Date: 2022-07-18
From: Thistle Hill Shelter Mile 1737.5

To: Velvet Rocks Shelter Mile 1753.6
Miles today: 16.1
Weather: clear sky

I got to sleep earlier than usual last night and I woke up about 520 this morning before the alarm. Apparently I didn¢t drink enough last night, as I didn¢t have to pee in the middle of the night. Of course now I really had to go, so I got up for the day. I went to get the bear bags from the tree on the way back. Just as I was untying the first bear bag, Pebbles passed me on the way out of camp at 5:30. We are basically ready to go at 7 today and we¢re the last ones out of camp. I¢m guessing some of those were trying to get into Hanover before the rain starts. Depending on the timing of the storm we have a shot of that as well.On the first climb of the day there was a bench at a viewing area and just passed that was a bunch of raspberries. Unfortunately there was a yellow jacket nest in the raspberries according to the comments in the farOut app. Timex, Pilgrim, and Orchid were hiking together at that point. Timex went through the raspberries looking for the nest and couldn¢t find it and didn¢t see any bees. Pilgrim went through and of course he got stung, being the only one that¢s allergic. He quickly got some benedryl on board and then continued down in the town.I caught up with them in town and we made a stop at Linda¢s house. She allows you to camp in her backyard and has drinks and coffee available throughout the day. We ended up taking about a 30 to 45 minute break. It looks like Pilgrim isn¢t going to show any significant signs of an allergic reaction but he is getting sleepy.Shortly before lunch it started to lightly rain, but not enough to put on any rain gear. It was still lightly raining by the time we got to the shelter where we were stopping for lunch. I had put the rain skirt that Jen got me on, and that seems to work pretty well to keep the shorts dry. Talus and Waffle were also at the shelter eating lunch.After lunch we put on rain gear for the walk down into Norwich, but it wasn¢t long before I got way too hot and sweaty in the rain jacket and we all took off our rain jackets and just got wet. There¢s a long road walk into Norwich, and we caught up with Talus and Waffle and ended up chatting with them on the way to the general store in Norwich. We had some ice cream, I got soft serve maple, and I got a couple things from the general store but they were out of many of the hiker favorites. Coming out of Norwich there was another long road walk to get into Hanover New Hampshire. The rain started coming down steadily on the road walk and I ended up putting back on the rain gear. Generally the skirt did a pretty good job of keeping the shorts dry. We crossed over the Connecticut river, and then did a reasonable photo op despite the rain and the cars splashing us with water.Lou¢s bakery closed at three so we did not get our free pastry. We decided to head to the co-op directly as they closed at 6:30 and we wanted to make sure we got all our shopping done before they closed. There is also a pizza joint that offers a free slice of pizza to AT hikers in town. We did our resupply shopping at the co-op grocery store, which definitely did not have a lot of hiker friendly food. As it was close to 6, we needed to make a decision on whether to get takeout food from the co-op or head the half mile back to restaurants in town. We decided to do the co-op dinner as none of us really wanted to walk back. After eating we had a long climb up to the Velvet Rock Shelter where we found Grits already setup in the shelter. Orchid and Pilgrim stayed in the shelter, while I chose to tent as it wasn¢t raining anymore. Just before I got my bear bag hung, it started raining again then rained on and off for the next couple of hours. Did not have any issues with getting wet in the tent. We¢d passed Talus and Waffle eating in town and they¢re tenting by the shelter as well as well.Steps 34400Weather Forecast: 78/68 with Tstorms and rain