Speck In The Woods

Day 11: 8/21/17

Happy solar eclipse day.

Wow. Today was another tough day without any real views. We climbed 3 ski mountains, count them, 3, I said ski mountains today along with a few other mountains. There are no switchbacks. They are straight up and straight down. We’re both very frustrated with the fact that this trail isn’t offering any beautiful scenery. Maybe we’re both just tired. After all, we’ve hiked at least 9 hours a day, today 10-1/2hours with the exception of the first day and the day we went into Manchester Center, in which case we hiked 5 hours those days. We haven’t had any zero days and don’t plan to take any.

One good thing about today is that we hit the halfway point. We’re at about mile 139.

Tonight we’re in the skylight lodge which is a log enclosed shelter. There’s one other person here, Jack. He’s from Vermont and section hiking the LT. We only saw one other person hiking today. Again, it was a SOBO.

When we arrived here tonight we had to get our water from a frog pond. Yuk!! I filtered it first and then boiled it.

Turning in hoping for a good nights sleep and a good day tomorrow.

Day 10: 8/20/17

Tough day. The LT is not groomed or kept nearly as well as the AT. There are many blowdowns across the trail that you have to navigate around. There was only one hiker today going southbound We’re in camp at Sunrise Shelter. No one else is here. We set up tents. The shelter isn’t very appealing. The air is cool. I’ve eaten supper and I’m still hungry. I had a freeze-dried chicken lime rice meal. Then I had some salami and some veggie stick snacks. And lastly I had a piece of chocolate. I think I could eat a double of everything.

Supposedly the trail is about to give us some views. We’ll see. We’ve definitely been in the green tunnel for a while now. Also, it seems we have to earn those views. Apparently the terrain is about to get more challenging.

We’re going on day 6 without a shower. We’re both pretty ripe. We have 3 more days and then we’ll be staying at an Inn for the night for another resupply. Looking forward to getting there. We have a way to go.

I was very irritable today. I fell once. I’m fine, but it made me mad.

The end for now.

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.

Day 8: 8/18/17

Rain, rain and more rain.

We woke up to wind and cold air and knew the rain was coming. We quickly, and I mean quickly, tore down camp and got packed up within seconds of the rain starting. It started about 7:30 am and never stopped all day. The trail was a river.

We had a pretty tough climb up Mount Killington. We debated stopping at the shelter 10 miles in and calling it a day, but we decided we were already wet and cold so we might as well continue and conquer Killington. We arrived at the summit muddy, wet, and shivering cold. There is a shelter (Cooper Lodge) on top of the mountain. They call it an enclosed shelter, but the windows are busted out so it really isn’t enclosed. It was run down and filthy, but it was drier than outside so we decided to stay. We changed into warm, dry clothes and cooked supper. We were eating when Sir Poops A Lot and Stacks came in. Turns out Sir Poops a Lot is a Woodard. No kin though. We hadn’t seen them in several days. They continued on down the mountain to stay at a Hostel. There were a few other people who stopped in but only one young guy stayed, Screwdriver.

We made a little over 14 miles in the downpour today. Nothing really interesting about the trail. No views today really. We were walking in rain and fog all day.

Hoping to have a little ☀️ tomorrow.

Day 7: 8/17/17

First and foremost, today is our 37th anniversary. Happy Anniversary, Danny. I love you and miss you. ❤ Hope you’ve had a great day!

On the trail today, it was a great day. We both felt strong and made our miles without too much discomfort. We stopped at one point while crossing a creek and took a little bath. Didn’t do a whole lot of good because we left the creek and immediately had a climb. We needed another bath with 30 minutes. One highlight today was trail magic. We got to the base of the mountain and a former hiker was there with a wonderful spread of goodies. I had a bottle of water, a granola bar and a tangerine. Yum. It was so nice.

We arrived at Minerva Hinchey Shelter where there is a mom with 3 children camping. They’re on a 3 day hike. The kids are fighting nonstop and the mom is yelling nonstop. Also, there is a group of Harvard freshman orientation camping here. It’s soooooo loud. Makes you want to pack up and keep walking. It’s good though to hear them having a good time

Most people that we’ve seen and leapfrogged with have moved ahead. We are at mile 84.1 of 273, so we have 188.9 miles left.

Day 6 8/16/17

Man, oh man. I got a great nights sleep last night. Caitlin and I had a room in the Hostel to ourselves. It was comfortable and quiet.

We both had packed our packs with our resupplies last night. They have a hanging scale there so we weighed our packs. Olfrie weighed 31.2 pounds with one less bottle of water than I usually take. I like to try to keep her 30 lbs. or under. Just means I need to eat all the heavy stuff first. It sounds funny, but that’s exactly what I do. I don’t eat what sounds good, I eat what weighs the most. Caitlin’s pack was 31.6. We both felt it today in our feet. I stopped to get water at about 10 miles in and soaked my feet while I got water. Of course I collected the water on the side that was upstream of my feet. 😳

Duffie delivered us, along with Grounded, back to the trail at 8:15 am. We made scrambled eggs for breakfast before we left. They were delicious. Grounded is hiking the AT SOBO, so we said our goodbyes to her at the trailhead. Quick story.  When Duffie picked us up we both said to one another that we thought we had met.  Turns out, we met in Maine at the Monson Hostel. It’s a small world.

We immediately had a climb up Bromley Mtn. Bromley is a ski mountain so there was a gondola and warming hut on top. There were a few nice views from there. We continued on and had several other climbs that led to nice views. My favorite of the day was a granite scramble up Baker Peak. The views were amazing.

