Date: 2018-08-12
From: Wilbur Clearing Shelter

To: Seth Warner Shelter
Miles today: 9.9
Weather: moderate rain

It rained hard last night. So hard that rain splashed off the wooden boards and onto the tent's bathtub. The bathtub got wet then the water seeped through. My sleeping bag got a little wet from the side walls. I should have put leaves around the awning to keep the splashback down. In the morning I got ready and ate some trail mix for breakfast. We were going to town in 3 miles and were going to eat there. Scissors and I got our stuff ready and talked to Magic and Big Red for a bit. They had stayed with a woman who Magic met in the airport on his way to the trail. She had given him his trail name. She cooked him a huge homemade meal and let them sleep at her house. I bet it felt amazing after all these days of rain. Scissors and I packed up and headed down the mountain to Williamstown. On the way down we talked about minimalism and how great it felt to have less stuff. Scissors told about when she was 19 and her roommate accidentally burned down the apartment. Scissors lost everything. Instead of feeling sad she felt more liberated with less stuff. I told her Theresa and I were using the Konmari method to tidy up our house. It's a practice were you only surround yourself with things you love. It helped us get rid of so much stuff.  We got to the access road to Williamstown and stuck out our thumbs. Within 5 minutes we had a ride to The Clark. It was Scissors' favorite art museum. The person asked us where we wanted to go. We said the Clark. He asked you sure you don't want to go to the Mass MOCA? Scissors said no because she liked the Clark more. The person who gave us a ride was the art director of the Mass MOCA. He told us about some areas to explore in Williamstown. We thanked him for the ride to the Clark. We got out and met group of employees getting surveys for the art museum. They told us about where we could check our bags. One guy was really interested in hiking the trail. We gave him the low down on it. I used the bathroom there to take the plastic bags off my feet so I didn't look so trashy. It destroyed that clean bathroom floor. We walked into the front entrance and the guy taking the surveys gave us free admission into the museum! We went in and first went to the food court. We were starving. They had pozole and we each got bowls. It was amazing after all the junk food we had been eating. The museum had a special exhibit with women artists in Paris.  We walked over to the permanent exhibit and saw Scissors' favorite painting of nymphs trying to push a half human half goat into a lake. A museum worker said that the nymph painting was one of Mr. Clark's favorite. He had seen it as a teenager and found it later in life and bought it. In his old age he used to be wheeled by it and he would pat the one nymph on the butt. We looked at a few other paintings before heading to downtown Williamstown. We went to The Purple Pub and got salads for lunch. Afterwards we found a small park in the middle of the shops and had a hiker garage sale to dry out all our stuff. People walked by and just stared at us as we laid everything out. We dried out or stuff then got a hitch back to the trail.At the trailhead we ran into Tree Beard and Silver Bullet who were taking a break. We were about 4 miles from the Vermont state line. We pushed on uphill to the border. When we got to the famous long trail sign Sunny, Mouse King, and Pappa Bear were already there.  We got a few group shots around the sign. Scissors jumped on my back and we got a stacked person shot. I didn't want my picture in front of the sign but got it from the back instead. We all pushed onto the shelter. As soon as we crossed the border the trail turned into thick mud. In some places it was so deep that it came up to your knee. I tried rock hopping around it but sometimes my foot slipped into it. It made me hike slower too.  Night fell and I put on my headlamp. My batteries slowly died and I used my cell phone for light. I slipped on a root and fell on my butt. I was ok though. We all pushed onto the shelter. It was jam packed with people and tents. The NOBO and SOBO bubbles were colliding. I found a flat spot and setup my tent next to Sunny, Scissors, and Bullet. I made a vegetable bark dinner and called it a night.Tonight is getting colder than normal. I might need my winter stuff back soon.