August 18

Marathon!

Good for us.  We got up early for once, and were hiking by 7am.  The weather, not so great.  Foggy, damp, and cold.  The clouds lifted soon enough, and everything began to dry out.  We had some big climbs mid-morning.  Styles Peak, with hemlock forest so dense it look like we were hiking down a hallway.  Then the Peru Peak Wilderness, and Peru Peak itself, where we stopped for a snack.  Then a nice flat peice around Griffith Lake.  Then up a bit to Baker Peak, which had a nice view.  We past Lost Pond, and the trail to Old Job shelter, before making it into the Big Branch Wilderness, and all the way to Big Branch shelter for lunch.  Almost 14 miles.  Impressive.  More easy hiking in the afternoon.  We stopped briefly to check out Little Rock Pond, where there was a caretaker and another for fee camping area.  It looked like a nice spot, and swimming sounded inviting, but we had big plans today and kept moving.  Up and over White Rocks and past another shelter.  On the way down the mountain, to the gap with VT 140, we caught up with Tink and Samson.  We had a long climb up Bear Mountain, but despite the gain in elevation, I had no problem with it.  On the way down the mountain, there was an area of the woods where other hikers had made a lot of cairns, forming a sort of rock garden.  Pretty cool.  We made it to the Minerva Hinchey shelter, and the sun was still barely up, after a 26.5 mile day.  Sweet.  There was a large group of college kids there at the shelter, from the University of Vermont.  They were doing a freshmen orientation outing, backpacking for several days.  How amazing is that?  All I ever did for orientation was go to boring meetings, and mixer with girls' dorms with punch and cookies.  Lame.  We all tented in the area down below the shelter, got water, ate dinner, and went to bed.  Feet are definitely tired.

Climbing Baker Peak.