clarendon shelter to rutland, vt

i set my alarm for 05:00 for two reasons: 1. i wanted to get into town early for more town time, and 2. it sounded like maybe a lot of folks from the shelter were aiming for the hostel. (this turned out to be both untrue and a non-issue as they have tons of beds.) i woke up around 04:30 and had a blissful 30 minute nap before i had to get up.

last night we heard and saw evidence of a thunderstorm, but it didn’t rain on us, and when the rain started in earnest in the morning, somehow the white pines we were camped under soaked up almost all the rain. my tent was essentially dry when i packed it up, as well as the ground.

i had breakfast in the shelter because i wasn’t convinced the pines would keep keeping me dry. in fact the walk to the shelter and to the bear box to get my food was pretty wet.

i was on trail at 05:59. the morning hike was through rainy wet woods, normally something thst would bother me, but today i was busy. i’ve been listening to michael pollan’s “how to change your mind” which unbeknownst to me is all about psychedelics. in the book he talks about how psychedelics are very good at temporarily dissolving the ego. this is because psychedelics reduce blood flow to the default mode network or DMN in your brain. the DMN is essentially you. when you’re thinking about something it’s the DMN that’s doing the work. another way to stop the DMN is through meditation. stop thinking about anything and blood flow and oxygen to your DMN decreases. long story short, i spent the morning trying to destroy my ego, if only for a short time. i’m happy to say that while i was not entirely successful i definitely had moments where it was pretty close to gone.

i passed governor clement shelter on my way to killington. magz and i spent a night there in 2020 under a white pine that had a squirrel living in it that i’m pretty sure was throwing pine cones at us all afternoon.

the hike up killington was much longer than i remember. the rain stopped before i got to the top, but it was still socked on with clouds, so i didn’t do the extra .2 mile to the top.

i stopped briefly at the shelter for a snack and chatted with the ridge runner “assblaster 5000” that had spent some time at clarendon with us. he said bugs had come and gone about 40 minutes before. kick and lyric showed up, dropped their packs and headed for the summit. i headed out. i wanted to see if i could catch up to bugs over the next 6 miles.

assblaster 5000 got his trail name for having a bidet that was battery powered.

i motored, stopping only briefly to construct a 1700 mile sign and take a photo at the mark.

i left the shelter on top of killington at around 10:10 and i arrived at rt 4 at about 12:15. as i exited the woods i saw bugs heading for a car that had just pulled over for her. i sprinted down and across the highway. the woman driving the car immediately asked if i was in need of a ride and started to clear her completely covered back seat, lamenting that it wasn’t going to be a comfy ride. just then another car, an audi SUV pulled up behind me and asked if i needed a ride! i hopped in with the audi folks, and they brought me to town, asking me all the requisite thru-hike questions.

they dropped me off in front of the yellow deli, where the hostel was. i entered and immediately found rocket doing his laundry. bugs showed up a few minutes later.

after showers and laundry was put in, kick and lyric showed up. they quickly showered and we left to check out the farmer’s market. sadly it was just starting to pack up. we went and got sandwiches from a place nearby. reuben for me as usual.

after lunch we swung by price chopper for ice cream, though i stashed it in the freezer at the hostel instead of eating it immediately. the afternoon was spent publishing journal posts to the blog, but i still didn’t get caught up.

later i walked with kick, maestro, and another hiker, “scoop” to price chopper to do our resupply. we dropped our stuff off at the hostel and went to a pizza joint down the street for beers. apparently bugs, lyric, and rocket had spent their afternoon drinking hard seltzers in the park. they contacted us about dinner vand joined us at the pizza place - a real disappointment for me because we had been planning on going to sushi around the corner.

the pizza was good, and the whole “fellowship” as magz calls us, plus scoop had a good time.

some additional images from today: