Day 54: Econo Lodge, Manchester, Vermont

Start: Stratton Pond Shelter (AT mi 1643.4). Stop: Manchester, Vermont (AT mi 1654). Today’s miles: 10.6 miles. Total AT mileage: 629.3 miles

I didn’t sleep that well. My legs and feet wouldn’t relax, minutes after I’d get comfortable, one leg would jerk out or a sharp pain would sear through my foot. All part of the adventure I guess.
I got up just after 6, packed and walked down to the bear box. Because it was so far from the shelter, and I didn’t want to backtrack, I ate my breakfast and brushed my teeth sitting on top of the bear box. I was on the trail minutes before 7am.. and I was on a mission: get to town.

I crossed paths with a few people walking south, but saw no one going north. The trail had a couple steep descents, but they were short and not too terrible. The rest of the trail was absolutely perfect-minus the bugs. It was smooth and calmly wound its way around.. if it went up, it was short and easy, if it went down, it was also short and easy.

The only complaint of the morning was those pesky bugs. If governments aren’t using bugs as a torture method, they’re losing a lot of valuable intel. I know I’d sing like a canary to make those damn bugs go away, and I haven’t even done anything. Question 1: “will my cell be gnat, mosquito, and fly free?” “Ok, yep. I did it. I did all of it.”

Anyway. Besides swatting at bugs and making mental lists of things I need to get while in town, the only other eventful thing to happen was another less than graceful fall. Luckily, I didn’t hurt anything, other than my pride of course. It doesn’t matter how much tread your shoes have when you step sideways on a wet rock. Oh, and I crossed paths with a snake that had his little head up and staring at me. God, they are SO creepy!

I got to the parking lot at 11:15am.. 10.6 miles in just over 4 hours.. go ahead and rename me TownLegs #2. It’s close to 4 miles to the Econo Lodge, so I sat down with my pack off, took my shoes off, and relaxed a bit waiting on FarOut and Sauce to come. No point in trying to hitch or secure a ride without them, since we’re going to the same place, the room is in Sauce’s name, and it was too early to check in. Not to mention I had no service.

Well, that was the case up until 3 minutes of typing that out.. because Ava, the caretaker from the Stratton Pond Shelter, showed up at that moment and asked if I needed to get to town. She was on her way to a training thing and saw me sitting in the parking lot, so she turned around and came to give me a ride! She promised it was easy to hitch from there, so I got in her white smart car (it felt like my pack took up the entire truck/backseat lol). She drove me to the EconoLodge, as I was walking in, FarOut called. They had just missed Ava! But the 3 of us would never have fit in her car anyway. They would try to hitch and call me back if they were unsuccessful, because I could ask the EconoLodge people to go get them if they had no luck.

I walked in at 11:47am, and the sweet manager let me check into my room, even without Sauce present. Cool. I ended up liking the room immediately, so I came back to the desk and booked the next night, too. Lol

FarOut texted that they got a ride but got him to take them past EconoLodge to town, so they could start laundry. I showered and then got my dirty clothes together and met them in town. I started my laundry, and walked across the street to where they were eating pizza and ordered some food. We sat at the bar and chatted while I waited on my pizza. By the time it came out, I had to go put my clothes in the dryer.. which worked out perfectly since the pizza was too hot to eat just yet anyway. FarOut and I ran across the street (ran is a bit of an exaggeration), and switched our clothes, then came back.

We finished eating and went to the grocery store in the next little plaza. It’s so hard to resupply sometimes. I’m getting sick of all the food there is to eat out in the woods.. but it just makes me appreciate town food a little more. We got all we needed, walked back to the laundromat to bring our clothes back over to the grocery store where the shuttle driver was picking us up from. He arrived 20 minutes later and toted us back to the EconoLodge.

They showered and got settled into their room, I laid on the king sized bed, chatted with Lauren a bit, then promptly logged into Hulu and caught up on some shows. It was my first time watching a show with intention since I’ve started this hike. It kinda felt weird. I’ve watched tv once or twice but it’s just been whatever someone else turned on.. it was actually therapeutic to watch something I’ve been following. I actually relaxed and enjoyed every second.

FarOut ended up ordering pizza from the same place we ate lunch at.. mainly because there were no other delivery options and everything close was closed. Good thing that we really liked it! When the food came, I went and ate with them in their room while we watched the Vanderbilt/Mississippi State baseball game. They went to Vandy so Sauce was definitely following it closely lol

At 9:45, I gave up on the game and retreated to my big bed. I bet I’m going to sleep so so well tonight. Today has been just the relief I needed! Not to mention all the words of encouragement I’ve received since posting about my nightmare-ish day yesterday. I really love my tribe. You people are so loved and appreciated. Sincerely. Thank you for being so kind to me.

Sweet dreams.