Day 111 VT9 Bennington to Story Spring Shelter

Today's miles 19.  AT miles 1626.1

We were up fairly early, packed and ready for just after eight when Roland kindly picked us up.  He had arranged to meet some friends for a cuppa in a local cafe and invited us along, he even paid for our drinks.  We had a nice chat with his group of friends for about half an hour then he drove us back out to the trailhead.  He was telling us about his plane that he built himself over four years from a kit and said if we'd had more time he would have taken us for a ride in it.   What a lovely guy, a true trail angel, thank you Roland. Sadly we forgot to get a photo with you. 

We were walking for nine o'clock. We entered Glastonbury Wilderness in Green Mountain National Forest.  We were definitely back in the wilderness, we didn't cross a single road today.  The last few weeks we've always seemed fairly close to civilisation with a few road crossings most days.  Today's hike was more or less one very long ten mile ascent up to Glastonbury Mountain 3748ft followed by a long nine mile descent. It's never just straight up and down though, both had the usual smaller ups and downs thrown in along the way.  We came across a bridge this morning over a stream with a sign 'bridge out'.  It was obviously on its last legs but we still cautiously crossed it.   The trail in the morning wasn't too bad but it got tougher and quite hard going after Glastonbury summit. Lots of damp slippery rocks and tree roots to constantly step over through a large section of cool spruce forest.

There was a very high rickety looking fire tower on Glastonbury Mountain summit which we climbed, it was a bit scary but had great views above the trees, a bit too hazy for a good photo though.  We are in moose country now with lots of swampy ponds and saw what we think must have been moose poop along the trail, either that or giant rabbit droppings!   There were lots of droppings just after the fire tower, must be a popular moose crossing point. We didn't see any fresh footprints so assume the poop had been there a while.

We arrived at our camp spot at Story Spring shelter about 6:30.  We are the only ones staying at the shelter, the first time we've had a shelter to ourselves although we're camping in our tent not in the shelter.