sharon mountain campsite to home

when i woke up it was raining. i lay in my tent, cozy and dry, but i wasn’t feeling good about the day. i considered doing a short 12 mile day to a road and having magz pick me up there. my joints weren’t feeling all that great, but i decided to move around a bit to see how bad they were. i was surprised to find that once i moved a bit they actually didn’t feel too bad. okay. plan a it is.

all i had to do was pack up and get on trail. once i was there it wouldn’t be so bad. i went out in the rain to get my food from the bear box, and ate a sad breakfast in my tent. i packed everything into my backpack, exited the tent and began the wet, muddy task of packing a wet tent. i got it in its bag, and stuffed it into the top of my pack. the tent seemed to be double the weight it usually is.

i got on trail and as predicted i felt better. still nothing close to good, but i was moving. the rain eventually stopped, but the trail would stay wet for the rest of the day.

i was in constant touch with magz to try and anticipate when i would arrive at great barrington. i crossed into mass and walked along sage’s ravine, a really fantastically beautiful place. i am confused though as the signs on trail seem to indicate that the ravine is the border between ct and ma, but on a map it looks like it’s very clearly in mass.

from there i headed up race mountain, mt. everett, and finally bushnell mountain. race mountain and mt. everett were fine, as was the climb up bushnell, but the descent was awful. it was steep, wet, slippery rocks the whole way, and they seemed to go on forever. i felt like i was stuck on a treadmill in some kind of hell. by the time i got down from bushnell i had slowed my pace so much i had to revise my arrival estimate with magz.

the last 4 miles were pretty flat and i tried to motor, but i was so tired. magz had parked and was heading towards me, which i knew meant very slow moving once we met up. to make matters worse, the mosquitoes over these first couple miles were relentless.

eventually i ran into them. the dogs came up to me and there was a grand reunion. magz stood back and waited for us to finish and then handed me a covid test. okay. i swabbed right there in the woods and did the test. we started walking towards the car. no smooches until the test said i was good.

unfortunately the test came back positive and in the worst way. ::cry:: the line was so faint, but was definitely there. so now what? magz considered her options, which included leaving me on trail. ultimately she decided we’d drive home, masked up with the windows open the whole way and i’d sleep either in the guest bedroom or in my tent on the lawn. i was so depressed and a little angry that this barely visible fucking line on a covid test was ruining my shower, dinner, tv, and snuggle time with my family. we walked largely in silence to the car.

the car ride home was also no treat. with the windows open, it wasn’t warm and my knees got cold and began to ache viciously. it seemed to take forever. i tried my best to bear it silently, but my constant shifting and rubbing of my knees let magz know i was having a bad time.

we arrived at home, and thankfully magz let me go in and take a shower. our shower head is pretty epic, and i took a pretty long and very hot shower, trying to reheat and relax. magz had made chili, one of my favorite dinners, and we ate it, 10 feet apart in the garage. i slept in the guest room and both of us were masked whenever we were in the house, and our air filter was on full.

not ideal, but i was home, showered, fed, and had a bed to sleep in.

some additional images from today: