Date: 2017-05-06
From: Kay Wood Shelter

To: Saint Mary's Church Hostel
Miles today: 11.8
Weather: light rain

The Kay Wood shelter setup of last night with the tarp hung for a windbreak turned out to be pretty comfortable. Right before I went to sleep, a third hiker showed up as John had predicted. This was Kevin, a retired Air Force Security Police Officer who had chosen to set up his tent at a campsite near the shelter. Kevin had been in Dalton all day and had just now returned. He commented on how everything was flooded and the trail itself was like a stream. After chatting for a while, Kevin headed back to his camp.  It was dark, so I never actually got to see him. It rained on and off all night long and it was chilly enough outside so that I needed to keep my 20 degree sleeping bag zipped completely up. In the morning I chose to ¢sleep in¢ a little bit and did not actually get up until it was light out (after 6:30). I heated water for coffee and nut-fortified oatmeal and also had a tuna tortilla wrap for breakfast. Then I went about packing up my stuff which was still pretty wet. I weighed my options about my next destination. Considering the weather, at the moment the rain appeared to have broken and remained cool. A check of the weather forecast indicated it would likely stay that way through early afternoon, so I decided to hike on. I knew the town of Dalton was only 3 miles away, but I still had a preference to make it to Cheshire, MA and stay at the Saint Mary's Church which runs a hostel for hikers. I also had planned to stop at the post office in Cheshire where another mail drop package from Teresa was waiting. However, knowing the post office hours were from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. I deliberately chose not to try to get up and start hiking at 5 a.m. in order to be there before closing. So I figured I would give the post office a call and request they forward my mail to another town further up the trail. That way I wouldn't have to wait around in Cheshire until Monday morning to get my package. During the entire breakfast and packing process, I had been chatting with John and we exchanged information about hiking gear and weather forecasts and so on. I learned that he is actually from Massachusetts but intends to settle in Asheville, NC. Having recently finished a contracting job in the Boston area as a mechanical engineer, John is now hiking to Asheville. He had just gotten on the trail from Dalton the day before yesterday and he said it took him all day to hike the three miles up the hill from Dalton to the Kay Wood shelter where we were. He said he¢d done a lot of hiking around home with his best friend for distances of 6 to 12 miles, but not with a 50-pound pack. He was finding that significantly different. So when I was packed and ready to go, I bid John farewell and good luck with his hike and asked him to say Hi to Kevin and then I headed up the trail. After Grange Hall Road I came upon Barton Brook with a footbridge crossing it. This was actually the confluence of two small streams but with all of the rain they were both significantly swollen (photo). At about 9 o'clock I called the post office in Cheshire Mass and they confirmed that they did have the package Teresa sent me. I explained that I would not be able to arrive before they closed today and they offered to deliver the package to the Saint Mary of Assumption Church where had intended to stay. As there was no phone number for the church in my guidebook, I asked Google, and I called the number that it gave me. I got an answering machine recording from the church and left a message explaining that I didn't want the delivery of my package to be a surprise to them and I left my name and number. It was about 9:30 when I met southbound hiker Sherene who had delayed her start from yesterday due to the weather and was headed south to Great Barrington, MA. Following Massachusetts, she planned to hike most of the AT in Vermont  Sherene is a graduate student and wanted to do some hiking but was not yet ready to hike the whole AT. I first noticed that her eyes were gray and then that they matched her gray shirt, gray hiking pants and grey hat with the OR Logo of the Outdoor Research hiking gear company. Her trekking poles were a sort of burgundy red as was her backpack. Anyway, I thought it all looks very good together and would give Sherene the best dressed hiker award if there was such a thing. Haha. She said she does not have a trail name yet and I explained that I would be taking a week off in Vermont and that by then she could be done with Massachusetts and it's possible we could run into each other again up there and that maybe by then she would have a trail name. She laughed and smiled. So we wished each other good hiking and she said, ¢I'll see you again in Vermont¢ as she headed off toward October Mountain shelter where I had lunch yesterday. By 10 o'clock I noticed that my Gore-Tex jacket was drying out fairly well, as were my Gore-Tex rain pants. I had put my regular hiking pants and my Patagonia insulation jacket inside the trash compactor bag to ensure they would stay dry in case it rains again today. As a consequence, I had only wet clothing to wear when I got dressed this morning. Since it wasn¢t presently raining, movement should help warm and dry those clothes. I took off my Gore-Tex jacket and used its arms to tie onto my backpack so