Day 122: Magical Manchester

Hiked 25.7 miles, staying in Stratton VT.

I got on the road a little later than normal today.  It wasn't as cold as yesterday but it still was cool enough to want to stay in my sleeping bag.  The trail is still muddy through this area so progress was not super fast but I was in the mood to crank out some miles this morning so I just hiked steady all morning.  I finally stopped and took a break near Stratton-Arlington Rd. on the way up Stratton Mountain.  I haven't had service on my phone in town for a few days now so I turned it on briefly during my break to see if I had some service at higher altitudes.  In came the missed messages, including one from Why Not, apparently she was only a few miles ahead of me and aiming for the same shelter tonight, sweet!

Early morning view of the mountains

The trail circled this pond

9 AM photo

It was overcast all morning and as I started the climb up Stratton Mountain I started to hear rumbles of thunder in the distance.  I pushed on hoping to get to the top and get a view before the rain hit.  There were a bunch of AMC trail crews working on the trail as I climbed up who were doing some maintenance work.  It started to sprinkle a little bit as I approached the summit but cleared again just as I finished my ascent.  At the top I ran into a bunch of AT thru hikers enjoying the view.  The clouds had parted long enough that we got a very clear view from the top of the fire tower.  The caretaker was also present and gave us a great tour of what we were looking at.  It was cool at the top but we got an amazing view of the upcoming mountain range all the way to Moosilauke.

On top of Stratton fire tower

On top of Stratton fire tower

The top of Stratton ski resort lift

On top of Stratton fire tower

On top of Stratton fire tower

On top of Stratton fire tower

 I spent quite a bit of time  up on top including eating my lunch.  As I finished up though some serious thunderheads started to form and I decided to try to get down the mountain as much as possible before the rain hit.  On the way down I passed Stratton Pond which would have been a great place to swim if it had been a super hot day.  From this point on the terrain became much flatter.  It did drizzle a little briefly but luckily the thunderstorms passed south of me and didn't hit.  My plan was to head to Spruce Peak shelter tonight to catch up with Why Not.  Coyote caught up to me about three miles away from it though and together we reminisced about how delicious Thai food and Ben & Jerry's would be tonight and spontaneously made the plan to head into town tonight.

Stratton Pond

Standing on Prospect Rock

Cool clouds

I arrived at Spruce Peak shelter and quickly dashed in.  "Hey Why Not, how does Thai food and Ben & Jerry's sound to you?" I asked.  She admitted that sounded great so I told her to pack it up and the three of us headed out.  It was a quick few miles into town and we got a hitch pretty quickly into Manchester Center, VT.

Entering Manchester Center with Why Not and Coyote

We stopped by Ben & Jerry's to sample some flavors to think about what we wanted after dinner and then walked to the Thai restaurant downtown.  As we sat down at the table a lady at the table next to us asked us if we were part of the show Amazing Race.  We proceeded to inform her of our trek and she immediately asked if she could buy us all a drink!  We ordered food and then proceeded to try to figure out where we were staying the night (food always comes first for a thru hiker).  There is a horse show in town and all of the hotels were full.

Trail magic round of beer, thanks so much!

Then our next amazing batch of trail magic happened.  All of a sudden a mother and daughter pair approached us and said "I hear you are looking for a place to stay, would you like to stay at our house?".  We were all stunned at their generosity and readily agreed.  They had already eaten but they offered to stick around until we were done so we invited them to share our table.  They joined us in celebrating our Vermont border crossing with our Vermont beer courtesy of David, thanks again!  They then drove us back to their beautiful ski house on the side of Stratton Mountain where we got showers, laundry and even got a bed each!  We were all blown away by this amazing trail magic, thanks again so much Karen and Leanne!

Celebrating Vermont with our trail angels Karen and Leanne