Hiking the Good Hike

   Well, I wish I could say that my restful day was followed with a restful night's sleep but that would be a lie. I woke up in the middle of the night sick as a dog. I think I ate and drank too much, too late, and well, just made myself sick. My stomach has become accustomed to trail food and not town food, which is very unfortunate because I dearly love my greasy, fatty town food. So needless to say I was not feeling up for the trail at 8 am. Luckily, I had a wonderful, trail angel of a friend who volunteered to take Giuseppe back to the trail as scheduled so that I wouldn't delay his hike. After our later start time was agreed upon, I pulle the covers back over my head and went back to bed. When I awoke, Moose was just returning with some muffins and fresh strawberries from the berry farm across the road. I tested the waters and everything seemed to be staying down okay so we packed up and Allison took us back to the trail around 11:00.

   It was a beautiful day as we hiked through not only woods but the ski slopes of Bromley Mountain as well. The day continued without incidence as we made our way to the shelter. Less than a mile from home for the night, we were surprised/scared by a very large porcupine that was hanging out about a foot from the trail, and my leg. It seriously gave me a scare and literally made Chris jump up on the nearest fallen tree. Once we regained composure, we met Giuseppe and Corona at a river front shelter where the water lulled us to sleep.

6/20 Day 109 Big Branch Shelter to Clarendon Shelter - 16.9 miles

It was a cold night and we woke up with no motivation to move. So for the first time on trail, we didn't even get out of our sleeping bags; we just rolled back over and took a nap. We eventually made our way out of camp and on trail by the early hour of 10:00. We took a snack break at a beautiful little spot along the banks of Little Rock Pond. Then we hiked on to see the swampy woods transition into an evergreen forest. Once we made it to the ridge we found a neat little place near White Rocks Cliff with several cairns built everywhere; Moose even took the time to make one himself. That night we stayed at a very rustic shelter with some new flip-flippers, Newton and his son, completing for us a pretty pleasant day.

6/21 Day 110 Clarendon Shelter to Long Trail Inn - 18.3 miles 

We were up and on our way early to tackle a 3000 ft climb over Killington this morning. Well, that and Nomad was planning to meet us at a parking lot on the other side of the mountain with food and drink, 2 of my favorite motivators out here. It was a beautiful day for a walk/big climb through the forest and with Nomad's help we hiked 18 miles by 2:00; sorry, we didn't stop for any pictures. We did, however, meet a new face on the way down, Johnny Blaze, and let him in on our trail magic as well. Nomad had a buddy from home with him helping/hanging out with him for the week so we got to make his acquaintance. Also, Giuseppe showed up with his 2 brothers and a family friend to help us finish off the smoked sausages and bratworsts. We then decided that since this was going to be our last visit from Nomad on trail that we would stay the night with him at The Long Trail Inn and hang out for a while. The Inn was a neat place with a game room and Pub with live music that night which made for a very enjoyable evening.

Thanks again,

Wide Load

"Not all who wander are lost."

Tolkien