Trail log, Day 58: I saw some trees today. And then some rocks. Trees interspersed with rocks, really. In some ways, it was similar to Day 57. Some of the trees were tall. Some of the rocks were white — quartz, maybe. In Pennsylvania I stayed in a shelter with a geologist. About the only thing he told me about rocks is that he doesn’t recommend walking on the sharp ones in Crocs.
I made good time (by my standards) the first 6 days into Vermont, averaging over 16 miles per day. That is the longest I have gone without resupplying or getting off the trail for any reason so far. On the morning of the 7th day there was a little restaurant called the Whistle Stop near the trail where I ate a big breakfast (2 eggs, 2 pancakes, 2 pieces of toast, 2 pieces of bacon, 2 pieces of sausage, orange juice, and a vanilla milkshake). It was delicious (especially after eating almost nothing but ramen noodles, rice, and lentils for a week), but I then climbed the trail several hundred vertical feet up a steep ravine. I felt a little sick that entire day, and have been proceeding more slowly since then.
The trail through the entire state of Vermont has been one of my favorite sections so far. There are lots of areas through pine trees where the trees are spaced apart far enough for air and sunlight to reach the trail, and the path is soft with pine needles. There were a few big mountains, but the trail takes its time getting up them so it was not often very steep, and some of them had panoramic views (and ski runs) at the top. It only rained on me once while I was hiking, which made the trail muddy and slick, but it dried out the next day. My knees have been doing well, my new pack is more comfortable than my first one, and I saw a porcupine and a big Pileated Woodpecker! The porcupine was walking down the trail towards me. I thought it was a beaver, but when it saw me it immediately turned around, giving me a good view of its impressive quill array, and walked back up the trail like a sloth. I followed, at a modest distance, for a few minutes until it finally turned aside towards a tree. When it reached the tree it just kept walking, without any hesitation or change it its movements, straight up.
For 105 miles, starting at the Vermont border, the Appalachian Trail is coincident with the Long Trail. When they split, the Long Trail continues 168 miles to the Canadian border, and the Appalachian Trail heads east to New Hampshire and Maine. It was interesting meeting the Long Trail hikers at the shelters and comparing our experiences. Most Long Trail hikers seem to go much longer between resupplying (5-9 days for LT compared to 3-6 days for AT), so they were usually carrying heavier packs and going fewer miles per day.
The day I made myself sick by eating too much before hiking ended up at Cooper’s Lodge, a shelter near the top of Killington Peak. Within an hour of arriving, even though it was not even 6:30pm, the sky was completely dark. Then the wind started blowing light rain directly into the shelter, so I set up my tarp between two bunks (I was the only one there) to create a cozy little cubicle shielded from the wind and rain. Almost as soon as I finished the light rain turned into heavy hail which bounced all around the inside of the shelter. But I was dry and warm in my cubicle, and unusually exhausted and sore and still not feeling well. I fell asleep while the storm was still blowing and thundering, and slept for 11 hours.
I was still sore and tired when I got started in the morning, and I couldn’t seem to stay hydrated. Every time I start feeling a little sick, I think I have Lyme Disease. I haven’t had to remove a tick since Connecticut, but that is partly because I didn’t want to find anymore so I stopped checking. According to Wikipedia, there is a 1% chance of the bite of a black legged “deer” tick successfully transmitting Lyme Disease; I suspect a much higher transmission rate of hypochondria.
I hiked 8 miles down to the Inn at Long Trail, a nice bed and breakfast located near where the AT and LT split. I think ski season is their busy season, and during the summer they give a good discount to hikers: $54 including breakfast. The inn has an Irish restaurant inside and the chef/sometimes-bar-tender, Patrick, had to go get something in nearby Rutland and offered to give me a ride so I could get some groceries. On the way he told me a little about the area and its history. The outdoors-ish culture and liberalness of what I’ve seen of Vermont reminds me of Boulder. Except people in Vermont smoke a lot more pot.
I also did a short day out of Inn at Long Trail. Now I feel fine. So I guess it wasn’t Lyme, but I’m still convinced I will get it. Maybe on Wednesday when the trail passes the town of Lyme, NH. That would be some good synchronousness.
Today I am in Hanover, New Hampshire. The trail goes right through Dartmouth College and the center of town. Last night I camped in the woods directly outside of town, and then today I walked back in to get amperes, WiFi, and groceries.
Despite how much I enjoyed walking in Vermont, I still found myself thinking a lot about all the things I want to do when I get home and don’t have to walk every day anymore. It is similar to the feeling I get when I’ve had a job for a few months (or weeks — or days) and am looking forward to quitting. So if you are making odds or taking bets on whether I’ll actually finish the entire trail, there is some inside information to consider! But I don’t have to actually make a decision about whether I will walk the southern half of the trail until I get to the northern end on Mt. Katahdin in about 5 weeks (441.8 miles).
Between now and then I have what is generally considered the most physically difficult section of the trail: the White Mountains of New Hampshire and the rocky hills of southern Maine. In the Whites the trail goes over several 4,000 and 5,000 foot mountains. That doesn’t seem very high, but because of the hazardous environment treeline is only 4,400 feet in the Whites. The tallest mountain the trail goes over is Mt. Washington at 6,288 feet, which is also the highest point on the Appalachian Trail (the lowest, at 124 feet, was at the trailside zoo in New York). The summit of Mt. Washington experiences snow storms every month of the year, holds the highest surface wind speed in the northern hemisphere (231 mph), has never had a temperature above 72F recorded, and has seen 135 fatalities since 1849. It also has a road and a cog railroad to the summit where there is a museum, snack bar, and post office.
I have now walked well over 700 miles in my first pair of Crocs. I’ve met several hikers who replaced their trail runners or hiking boots at least once in the same section. They are getting a little thin, but more comfortable than ever on the current terrain. I am going to try to get through all of New Hampshire (and maybe Maine!) without replacing them, though I am still a little worried I might slip off a mountain and die
[Good news: I didn’t die.]
. I’m hoping for good weather.
Diode