Date: 2007-06-16
From: Telephone Pioneer SHelter

To: 10 Mile Lean To
Miles today: 13.0

I slept much better last night and got up at the usual 5:30 today and was on the trail at 6:30. My knee felt swollen inside when I started hiking, but within 30 minutes it was OK and no further pain. After climbing down the mountain I was on, the trail went through a lot of hay fields, but first was the Dover Oak. What a magnificent tree, it¢s supposed to be larger (older) than the Keefer Oak in Virginia that I passed last year. It gives a new meaning to ¢the mighty oak¢.After the Dover Oak, I went through all the hay fields, the grass was over my head! At least there was a nice wide swath cut for the trail. The dew was very heavy this morning, so my shoes got soaking wet. Then, there were hay fields that did NOT have a trail mowed, and I had to ¢swim¢ through grass over my head, it was sort of neat, and I¢m glad I¢m not allergic to anything, but was I a mess- covered in grass seed. I had to cross a few stiles, and hike across what seemed like miles of bog boards ¢ NY is the ¢Home of the Bog Board¢ State! I finally got to the ¢Appalachian Trail Station¢, I had been hoping for a train station with a bathroom and trash can! Nope, all it was is a park bench on a small platform by the side of the tracks. It did have a trash can, so I dumped my trash, and Yes, I did sit on the park bench. (have I ever mentioned that its my rule, you have to sit on every park bench you come across ¢ there are so few of them).Back up into the woods, I entered the ¢Pawling Nature Conservancy¢ and let me tell you, the trails in Pawling are appalling! They were so eroded and washed out. I passed a couple of trail maintainers, I talked to them for a while and then hiked on, around the bend was another guy sitting in the middle of the trail with a huge pair of shears in his hand. He was just sitting there opening and closing them in rapid succession.   I knew he was a trail maintainer, but it looked kind of funny. I said to him ¢That could look very scary¢ (here I was a lone female hiker with the ¢grass clipper killer¢). He reassured me he was just a trail worker (which I knew) and we then just chatted for a while.As I crossed into Connecticut, I crossed a bridge over a river, alongside of which was private property. This property owner has a 10 ¢ 12 foot high barbed wire fence crossing the river and all along the edge of his property that backs up to the AT! Then, a little later, I was not sure which way the trail went. There was a side trail that had a sign on a tree, so I went to read the sign ¢I¢d turn back if I were you¢. Not a very welcoming feeling in Connecticut.I finally made it to the shelter. It¢s right off the 10 Mile River where it junctions with the Housatonic River. There were 4 of us in the shelter, and it poured for about 20 minutes. After the rain, we heard a bunch of small voices and thought a family was on their way in, nope, Girl Scouts, 5 girls and 2 leaders.   They only had one 2-man tent (for the leaders). There is not room in the shelter for the girls, and boy are they noisy!   I don¢t¢ think it¢s going to rain again, but they are not prepared !! Their leader did tell them it was quiet time at 8:30 (we laid down that rule) and she did get them to sleep at that time, but she was a lot noisier then the girls were while trying to quiet them down.Oh well, I slept well during the night for the most part, the girls started to whisper and talk a few times, I had to hush them up. I got up to pee once and saw the most spectacular site. The shelter opens onto a small meadow, it was all misty from the rain, but there was most spectacular lively dance of fire flies out in the meadow. I have never seen such a display before. It was like fairies lighting up the sky. One of the guys in the shelter said it was like a laser light show.