Date: 2012-07-26
From: Claringdon Shelter 

To: Cooper Lodge Shelter 
Miles today: 10.1
Weather: overcast clouds

Last night it rained a little and when we got up at 7:00am it started to rain once again. We got all packed up then waited a little while to see if the rain would stop but it never did so we just headed out into the rain. Today we had a few things going on, first there is a section of the trail that is closed due to last year¢s hurricane, second we will be under 500 miles to go and third we have a 2500 foot climb up to the shelter we will be staying at tonight. The trail went up and over a little climb then we got to road where we had to start road walking around the closed part of the trail but I think it is more or less just closed for day hikers, we are thru hikers and we know what we are doing so like most other thru hikers we went through the closed section. We had heard from many sobo's that it was passable and it turned out to be. There were some places where the trail was washed out but there was ways around it and there was one bridge that was washed out but the creek was still passable...plus if we would have gone around on the detour we would have missed to sing on the tree that said only 500 miles to go. Once we got to the other side of the closed section, we were only about half a mile from the next shelter and of course it started to rain again. We got to the shelter and found that One Speed was there and he said that we had just missed Jersey and Hill Hiker, they passed us this morning while we were still at the shelter from last night. While we were there Just John showed up once again, somehow he keeps getting behind us and he keeps catching up to us in the most random places and its happened like five times now. The two weekend hikers, Crush and Pocahontas showed up as well and we all waited for the rain to let up before we continued on. We waited a half hour and the rain did not let up so we continued on out into the rain to start the 2000 foot climb up to the top of Killington Mountain. Luckily about fifteen minutes after we left the rain stopped. We went up and up and soon we were in the clouds and then the hardwood forest gave way to the sub alpine forest so I knew we were getting close to the top. The fog got so thick that we could not see more than fifty yards all around us and it was causing the trees to drip on us all the way up. Soon we got to the top of the steep climb and from there the trail continued going up but it was not nearly as steep. We got to the shelter and both Jersey and Hill Hiker were inside trying to keep warm because it was only 61 degrees, & the wind was blowing and it was very damp. Not long after we got there Just John, One Speed, Crush and the two weekend hikers also showed up but only Just John and the two weekend hikers decided to stay here the rest continued on into town tonight. This shelter is one of the oldest shelters along the trail and it shows it. It is a fully enclosed stone building with a door but it had windows along the front side and they do not close so the fog and wind came blowing right in. The roof also leaked here and there so we had to choose our bunks according to the leaks. We all got out of our wet clothes and put on dry ones, I even put on my dry socks and my rain coat to stay warm and that shows how cool it is up on this mountain. We then set up our bunks and crawled into our sleeping bags at around 7:15pm, Just John and the weekend hikers decided to tent rather than stay in the shelter so it was just Jersey, Hill Hikers, Big Sky, Sugar and I in the shelter tonight. Tomorrow we are doing a short day into town and we are expecting more rain so its time for bed even though it is only 8:00pm...night all.