Date: 2016-07-26
From: Bennington, VT

To: Goddard Shelter
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: light rain

Got a ride to the AT trailhead from the son of the hotel mgr. Young guy. He was East Indian, like so many other small motel owners nowadays. Told me his family had just bought that motel just two months ago. Since running a motel is such a big endeavor, he had offered to help his parents with its operation. I thought that laudable."So where did you move from," I asked? Atlanta was the reply. Having seen a bit of the community the day before, I remarked, "Pretty small community, Bennington - and awfully white." That really opened him up. Went on to tell me there were only two other Indians in the town, and virtually no other people of color. Talked about all the amenities in Atlanta, plus its large Indian community (translated - there were more women he could chose from). Didn't sound like a guy who would put down roots in Bennington.Hit the trail at 8:45 am. Only 10.1 miles to go today, but it was all up. A nice steep rise of 1,300 feet in the first 2.5 miles, followed by downs and ups (mostly ups) for another 1,000 ft. elevation gain to the Goddard Shelter. It sat just below the summit of Glastenberry Mtn. Believe me, the cumulative rise of all those ups and downs was much more than an additional 1,000 ft. I completely sweat thru my clothes in the first 60 minutes (1.5 miles) of the climb. Dripping with sweat. This would have been a hard climb even without a 30 lb. backpack. Boulders and rocks littered the trail (see photo on 1st day of my hike for example).When you loose so much moisture thru sweat, you loose a lot of salt. That has to be replaced - water alone won't do it. If you don't then you get dizzy and light headed, plus water alone never seems to slake your thirst. I was so glad to have those electrolyte tablets. I dropped them into the water bottles freely - even though they made the water taste terrible.OK - I made it to the shelter alive by 3:00 pm. There eating his post hike snack was Peter (he refused to use a trail name). Peter was a bit younger than me and doing the same thing - section hiking. I had met so many thru-hikers (I.e., GA to Maine) that I thought we section hikers might be in the minority.Peter turned out to be a retired actuary. Had been on the AT for 17 days. We chatted a while and found common ground on many issues. Hey, he brought up politics and economics - I didn't.We were soon joined by a slew of thru-hikers and 4 other section hikers. Most of the thru- hikers stopped briefly for a snack, then shouldered their packs to add more miles. As Copper Kettle put it, "If I don't do the miles today, I'll just have to do them tomorrow." Buy this time in a thru-hike (about 1,600 miles out of 2,100 total on the AT) the daily hiking starts to become more like a job - a daily grind. Only one thing keeps them going - Katahdin, Katahdin, Katahdin..... They sense the end is at hand.Some still have a sense of fun and adventure about them. Such was the case with LC and his female companion, Snickers. I think she made LC laugh. And he bore the heavier load on his back for her (told me his pack weighed 40 lbs). Better to go on a long trip with someone you care about rather than alone - just like in life. Anyway, they went to the top of Glastenberry Mtn to camp. There is a fire tower on top of that Mtn giving exceptional views, especially of the sunset.We had two campers right next to our shelter that evening. A young couple from Vermont who had just married. They were spending their honeymoon hiking The Long Trail. Hearty Vermont stock! And very nice people, too.Peter and I shared the shelter with Joda that night. He was another solo thru- hiker that came in late. Too dark to travel on, so he stayed. Both Peter and I turned in at hiker midnight - 9:00 pm for anyone else. Joda was still cooking his evening meal in the gloam of the evening as I slowly nodded off to sleep......