Date: 2004-08-01
From: Eliza Brook Shelter

To: Liberty Spring Campsite
Miles today: 11.4
Weather: overcast clouds

The morning was bright and clear and full of cool dry air. Nice. The tents had been full of teenagers who were now up and going through their morning rituals of food prep and packing. I did my best to sleep in, but finally succumbed to the morning and packed up. Back over at the shelter it was time to sit on the dry floor, eat my breakfast and write in the journal. Most of the shelter dwellers had headed out. Those who remained asked where my tent had been and when I had arrived. Two of them, a twenty something guy and girl, suddenly got very apologetic. They said they would have made room. I told them of my preference for my tent over a crowded shelter. They were the leaders of an AMC teen trek. With my Valley Voyageurs history this gave us quite a lot to talk about. They were a bit embarrassed to admit this, but it turned out that they, the leaders, had foolishly pitched their tent in a dip and it had swamped in the rain. This explained why it was now hanging, fully assembled, upside down between 2 trees. They had been the folks squeezed in at the foot of the shelter last night. They asked me not to tell AMC since they now knew, as an adopter I worked for the same folks. We had some good laughs.All that sleeping and talk made it after 10am when my boots hit the trail again. The next proposed rendezvous was to be with Graham D on the summit of North Kinsman at noon today. Here again, this is a section of trail that is not a total stranger to me but it had probably been on the order of decades since my last traverse. What surprised me were the exciting cascades the trail passed way up in the boreal forest. I had completely forgotten these over the years. There were also some nice bogs up on the ridge just below the final ascent of South Kinsman.It was probably quarter past noon when Graham came into sight on the summit cliffs of North Kinsman. He claimed to have only been there for about 5 minutes. It was a warm humid day and the mists and clouds were having fun dancing across the mountains and sky. Graham noted that it had been 8 months to the day since we last sat on this spot. That's right. We were here at midnight last New Years Eve. Later it occurred to me that he was wrong which is really funny since he is a fairly bright engineering student. The fact is that it had been 7 months and 12 hours to be precise. Regardless, it was a pretty cool reunion. He had of course brought some of his mom's famous muffins to help with the celebration. We sat on the cliff overlooking Kinsman Pond, Lonesome Lake, Franconia Notch, Franconia Ridge and the whole of the White Mountain National Forest for at least an hour. We ate and talked and then moved on down the trail passed Kinsman Pond and down to Lonesome Lake Hut.Just for a little back ground here. Graham had been friends with a bunch of folks on the Technical Crew back at Gilford High School which I directed. He would show up on occasion to help out. He would join us on wilderness adventures sometimes. He and another of that gang, Alex, joined me on an epoch two week adventure in the Wind River Range of Wyoming which included days and days of off trail hiking, navigating and glacier travel. That was a good time too. He's also the guy who dropped me at the airport in Manchester, NH to begin this grand adventure on the AT. He is also my co-trail adopter and is looking after our trail this summer.A couple of hours later we dropped by Lonesome Lake Hut for about 20 minutes of snacking and checking out the journal. Graham was going to take me into town for a little resupply and some pizza. This left me with a perplexing question. Graham had not hiked up to the hut on the AT because there is no parking where it crosses under the Franconia Notch Parkway. The parking area went away 20 or more years ago when the old route US-3 was upgraded to the new Parkway. The question was to stay true to the trail or true to a friend. Camaraderie won out and yes some purists will say that I blue blazed and it is true, however, it is not like I haven't hiked that section in the past. We're talking about 2.2 miles here. The trails we took were certainly as challenging and as long for sure. At any rate we had a great time hiking and talking.On New Years Day 2006 I dropped by Lonesome Lake Hut after spending New Years Eve on the summit of North Kinsman and at Kinsman Pond Shelter for the third year in a row. The old journal from summer 2004 had entries from lots of trail friends. We drove from Lafayette Place to Lincoln and picked up some groceries. Then we had some pizza and ice cream. Then Graham dropped me at the bike path at the Flume parking area. It had to be about 7pm. By 7:15 I was back on the trail as it joined the bike path briefly and then headed up to Liberty Spring Campsite.The trail to Liberty Spring climbs 2400 feet in less than 3 miles. It's no stranger to me. It was well past dark when the glow of the caretaker's tent appeared above me. My mood was pretty full of joy and certainly the caretaker noted that. He recognized me for a thru-hiker and asked if I was Voyageur. That really took me by surprise. He said he had something for me and invited me into his tent. Caretaker tents are big army style canvas affairs with plenty of room to stand and sit. Sure enough, there it was, a little bag with my name on it. This was amazing. I was so excited.The care package of trail magic was from the Wilson family. The bag included such goodies as Little Debbies Brownies, fun size Snickers bars and a whole bag of Pepperidge Farms Chocolate Chunk Cookies. Mmmmm. Chris Wilson had been in the same class as Graham and on the Technical Crew working with me. He and I had gone on a backpacking trek in the Weminuche Wilderness of southwest Colorado a few years ago. His younger sister Liz had been on the middle school crew and she was the one who had made this delivery with some friends from her college. They had both transferred to private schools before graduating high school and I missed them.I thanked Huff, the caretaker but he insisted it was the floating care taker who deserved the thanks. He took the package yesterday and left it for me. He needed to be thanked too. It surprised me the cookies hadn't been opened. Huff said it was hard to resist. I gave him one in thanks. We talked for a bit then he pointed me to a platform he thought was still empty. My tent went up without the fly and as I was crawling inside another guy showed up. He just threw his bag on the platform and slept under the stars.