{"id":933,"date":"2014-07-31T20:40:27","date_gmt":"2014-08-01T00:40:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hnatow.com\/wordpress-happytrails\/?p=933"},"modified":"2014-07-31T20:40:27","modified_gmt":"2014-08-01T00:40:27","slug":"day-107-dalton-ma-to-mt-greylock-mile-1582-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/hnatow.com\/happytrails\/?p=933","title":{"rendered":"Day 107 – Dalton, MA to Mt. Greylock (mile 1582.4)"},"content":{"rendered":"

We returned the very compact and economical Challenger this morning, despite the knowledge that we could get to Katahdin a bit<\/em> faster in it than walking. After the return ride from Enterprise back to the Shamrock Village Inn, we departed for the trail. The Shamrock Inn was a nice place to stay and the innkeeper Laura was super friendly to us. Dalton was a good zero day town for sure. The rain was off and on in the morning before we left, but actually held out pretty much all day for us, which was amazing. It stayed really comfortable for hiking almost all day and we only had a tiny sprinkle of rain right at the end of the day and even that ended quickly. The trail had also drained back to a normal state. It felt really good to be hiking in dry conditions again. We felt like we were flying even though we had full packs and our biggest climb since Virginia. The climb at hand was up to Mt. Greylock, our first climb up over 3000 feet in over a month. It actually was pretty easy and graded pretty nicely. <\/p>\n

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Cool little pond on climb up to Greylock <\/p><\/div>\n

There is an observation tower at the summit, but it was closed for repairs unfortunately. <\/p>\n

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Greylock tower<\/p><\/div>\n

There are some cool views though at the summit. You can see into the Green Mountains in Vermont and even a few peaks in New Hampshire from there. <\/p>\n

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View from Greylock <\/p><\/div>\n

We decided to stay at the bunk room in the Bascom Lodge, also at the summit of Greylock. The mileage worked out pretty much exactly to where we wanted to stop for the day anyway. While we were getting settled, clouds just completely rolled over the mountain within seconds. The view was gone literally 10 seconds after I took this. <\/p>\n

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Cloud taking over the mountain <\/p><\/div>\n

Then after a brief rain, it blew out and we had a really great sunset. <\/p>\n

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Sunset on Greylock <\/p><\/div>\n

It was a fun day of hiking. With the rain and waterlogged trails I can’t say we’ve had a lot of those of late, so it was a pretty awesome change. <\/p>\n

Tomorrow we head out of the lodge and continue north towards the monsters. They are getting closer and closer and every day it feels like we’ll be there soon. We have some good milestones coming up tomorrow that I’m really excited about. <\/p>\n

Vital stats for Thursday, July 31st :<\/strong>
\nMiles hiked today – 17.2
\nMood – good
\nPhysical state – good
\nSmell – like a cool piney breeze blowing off the mountain through the rocks and past the alpine brooks (ok ok, I mean tiny bar of soap)
\nSong stuck in my head – Don’t Cry For Me Argentina by Madonna from Evita (Why? Wtf? How does this even happen?)<\/p>\n

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