buchannan lodge to a real bed?

miles: 15.7

what a day! woke up at buchannan lodge, packed up, breakfasted, and was on trail by 0630hr. i had a long day ahead, over mt. mansfield, the highest peak in vermont at 4393 ft., so i motored.

arrived at harrington’s view, quickly took a snap, and wad on my way.

i motored on, running into two SOBO hikers .3 mile from puffer shelter. they recognized me as the hiker talked about by nails and mate who had stayed there last night as well. apparently mate has taken a new trail name, “swamp donkey”, another name for moose, his BSA name, and for the fact that he enjoys yelling “donkey! what are you doing in my swamp!” from time to time. love it!

i motored on, passing a beautiful beaver bog.

i stopped briefly at taylor lodge for my 10:00hr. second breakfast, before continuing on.

the trail was reasonably clear, with short slow sections of roots, rocks, and steep sections to traverse.

as i approached a small stream, i saw two hikers taking a break. it was nails and swamp donkey! pack off, i sat for a few to chat and find out how their night off trail went. they were planning on summiting mt. mansfield and ending at smugglers notch, where they had a car waiting to take them home for the night again.

i headed off, as my “stretch goal” was a 19 mile day, and i had to get over mansfield first. at the closest water source to the bottom of the mountain, i decided to camel up with water. while i was filtering nails and swamp donkey passed me up. nails also offered to take me home for the night. i said thanks, but that i’d think about it.

so i hiked on, now with the possibility of a bed in my future. when i caught back up with nails i asked, can i get a pizza, a beer, and some ice cream? she said no problem. then it occurred to me that she probably also had wifi, which would make updates to the blog take a fraction of the time. she did. that meant i didn’t have to sit on top of a mountain doing it. i was sold.

i continued with nails and swamp donkey up to butler lodge for lunch.

we finished lunch, and headed for mt. mansfield forehead. (the mountain has several peaks, forehead, nose, lips, chin, and adams apple.) after a very steep climb, and at least one sketchy spot where i thought, “well if the next 2 seconds go badly, it’s going to be my last 2 seconds”, we arrived at the forehead. it did take a bit longer than it should due to the copious amounts of blueberries that needed eating.

at the forehead we could see the nose and chin of mansfield. we continued on. i thought our climb was pretty much over, but i was very wrong. from the foehead to the chin is 2 miles, and many hundreds of feet more in elevation. in addition, once we passed the visitors center between the nose and chin, the trail was MOBBED with day hikers. we had to take our masks on and off every few minutes as we passed day hikers in what were essentially 2’ wide paths through the trees. on the rocks it wasn’t as close, except then you were huffing and puffing and putting on the mask felt like suffocating.

eventually we reached the summit of the chin. it was mobbed with people.

we didn’t linger at the top for long. we started the descent down the north side, another perpendicular climb down. i would definitely not want to do this in the rain. even dry it was pretty precarious at times.

we passed taft lodge on the way down, where i was planning on staying. there was a sign saying that due to it being in the alpine zone, there was no tent camping (it was the same for butler lodge).

we continued to descend until our knees would have no more, and suddenly we were at vt rt 108, smugglers notch.

the car was down the road and we cut through the stowe snow machine maintenance plant, where they were working on the snow machine tracks. they are huge!

we hopped in the minivan and headed for the store. i got ice cream for everyone and beer. arrived at nails’ house and met the family. showered, pizzad, blogged, beered, ice creamed, and now bed. they even have a jack russel on stilts (like lucy, though different coloring) he’s 2 and just wants to play alllll the time. sadly at the moment i can’t actually chase a dog due to leg and knee fatigue. the kicker, his name is . . . lucas! hah!

what a day!