Thursday June 6, 17.3mi/27.8km
Winturri shelter (1722.9) to West Hartford (1740.2) (VT)
It rained heavily all night, finally stopping at 6am. The other two started packing up at 6am, and departed at 7:45am…a very long time. We left by 8am, and had an easy morning of downhill.
Most of the views today were from a field or meadow.
At the first road crossing there was a farm market, so we stopped for a second breakfast and got ice cream, pie, and soda pop. Then, more grassy meadows!
It was a pretty uneventful morning, and I passed only one other day hiker and her dog. At the trailhead, the info board had some artwork from a local elementary school. These are always interesting to see. It’s also in French!
Of course, after crossing the road, there were more meadows.
And in the forest, many of the trees had tubing attached to them. I’m assuming these are sap collection lines, for maple syrup.
There were also many old rock walls nearby, probably marking old property lines.
We stopped for lunch at a great spot, on a gravely patch next to the trail, sitting in the sunlight. It was one of the best lunch spots in awhile. No sitting in a dark, dirty shelter today!
After a final stretch in a forest, we came to a small village and crossed the White River.
We stopped by the library to fill our water bottles, and the librarian explained that the house next door letss hikers stay and sleep in their finished garage. It was very early, and we had only done 17 miles, but it sounded nice. So, we wandered over and the owners invited us in.
Linda and Randy offered us a soda pop and some muffins, and we chatted for a bit.
Then, back up to the garage to watch some old VHS movies on an old school TV. Mrs Doubtfire, Hook, Jumanji, Back to the Future… most of the tapes were a Robin Williams movie, haha.
After removing a wayward bird that found its way inside, I went to bed. Tomorrow, we get to New Hampshire!
And it had an odd alternative route. No thanks, I’ll stick with the trail that has good weather!
About 2mi/3km into the day, we came to the Vermont border. This is also where the 273-mile Long Trail starts. It is an older trail, and was the inspiration for the Appalachian Trail. The Long Trail (LT) and the Appalachian Trail (AT) share the same path for 105 miles.
And of course, there is heaps of mud at the border. Hikers sometimes call this state “Vermud”.
There was one distant view all morning, at a power line corridor.
And one view at a nice beaver pond. This was a perfect spot for moose, though I looked and didn’t see any.
This photo shows the construction of the dam itself. Clever beavers.
As usual, there were nice boardwalks to keep our feet mostly dry.
At lunch, I celebrated being in Vermont the only proper way, with cheese! Cabot cheese.
After lunch, there weren’t many views, but I started noticing the close-up scenery. Some flora:
And fauna: (a newt)
There was one view, at a high point called Harmon Hill. Looking west, down to Bennington:
Then, after a ridiculously steep descent on slippery rock stairs, we crossed highway 9 and the Walloomsac Brook.
And there were so many more newts! These spotted orange critters are everywhere, I try not to step on them.
The final 2 mile climb up to our shelter for the night was slow. It wasn’t steep, and actually had some nice switchbacks, I was just hot and tired. There was also a neat piece of geology that the trail passed thru, called split rock.
I arrived to the shelter at 5pm, to find this cool sign in red letters.
There was a group of 5 people at the shelter when I arrived, but most of them departed, hiking south to the road and into town. One hiker remained, and he put on some episodes of a Netflix cartoon, and Bob and I watched too.
