Date: 2022-07-17
From: Killington House Mile 1723.5

To: Thistle Hill Shelter Mile 1737.5
Miles today: 14.0
Weather: scattered clouds

So we woke up at our regular time to get ready to go and help pack up the house. Jen is leaving directly from the trail head to go home as it¢s on the way. We managed to clean up the house and get everything packed in the car just a little bit after 7. The back of her Outback was packed, and there¢s stuff around our feet but we managed to make it all fit. With the full backpack and food resupply the blue blaze trail from the Greengate parking lot back to the AT definitely seems way steeper than it was yesterday, even though it¢s only about a 300 foot climb.I brought pizza, hard-boiled eggs, vegetables, and a turnover from home. We ran into Talus and Waffle on the trail and I offloaded the pizza to them. I had brought lunch and was already thinking I was still pretty full two hours after breakfast and I was going to have to carry the pizza all the way to Hanover on Monday.As we got to the Route 12 road crossing, we found that there was a farm market about 200 yards down the road so we headed there to see what they had. Ended up grabbing a bunch of berries, a nice muffin, and a Gatorade. There were some Meadow walks right before and it¢s now about 80° and the cold drinks really hit the spot. There were several other hikers at the farm stand, a couple of whom are going south, and we heard that there might be some trail magic at a road crossing coming up. It¢s the first warmer day in a long while and we are definitely not used to the heat again.After leaving the farm stand, a couple miles later we came across a nice stream for a foot soak, but it drains from cow pastures, and so we headed up to the next stream which is good drinking water. Unfortunately that stream is relatively shallow and is not a good foot soak cool off stream. We did end up dousing ourselves with water to cool off and we had lunch there as well.About 2 miles and two climbs later we came across the trail magic at a very nice stream. They actually had root beer floats! The ice cream was soft but it absolutely hit the spot. That¢s the first root beer float I¢ve had on trail and I never expected it would actually be on the trail. They also had Italian ice and clean water. It was run by two hikers named Queen Bee and Endless who have both liked the AT, PCT twice, as well as several of the other shorter long-distance trails. It¢s probably closer to the mid 80s right now and sitting in the creek having a root beer float is absolutely wonderful on a hot day.We left after being there for over an hour, and then immediately began a long climb which included some meadow walks, so by the time we reached the top we are already hot and dripping sweat again. About a mile before camp and the last climb we came across a sketchy water source and ended up splashing ourselves and having a bit of a water fight. Just to cool ourselves off again.Tomorrow brings cooler temperatures and rain, but it looks like we¢re going to get the extended heat up here as well with temperatures forecast for the mid to upper 80s after that. On Friday we¢re climbing Mount Moosilauke with Nick. It¢ll be hot and exposed up top, but it¢s about 4800 ft so somewhat cooler. However that¢s tomorrow¢s problem as they say.With taking the zero, we¢re seeing a lot of new faces at camp with about 10 people here, two heading south and everybody else going north. Talus and Waffle are here as well. This shelter has the coolest Privy on trail, so they claim. Which means it has a half wall and the top half is screen only. You can see someone sitting on the pot, but at least you can¢t see them from the waist down. Until you stand up. I still think the fully open air pretty from a couple weeks ago it¢s cooler :-).Steps 27300Weather Forecast: 85/64 sunny