Date: 2004-07-29
From: Mark Noepel Shelter

To: Sherman Brook Campsite
Miles today: 11.4
Weather: clear sky

Today started even more inside-a-cloudish than yesterday ended, very foggy and everything drenched. I made my way up to the summit of Mount Graylock, stepping carefully through the boggy spots trying to find firm stones to step on. Every now and then my boots went into the deep mud, but by some miracle the waterproofing and Goretex lining kept my socks dry.At 3491 feet Mount Greylock is the highest mountain in Massachusetts and the highest I have been up since Virginia. Right next to the summit is Bascom Lodge, an inn rather like LeConte Lodge in the Smokys except it is a single stone building built in the 30s by the CCC and the food is brought up by truck instead of helicopter and llama. In theory you need a reservation even for meals. Breakfast is "family style" at 8am and I arrived outside about 820. Perhaps I looked forlorn because when I went past the dining hall and a worker saw me he went around and let me in. Then when I asked if the snack bar was open he got me a plate for breakfast, which was still going. I lucked out, my timing was perfect and there was enough food for one more person so I sat down to my second breakfast of the morning! I had mushroom omelet, bacon, a delectable and filing mixture of fried onions, potatoes and cheese, plus cantelope, toast, orange juice and coffee. Mmmmmmmm. He was a very good cook, everything was delicious and I thanked him profusely as only a satiated thruhiker can. Then I went outside and refilled my water bladder from the tap and started groping through the dense fog for the northward Trail off the summit. Just as I found it I noticed a faint shadow through the gloom off to my right and suddenly realized it was the huge memorial to Massachusett's WW1 dead, almost invisible in the murk. Going closer I managed to get a picture of the lower part, then went in the door at the base. I found myself in a round room with an arched arcade around the perimeter. Around the top were passages from "In Flanders' Fields", the same WW1 poem I had quoted back at Lehigh Gap, including the end part about keeping faith "Or the dead shall not sleep, though poppys grow, in Flanders' Fields" A staircase wound upwards invitingly, but since all I would see from the top was more fog I decided against climbing up.Outside I ran into more red raspberries, the only berries I found all day. The sun finally started to break through and start drying things out, but not fast enough. On the slippery descent off the mountain I slipped, fell, and bent the same lower Leki pole section that had been replaced in Damascus after I bent the original near Roan Mountain. Down in the town of North Adams at the foot of the mountain I went to the supermarket and bought food, including a pint of whole chocolate milk for today and a pound of liverwurst for tomorrow. Then I checked my email and went to the Friendly's restaurant next door, where I had a double chocolate shake, a chicken breast sandwich and a free sundae! Of course I picked black raspberry ice cream in keeping with the berry theme of this part of my hike.Then across the Hoosic River. It drains into the Hudson, so for the last couple days I have gone from the Housatonic basin back into the Hudson basin. I wonder if any of the Trail drains into the St. Lawrence? Then the last two miles up Sherman Brook to the campsite.It was the first time I had to put my tent on a wooden tent platform, which becomes quite common in New England. To my delight, my Nomad tent went up without any extension ropes or even hooks or nails. I could slip each rope or cord between the ends of the boards and slip a stake through the loop to hold it in place. By careful siting, everything fit nicely! The tent is so long I had to put it up diagonally, hogging the entire platform. I had hoped it would leave room for another tent for sites where there are a shortage of platforms, but no such luck. I guess you can't have everything!Today I put my third filter cartridge in my filter bottle. The last replacement was somewhere before Damscus and by now I could barely get water through the old cartridge. I have one spare left, which ought to last the rest of the hike.With two big meals in me today, several others recently, and a resupply I am ready for the four day trek through Vermont's Green Mountains to Manchester Center.