Date: 2017-07-02
From: Bascom Lodge

To: Bennington
Miles today: 24.7

As I leave Bascom Lodge, Greylock is still shrouded in mist. It's six miles down to the valley over two subsidiary peaks and a long steep descent. With few rocks and recent rain I fall twice in one minute on the steepest section. After the second time I stay seated and start laughing. There is only one way down, so I press on. When it finally flattens out the trail turns to slick clay mud until it enters town.I pass residential streets outside North Adams. Nothing close enough to walk to - no cold drinks this morning. The trail crosses the Hoosic river on a steel footbridge brightly painted with children's handprints. It turns off the road and goes up someone's gravel driveway. They have a hose out with a sign welcoming hikers to use it. I begin another climb along a raging creek, the torrents of storm runoff cascading over boulders and making a hundred little waterfalls. But soon the trail turns muddy, and then soupy. At times I'm climbing up a stream for a long ways. I should just embrace the fact that my feet will be soaked all day, but I can't. I hop from rock to rock, root to root, clambor along the banks of the trail, and bushwhack when there is no dry way through. My shoes and socks get wet anyway. I get angry at the trail builders for their nonexistent efforts to redirect runoff from the trail. This is trail building 101 and is done in every other state. It's like they found a stream and painted blazes along it.A few miles in I cross into Vermont. Vermont is known affectionately as Vermud on the AT. May is mud season, as spring melt turns trails to mush. This year there's been so much rain the mud never dried up. This southern section is known for mud, a local later tells me.The 18 miles across this nameless, viewless mountain are miserable muck-walking. There are no clearings to rest, no rocky outcroppings to lounge on. Even the shelters I pass are in flooded areas and positively uninviting for a break. My one respite is a power line clear-cut more than halfway in. There's a welcome strong wind. Though it doesn't deter the flies that have been buzzing me all afternoon. My bug spray has run out. I see lots of weekenders, dayhikers, and short-term section hikers but no thru-hikers. I was first out this morning so no one has caught me and I've caught no one. But I'm told there are large numbers within a day of me. Somehow I've fallen into a void.I have to hustle the last few miles to meet my ride into Bennington. It's already evening. I pass fern-covered open meadow on Harmon Hill, the loveliest spot of the day, but can't linger. The descent to route 9 is steep, rocky, and jarring to the knees. Steve from the motel comes to pick me up. He drops off five hikers hitching out of town. They're part of an even larger group, and will hike up to the nearby shelter for the night. A few of them sound British or Australian.After a shower, laundry, and dinner delivered to the room I begin to forget about the mud. We'll see if the shoes dry by morning. I'm tempted to take a zero in Bennington but that would throw off my schedule. I will just leave a couple of hours late tomorrow morning so I can resupply and hit the post office. And get bug spray.