You can’t even imagine how good just a simple hamburger can be when you’ve eaten noodles and tuna for a week.

Once we had our bellies full and our clothes were clean we moved on up the trail. It was only a mile or so past this point that we split off from the AT. So from here everything is new territory for me

We ended today at the Rolston Rest Shelter. There is only 1 other person here. Quite a change from the crowds right now on the AT.

We have completed about 110 miles. We have about 163 to go.