Day 53: Stratton Pond Shelter

Start: Glastenbury Mountain Firetower (AT mi 1624.3). Stop: Stratton Pond Shelter (AT mi 1643.4). Today’s miles: 19.1 miles. Total AT mileage: 618.7 miles

Today.. well I’ll be honest, today sucked. It was a mentally tough day and mix that with long miles and 2 falls, you get a real pissed off me. Let’s just start from the beginning..

I woke up off and on all night to loud popping noises on my tent. When I got up at 11:30pm to pee-I realized it was rain. The firetower didn’t help prevent any rain falling on my tent, it actually made the cumulated drops that much bigger to splat all over the place. While I was up, I moved my pack to where it would stay dry, and then went back to sleep. I woke up again around 3am to realize I must have not covered my ground tarp completely, since beads of water were coming through the floor of my tent and my stuff was getting wet. Awesome.

I put electronics on top of other things, and did my best to keep my sleeping bag dry, then tried to sleep again. I woke up a little after 5 am to my watch alarm, we were supposed to be getting up to watch the sunrise from the tower, but it was pouring rain, so I turned it off and fell back to sleep. I thought I’d hear people up and moving, but I didn’t, until around 6:45, I roll over and see FarOut’s shoes at my tent. It wasn’t until then that I realized she was talking to me! Lol I guess I got my good sleep from 5-6:45.

Sauce and her stuff got soaked this morning too, they were all packed and heading out. Knowing that, I got my butt in gear and was packed and leaving a little after 7:15. I felt off though. Maybe still stuck in a sleepy fog or something. Sometime around 9:30, Wizard, Killer, Lilo, and Sweeps passed me. I thought they had already left this morning because their food bags were gone, but apparently I beat them out of camp.

We leapfrogged each other all day. The trail started down Glastenbury Mountain, which was painful on stiff feet. I was completely starved by 11:30 and searching for the next shelter so I could eat my lunch and lay out my tent to dry. I was less than a quarter mile from it when I slipped on a rock and fell all the way to the ground.

Surprisingly, I hit my right knee instead of the same spot I keep torturing on my left knee. Now, I need you to picture this. The trail is dark brown, almost black mud, with big rocks thrown in for fun. To my left is a beaver bog. Bugs are absolutely everywhere, including burrowing into my hair and trying to get into my ears. And it’s muggy as hell, so sticky humid that my actual legs were dripping with sweat, along with every inch of the rest of my body. And down I go, into murky, mushy, mud. And you know what? I sat there a minute and contemplated life- even the bugs thought I was a disaster, because while I was splayed out, attempting to brush off the mud from my legs, hips, arms.. none of them were swarming me. Hell, I’ll just stay down here, then.

I had gotten back in front of Wizard and them, so I just knew they’d come walking up on me while laid out.. but to my benefit, they didn’t. I got up, cussed a bit because the bugs were back, and carried on. A whole 6 minutes later, I was at the shelter, laying out my tent, getting water, and eating lunch.. while I was grabbing the water, Wizard and crew appeared and ate lunch with me. I really did just barely get by without witnesses to my fall and then meltdown. Cool.

I stayed almost an hour at the shelter. Killer gave me a little pep talk before they left (they all left before I did, I just wasn’t mentally ready for the climb we were in, or the next one either for that matter). It was helpful, and I’m grateful to her for her motivation. I put on some music, Bruno Mars Radio on Pandora, and jammed out. Granted, it was still sticky, hot, and miserable.. but I was in a better headspace.

I passed them again while they were getting water, I still had a liter from lunch so I was good. Sweeps said a sweet little, “you can still take a break if you need one, even if you don’t need water..” which was so kind, but I knew if I stopped so would my momentum and motivation, and I had almost 9 more miles to go, 5 of which were up Stratton Mountain, an 1800ft change in elevation from where I was standing. I had to keep moving!

That climb was nice starting out, and if I really think about it, the whole thing actually wasn’t bad, but I was plum miserable because of the bugs and heat. I tried like hell to make myself stay positive, but there’s only so many times you can smack yourself in the head trying to get a fly out of your hair before you’re angry at everything. The climb started to get tough, so I decided to multitask to keep my motivation up. I would upload a picture to the blog, while it was loading I’d hike up hill, when it would “save” I would pause for a breather and to upload the next one. I did that until I uploaded all the pictures for yesterday’s post, and then I sat on a rock and set up the actual post. I won’t lie, when it said “published!” I was sad because I knew it was time to get moving and I had nothing else to distract me besides Bruno.

