Date: 2015-09-04
From: Mt. Greylock

To: Cheshire/ US 9 -- Graymoor area 
Miles today: 8.4

I awoke reasonably early, but I had decided to wait & buy breakfast at 8:00 at Bascom Lodge [The complimentary breakfast they advertised turned out to be a muffin & coffee!]. While waiting, I packed up & did the quarter mile I'd skipped last night. Then I met SOBO Monkey-toes, a young woman whom I'd met briefly back in the White Mtns. We had breakfast together. She's had some health issues & is now trying to decide whether to continue on the Trail. There was little visibility at the summit, so I didn't even check whether the tower is open. There was a log that needs cutting 1.5 miles South on Trail. In that area, I met an orientation group from Williams College. In the last week, I've seen similar groups from Yale & Tufts [& Harvard Med. back in the Whites]. I also met a couple of guys who said they were hiking the Long trail!Coming down a Mtn like this is interesting . The first 2.6 miles don't go down much at all: a series of ups & downs. Then you get the feeling of going down, down, down, with switchbacks & everything, for several more miles. You may think you are near the bottom. Then you get a view down a steep, wooded slope & recognize that there is lots more to come. Monkey-toes & I passed each other a couple of times, because she stopped to use her phone, tho she was hiking faster overall. We met some week-end hikers who were coming up & commenting on how steep it was, long before they got to the steep part!  She got to the church hostel first but had to wait for the priest to return so she could get a mail drop that had been sent there.I wanted to talk to him too about leaving some stuff, so I used the time to walk down to the liquor store to get a box. I thought I was getting short on cash. The ATM at the bank rejected me. When I went to try the one at the liquor store, I found some money I had forgotten about.At the bank, I saw Sparky, whom I had met some time in the past. There was also a NOBO leaving the hostel when we arrived.Then it was time to return to the church, finish sorting the stuff I was going to leave as I go cook-less for the next week, change into my traveling clothes, talk to Father Dave, & get down to the bus stop for the Bus to Pittsfield.I stayed in Pittsfield longer than expected because the train from Boston was late. I was able to use the time to get some things to eat...oh yes, & some batteries for my headlamp. I don't need a repeat of last night's experience.My plan at this point is to jump down to NY, hike for a week down there, & then come back to meet Susan in Cheshire. We had concluded that Massachusetts & Connecticut would be the easiest parts of the trail for her in the area I was hoping to cover this year. Price-wise & schedule-wise, it seemed to make sense to take the train, rather than a bus that would go all the way into NY City & back out. The train to Albany was a couple of hours late, but I didn't miss my connection because the train from Montreal was late too. That one left me at Poughkeepsie, where I could get a local train to Peekskill, near Bear Mtn. By then, it was 11:00. I couldn't find any other kind of ride, & didn't know how to get around Peekskill, so I ended up paying $15.00 for a taxi to go the 4 miles along Hwy. 9 to the AT crossing. I just walked a little bit up into the woods & camped [avoiding the poison ivy].