Murmurs of Maine

• Today I traveled 25.4 miles with 5466 feet of ascent and 5131 feet of descent.
• Sweet Potato and I left Great Barrington and hit the trail at 9:15 this morning after having a big breakfast at Micky D’s. We were shuttled to the trail head by Joe, a native to Great Barrington who’s been shuttling hikers since 2017. He wrote down our names, where we were from, the brand of our packs and took our picture. He says he’s shuttled over 4000 hikers since he started keeping track.
• The first 10 miles of the day consisted of the 3 separate peaks, Bear, Everett and Race. Everett reminded me of a smaller Maine mountain with it’s steep ascent to the summit and granite balds and ridges at the top. It was a great getting returning to some Maine hiking.
• We pushed past a great stealth spot by a flowing stream at the end of the day to what the extra 1.4 miles to the shelter, but it ended up being a steep half mile side trail to the shelter that’ll add a total of a mile to our hike which was a bummer.

Peace!