Date: 2005-08-12
From: Colrain, MA

To: Dalton, MA
Miles today: 17.0
Weather: clear sky

17 miles todayDalton, Mass.I woke up at 5:30 after a really good nights sleep that I needed badly. I stayed in bed and did my journal for yesterday because I was too sleepy to do it last night. I went downstairs about 6:30. I knew Amoeba and her sister, Nancy were up because I could hear them talking. I appologized to Nancy for meeting her last night and then running off to bed. She said she understood. :-)) I made my coffee and then went back upstairs and packed up and cleaned up my room. When I was done, I went back downstairs and we all talked for a while. I wasn't in too much of a hurry because I was only going to Dalton, Mass today with plans of finally staying at Tom Lavardi's home. Tom and I went out and ate lunch together back in '02, but it never worked out for me to tent in his yard before. Amoeba and I left after saying goodbye to Nancy and drove to a diner in Williamstown for breakfast. We met 2 nobos there that needed a ride back to the outfitter, so we took them after we were done eating. Their names were Toolman and Harmonica. Amoeba stopped at a grocery store for me and I bought a few things for today, then she drove me to the summit of Greylock where she picked me up yesterday and she dropped me off at 10:30 this morning. Amoeba, I can't thank you enough for all the trail angelin' you've done for me. I really enjoyed everything and you have a wonderful home. Looking forward to the next time we run into each other. She left after a nice hug because the park ranger was checking vehicles in the lot to see if they had paid to park. I went into the lodge and signed the register and hung out for a while. I finally started walking just before 11am. I had a long way down Greylock before I got to Cheshire. It was about 7 miles of mostly downhill, but graded pretty easily. I'm going to just list all the nobos I saw today because there was so many. They were Poet, Serenity, Tracker, Pixie, Pinetree, Sensei '05, Scholar, Milkman, Sandy, Blotter, Limbo, Dorothy and Toto, Sundance Kid, Spicey, Litefoot, G.Q, Seeker, Peanut, Liso, Fester and the first sobo I've seen in a while by the name of P.J. Pixie was Pinetree's wife and she told me he was coming along pretty soon, so I had a little fun with him. When I saw him coming up the trail I yelled out his name like we were old friends. He looked up like he was glad to see me and then he got a real puzzled look on his face. Poor nobos having to put up with me. ;-))) Dorothy and Toto were a man and wife, not a woman and her dog. Sundance Kid saw me coming up the trail and yelled out my name. I couldn't remember where we met but he did. Earlier this year I was doing trail magic near Davenport Gap in Tennessee and he and another guy needed a ride because it was getting late. They ended up walking the 2 miles to Standing Bear Hostel because they ralized it would be too hard to get back to that area in the morning. I hiked into Cheshire and stopped at a little ice cream store along the trail through town and got a Gatorade and ate my leftover pizza from last night and the rest of that deliious blueberry pie Amoeba made for me. :-))) It was a very warm day, but sitting at the outside picnic table was nice because there was a breeze and it was in the shade. I hiked on and climbed about 1000 feet up to The Cobbles. Hey John Galt, that's the place I witnessed history being made in '03...remember??  ;-)))  (Private joke..sorry) It was pretty easy walking into Dalton and I got there before 5pm. I went right to Tom Lavardi's home and saw him sitting on the front porch talking to Seeker. It was great to see Tom again. We sat there and talked for a while, then he went in and made some sandwiches and 4 of us ate dinner. We had chips and sodas too. I set up my tent in the back yard and then went back on the front porch and wrote my journal. I forgot to mention in yesterday's journal that I saw the first turkeys on the trail I've seen this year. There were some hens and a bunch of young ones that all took off flying. I saw them while I was climbing Greylock. Thanks again Amoeba for all you did for me. I really had a great time...even though you kicked my butt in poker. ;-)))