We covered 14.8 miles today. We’re at Lost Pond Shelter tonight. We’re tenting. There are a couple SOBO thru-hikers here and about 5 NOBO AT thru-hikers. I think the crowds are gonna disappear in another couple of days once we split off from the AT and head toward Canada.

It’s cold tonight. I’m guessing in the 50’s. It feels nice. We had perfect hiking weather today. The only negative about a chilly night for me is having to get out of my cozying quilt in the morning.

Day 5:  8/14/17

Remember the Green Mountain House Hostel from my 2015 AT hike where I finally got a shower, washed my hair and got to shave my legs and then angels sang? Yeah. Well here I am again. And, yes—I got a shower, washed my hair and shaved my legs for the first time in 5 days and yes, the angels sang again.  I’ve worn the same clothes for the last 5 days and they even got washed today.

Thumbsucker and I got up early this morning and headed out of camp after some warm oatmeal. We made our way down the trail for the 8.9 miles to the road that leads into Manchester Center. At one point on the trek today we were about 3 miles from the road and a couple who had started a day hike from the road hiking southbound passed us. Caitlin and I both literally turned when they walked by and I actually said outloud, “Wow, you guys smell really good.” They smelled like fresh laundry. It was such a good smell. I can’t even describe how we smelled, but their aroma made us stop in our tracks and inhale deeply over and over again. It really is the little things. Lol

So we made pretty good time and got down to the road. There was a Scottish man standing by the road hoping for a ride. He wasn’t having any luck. Cars were rushing by. We told him he had to stick his thumb out to solicit a pick up. Caitlin and I dropped our packs and stuck our thumbs out and within 2 minutes a Subaru pulled over and we all 3 quickly jump in. The lady driving introduced herself as Margaret, the local pastor. She was super friendly and very comedic. She kept us laughing the whole way to town. She was telling us to eat at Thai Basil and said she use to work there as the bartender. I asked if she was a bartender before she became a pastor and she just replied, “both”. She was very kind and we were very appreciative of her kindness.

Margaret dropped us off at Thai Basil and we enjoyed a delicious meal. We then went across the street to the ice cream shop (this is where Ben & Jerry’s is made).  Dancing Bear, Uncle Puck and JP were all there. Caitlin joined them for ice cream and I went next door for a cup of coffee.

Caitlin and I went to the Outfitter and actually found a couple of things we needed in the free hiker box. We then went into a local co-op art gallery and on to a Natural Market where we got a couple of other things we needed.

We had reservations at the Hostel so we called and Duffie came to pick us up and get us from town to the hostel where we were able to unpack and clean up and pick up our resupply boxes of food we had sent ahead. I actually only had one dinner (the one I had to miss the night of the storm) left in my pack. So I was almost out of food

Here tonight so far are the 2 of us and another young girl from London named Grounded (because she falls a lot) and another guy from FL, whose name I don’t know

Duffie will deliver us back to the trail at 8 am tomorrow so we can keep moving forward.

Now to go load Olfrie down with my resupply. Yay 😊 and Ugh 😑.

Posted the last 4 days. First service sufficient for posting.

Day 4: 8/14/17

Today was a 15.6 mile trail day plus a 1.2 backtrack mile day. It was a good day nonetheless.

We started out on this beautiful day with a little pep in our steps. We soon came to the mud that I remember of Vermont. That shoe-sucking, slippery mud. I am still thankful, though, that this mud hasn’t been this bad the whole time like it was in 2015. Doesn’t even compare.

We trudged through and leap-frogged today with several AT hikers we’ve met in the last couple of days. Dancing Bear, from Germany, and Uncle Puck, from Wisconsin. We’re still seeing Mitchell and Hazel from time to time. We made it through the mud to the base of Stratton Mountain. We crossed a beautiful river and started the climb up the mountain. The water in the river looked inviting, but we decided to hike another 0.6 miles up to where there was supposed to be a creek. We’d get our water there. Got there and the creek was dried up. How in the world could that be?? There’s so much water and mud on the trail and it was torrential downpours the first 2 nights we were out. Oh well—it was dry. We had a 3.4 mile, pretty steep climb up Stratton so we had no choice but to backtrack the 0.6 miles back down to the river and fill up on water. We stopped for lunch when we got back up a little way only to be lunch ourselves for the mosquitoes. First time I had to break out the Deet. It worked. Added to the beautiful aroma of my delicious odor, but whatcha gonna do? I think it’s about time for a little more than a wet wipe bath. What do you think?

Well moving on. We arrived at the summit of Stratton Mountain and climbed the firetower for a 360 view. It was beautiful!

There were several people on top so we chatted a bit and then continued our walk north. About 3-1/2 miles later we arrived at Stratton Pond where the loons were singing. We never saw them, but we could hear them. What a beautiful sound.

Now we’re in camp at a little site where we set up our tents close to Winhall River. I love sleeping close to rushing water (as long as it’s not coming from the sky). I had a delicious meal of beef stroganoff and dark chocolate and fresh yellow river water.

Oh, and look at this snazzy bear bag hanging.

Tomorrow is about a 9 mile hike (called a Nero in trail terms) to a road where we’ll hitchhike into town and stay at the Green Mountain House Hostel. We’ve sent resupply boxes there. We’ll shower and sleep in a bed tomorrow night. Looking forward to it.