Date: 2015-07-09
From: Great Barrington 

To: Shaker campsite
Miles today: 17.6

A good night's sleep in a cool, bugless room was great. As we were chatting with one of the couples we met yesterday, we mentioned we needed a ride back to the trail. They offered to take us. We eagerly accepted even though we left a bit earlier than planned. But, when you are at the mercy of others, you accept what ever is offered. Our trail angels today were Mark and Gerda. Mark drove us to the trail head and we started hiking at 9:53.    As we started onto the trail, trail magic awaited us. This trail magic was given by Red Panda and her family again. This is the fourth time we have came across trail magic by Red Panda and her family. Since we just resupplied and we just started hiking for the day, we passed over this trail magic. Crazy, we know. But others may need it more than us. Today's hiking started pleasantly. We traversed over a meadow and along a river. The trail was flat. But, of course this ended and we climbed. But, the trail was the steep, rock covered trail we have had the last few weeks. It was a clear trail that rose gradually to the top. We still huffed and puffed to the top, but, we could set a pace and keep that pace going. We haven't been able to do this for weeks. The forest was an older forest we hiked through. This always makes our hike more pleasant as there are no shrubs rubbing against our legs. The shrubs rubbing against Lavender's legs freaks her out as she worries a snake is hiding in the shrubs.    We took a short break at 11:30ish at a rock outcropping. We met another thru-hiker, Rise. We enjoyed a conversation with him during our break. We also saw Take It Easy. He now has a friend that joined him for the remainder of his hike. We named him Smiley because he smiles so much. That could be because today is his first day of hiking. He body isn't worn out from already hiking 1525.3 miles!! We were smiling also on our first day of hiking. We don't smile so much now!!   We were going to take a late lunch since we took a late morning break. As we were discussing where to break, a SoBo section hiker told us about trail magic 1 mile ahead. That made our decision of where to stop easy!! We were stopping at the trail magic.    We hurried, almost running, to the trail magic. The trail was soft, as it was covered with pine needles. We saw the trail magic ahead. We didn't want to look to eager, so we slowed a bit just before the vehicle.    Lo and behold, a couple from Ohio who plans on thru-hiking the trail next year was giving trail magic. They had chairs. More importantly, they had pulled pork sandwiches, coleslaw, chips and soda. And we ate. It was so good. As we were enjoying our food, a SoBo came by. This is our first full fledged SoBo. He started from Katahdin on Jun 1. He is ultralight meaning his backpack weights less than 17 pounds. Makes us look like we have huge backpacks. But, we hike our own hike. We left the trail magic and climbed uphill. Near the top we hiked around a pond that was formed by a very large beaver dam. You could see evidence of beaver activity as many trees were down and you could see the signs of beaver chewing on them. As we stood there looking at the pond we saw a beaver way off shore swimming. He seemed to notice us also.   He swam closer and closer to us, watching us the whole time. He got within 15 feet of us before turning away. We are sure he went home and told his family about the two crazy hikers he saw today.    As Newton's law of gravity goes, what goes up must come down. The AT law is what goes up, must go up higher, higher and higher and it must be steep.   And that is what we did - climbed steeply. We also came down eventually. And, guess what was awaiting us at the bottom?? More trail magic. There were sodas and peanut M&M's. We took a break and enjoyed an ice cold soda.   We continued on further. We were planning on stopping earlier. But, the trail was easy. The forecast called for rain. We wanted to set up camp before the rain came.   We were two miles away from the tenting area when we felt the first drops of rain. We ran down the mountain, crossed a road and the rain stopped. We didn't get wet at all.   We slowed our pace. We came to the camp site. As we were deciding which camp site to use, the rain started again. We quickly chose a site, quickly set up our tent and threw our packs inside the tent. Count ran to collect water. Lavender crawled inside the tent. Count came back to the tent and it really started to rain.   We are holed up in our tent for the night. We have to make and eat dinner in the tent. We also have to set up our sleeping pads and everything else inside. It is hard to imagine having a large master bedroom with lots of room as we sit in our little haven! But, it is raining, raining, raining. We hope for a dry tent and everything else in the morning. It may be a difficult night to sleep with the sound of rain pounding on our little safe haven.