Today's miles 16.5. AT miles 1595.6
We managed an earlier start today, we were walking for 7:30am. It was another very warm sunny day, not much humidity though and with a nice cool breeze. Just over three miles into the day we reached Mount Greylock, the highest peak in Massachusetts which has a veterans war memorial tower on the summit. There is also Bascom Lodge where we called in for a coffee/coke and some cookies. The views from the top where a bit hazy today.
The next six miles were mainly downhill but with a couple of short ups thrown in up to Mount Williams and to Mount Prospect which did have clearer views and where we stopped for another break. Once down it was three miles back up again. We're back to long ascents and descents again which we prefer actually to lots of smaller ups and downs. The trail eventually levelled out a bit for the last few miles.
We crossed from Massachusetts into Vermont later on in the afternoon, our twelfth state. The state border marked the start of another trail, The Long Trail, which runs concurrently with the AT for the next 105 miles then disappears in a different direction to the Canadian border. Vermont is known as the muddy state and often nicknamed Vermud. It lived up to its name, we hit muddy patches not long after crossing the border. Thanks to the warm weather the mud was not too bad but there were a few soggy patches with conveniently placed stepping stones. We'll see how much more muddy it gets over the next few days.
We arrived at our shelter, Seth Warner shelter at 4:15pm, Milky and Springside where there already again. They are real early birds and start hiking around 5:45am each day. A handful of weekend/section hikers turned up later.
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