Back to climbing I went. 2 miles from the top, I chugged the rest of my water. My app said there were at least 3 streams to get water from between the top and the shelter I was hiking to. One of the streams was only 0.2 down from the top! Perfect! So, up, up, up I went. I saw the tower on top of the mountain, and I walked right passed it because I was so thirsty, all I could think about was going that 0.2 downhill to water.

I went 0.2 down.. and saw a mosquito infested trickle. There was a trail to the side that went back UP. That was apparently where the good water was coming out. But the bugs were so thick, I frustratingly kept walking downhill. I checked my app: next stream is 1.4 miles away. Fine. Down, down, painfully down I go.. swatting at bugs and swearing that when I get to town I’ll do like Wendy said and find a bug-net for my head, claustrophobia be damned. I get to where the stream is supposed to be, I walk over the rocks that it’s supposed to be pouring over, under, and around. Not one single drop. Seriously?! The words that came out of my mouth would have made Samuel L Jackson blush. I was pissed. And really freaking thirsty.

I look at my app, next stream: 1.2 miles. Jesus. I kept hiking. My feet were throbbing, my knees were aching, and I was all around over this whole day. I don’t care how pretty the views were or how badass it was to complete what I have. I was done. As I was angrily stomping along, I was quickly humbled by a root I didn’t see, that I proceeded to trip over and come down hard on my left knee, scraping the crap out of my shin. You know, the one that’s recovering from shin splints.

Y’all. I rolled onto my butt and just sat there. Bugs swarming, tears swelling in my eyes but not dropping, chin starting to shake. I really think I would have had a full blown cry session if I wasn’t so damn dehydrated. I then got mad that my tears wouldn’t even fall. I looked at my phone. That stream was now only 0.4 miles away, and the shelter was only 0.8 from where I sat.

I took a deep breath, collected myself and got up. I slowly walked to the water like the most pitiful thing you’ve ever seen. Like I had been jumped and my dog was stolen. Each pole was hanging by my side, my pack wasn’t even fastened all the way. I just trudged along watching every step like a hawk. When I got to the bridge with the creek rambling under it, I squealed I was so thrilled to finally have water! I dropped my pack and poles, got my bag, and filtered a liter, then drank half of it immediately.

I put my pack back on and walked the 0.4 to the shelter. Sauce was cooking dinner, and I was so happy to see him that the tears came back.. lol.. they still didn’t fall, but I knew I was one “aww buddy” away from completely losing it. Emotions just take over sometimes. I collapsed on the shelter floor, and he told me they had a tough time today, too. Then FarOut walked up, she had just swam at the pond down the trail a bit, and said she felt much better.

She could see in my face that I had a hard day, she confided in me that she did, too. And then, she kindly helped me put up my tent in the last flat spot while we commiserated. Man, these two really are solid in the friend department. It’s so difficult to adequately explain this adventure we’re on, so that you fully understand it.

Sometimes I don’t even understand why I have this pull to do it, because it is so absolutely hard at times. I’m beyond grateful that I have found people on this journey. I can’t imagine being solo and then having a day like today.. and not having someone who understands and just went through the exact same shit as I did.. I don’t know that I’d have it in me to continue. I am stubborn, so maybe I don’t give my mental strength enough credit.. but you get my point. I’m so very grateful for my tramily.

Anyway. I went down to the pond with Kat, a nurse doing a section hike that got in roughly the same time I did. I got my water bag full, then got down to my undies and hopped in. She probably thought I was nuts, with my rashy thighs out for anyone to see.. but I definitely didn’t care one bit. I swam out until I couldn’t touch, I scrubbed what I could of my body with my sponge (my shin stung in the water like crazy), I let the water “wash” my hair. It was the best part of my whole day, and I’m so glad I got in!

I got out and put on my dry sleep clothes, not caring that I had to get naked to do so. And then we walked back up to the shelter. I filtered my water, ate some ramen, and quickly put my bag in the bear box, went to the bathroom, and headed to my tent. FarOut and Sauce had stopped by while I was eating to confirm our game plan for tomorrow. All three of us pretty much instantly agreed that we need a zero. So, tomorrow, we’ll hike 10.7 miles to a road, hitch to town, stay in the EconoLodge, and if it looks decent enough when we get there, we’ll book another night.

It’s kind of perfect, because that zero will give Lizard, Derby, and Curmudgeon time to catch up to us! Even if we don’t get to hike out of town together (they will probably want a zero after all this crap, too), at least we’ll get to see each other! I really hope so anyway. I miss our big group.
I’m laying in my tent now, completely sore and very tired. I wish I could teleport to that EconoLodge. Goodnight, y’all.