that it could continue to dry, and I hiked wearing my wet long sleeved blue base layer shirt which I knew would dry quickly. I also put away my wool cold weather hat and put on the green cravat I have been using as a head covering since losing my regular hat. It was soaked, but by 10:30 the sun started to come out and it, too dried quickly.About 10:45 I entered the town of Dalton, MA, walked down a residential street, turned left on Main Street, and crossed a bridge over the Housatonic River once again. I stopped at the Juice & Java Coffee Shop to charge my phone and get coffee, a toasted wheat bagel with peanut butter and something called a whoopie pie. I made one more stop at a gas station convenience store for headlamp back-up Triple-A batteries, two large Snickers bars, 3 Clif bars and a pastry which looks remarkably similar to the whoopie pie I had at Juice & Java.After leaving Juice & Java, I met a hiker with trail name Dr John. We walked together as the trail continued on a couple more streets through the town of Dalton, MA. And then the trail reentered the wood line and we hiked together until we reached the location where Dr. John intended to camp for the night. That was the Crystal Mountain campsite a little bit closer to Cheshire, MA than Dalton. Dr. John is a theoretical geophysicist which he explained is essentially the physics of plate tectonics. He has hiked the entirety of the Appalachian Trail a couple of times before. He did a thru-hike in 2004 and completed it in sections in 2007. As we climbed most of Crystal Mountain enroute to his camp, we discussed all sorts of things including politics, religion and civics. This made the time fly and before I knew it we were there and I was more than halfway between Dalton and Cheshire, my destination for the day. Dr. John had carried some beer with him from Dalton so when he offered I accepted and we stopped where the side Trail branched on blue blazes to go to his campsite and we drank a beer and took a picture together. When I asked if he would mind if I did that, he said, ¢not at all,¢ and from his perspective the photos with other hikers are more important than all the pictures of the scenery one gets during a thru-hike. He said after a while all the landscapes start to look alike but it's all the different people that you will want to remember. So we bid each other good luck and I continued on. Soon I passed yet another beaver pond called Gore Pond. Next was the summit of Crystal Mountain. At some point, while I was hiking with Dr. John, the sun had come out and it turned into a very nice day. I listened to a voicemail from father Matthew at the Saint Mary's of the Assumption Church confirming that he had my mail package, and he gave me details for staying at the parish. I called him back and left a message indicating that I had gotten his message and I thanked him.At about 4 o'clock, on the other side of Mount Crystal, I came to Cheshire Cobble, from which there was a beautiful view of the town of Cheshire and the Reservoir with the same name (photo).  At that location I also met a couple and their dog named Brady. When I asked, ¢Like The Brady Bunch?¢ the guy, whose name was Murray, looked at me like I must be from Mars and said, ¢No, like Tom Brady.¢ He was from Clifton Park, NY and I told him that I had been there when I was in high school. The woman was named Shirley and she is from Cheshire. She asked if I was staying at Saint Mary's and when I said, ¢Yes,¢ she encouraged me to go to the spaghetti dinner that they would be having tonight. She said that she had gone to college in Linden, VT up in the northeast corner of the state. And when I told her I had been born in Newport and lived in Derby, VT which is also up near the Canadian border, she immediately knew where that was. Small world. I took a landscape photo where the highest peak in Massachusetts is visible: Mount Greylock which I should be getting to climb sometime in the next day or two. And I took another photo of the Brady family (at least that's what I will call them) with Cheshire Reservoir in the background. We then said good day and goodbye and when I continued hiking I discovered that I had accidentally taken a blue-blazed trail to get to the actual Cheshire Cobble so I returned to the main trail and continued down the mountainside toward the town.A Saint Mary's I got my package, paid $10 entrance fee and partook in the spaghetti dinner as Shirley suggested. I also purchased $10 in raffle tickets which I used to take a chance on some maple syrup and maple sugar treats. During the dinner, I spoke to a couple who have properties near the trail and I gave them my claim ticket and wished them good luck. I talked to several other people; I think the whole town was there! This was a fundraiser to help a local woman who has been battling cancer. I talked with her, her mother and sister after dinner. I also got to meet Father Matthew and thank him in person, as well as Michelle, who actually runs the parish hall. After the dinner, while the fire department and other volunteers were cleaning the hall until about 9 pm, I updated my hike plan, and spoke with two other hikers, Gas Tank and Jolly Roger (He and she). After we got to the rooms in the hall designated for hikers, I repacked my food bag, laid out some stuff to dry, washed up, took care of my feet, and then went to bed. GoodnightNOTE: I've completed 1/4th of the AT!