Dalton Mass.,Vermont looms ahead in 24 miles

Sean posted his update this morning but I thought I would add my own two cents to the blog. It has been quite a while since we have been afforded internet access, and we apologize for the lack of news over the past several days. Tomorrow we expect to tackle Mt. Greylock, the highest mountain and point of the AT in Mass. We spent last night with my college friend and fellow Aires singer Brian Litscher, and his wife Marie. They rejuvenated us with steaks on the grill, Ben and Jerry's ice cream and a soak in the hot tub. We took our time getting out today, while shopping for groceries and finding Dewey a new pair of trail runners (his last pair had 750 miles on them!). We got on the trail and hiked 10 miles to Dalton (big day, right?) and are holed up tonight with Tom, who offers his house to thru-hikers as a place of respite, providing beds and meals. He has been doing this for twenty-five years, and accepts no donations or fees! We have had it good for the past two nights and its going to be hard to get used to 'roughing it' again on the trail. However, we expect to camp tomorrow on the shoulder of Greylock, and to be in Bennington by Monday evening. We'll continue the hike north through Vermont, and will get picked up by our friends Tim and Deb Shafer, by the end of the week; themselves returning from a four day backpacking trip on the northern Long Trail. Ah, it's great to be back in New England where we have friends and family. We had a wonderful dinner with my sister-in-law Patti in Great Barrington, enjoying stone fired pizza that was out of this world. We had originally planned to return to the trail that evening after dinner, but ended up opting for a motel instead as post-prandial lethargy took hold. This turned out to be a very wise decision, as it rained cats and dogs within 15 minutes of our check-in.
New Jersey and New York passed relatively quickly. NJ was pleasant with fairly gentle terrain. New York posed very significant challenges at times, with sharp rocky climbs and scrambles. Of course we hit this in the middle of the heat wave that Dewey described. After crossing into New York, we spent the next 6 miles on open rock ridges, which just concentrated the heat even more. Far below us was wonderful- looking Greenwood Lake. We reached the road, nearly dying of heat exhaustion, but were successfully resuscitated by a nearby creamery that had the best ice cream, or so it seemed at the time. It was then that we decided to pull an emergency motel stop on the lake with the Antons, who were very lovely people. We called and they gladly came to pick us up (and later gave us a ride back to the trail the next day) and brought us to the motel. A swim in the lake fully restored us. That evening we mt Debbie Holton-Smith, a friend from our Dartmouth-Hitchcock days who met us and took us out to dinner. It was great to catch up after so many years. The following day was the worst of the heat, registering at 98 degrees locally holding our mileage down to 14 miles that day, the shortest mileage day since we started the AT. Luckily we found a trail angel- Patty-o -just after entering Harriman State Park. He provided food cooked on a small grill and cold beverages. He also suggested we camp at Island Pond, only 1.5 miles up the trail from there. This was the best advice, as the lake was wonderful for swimming and we camped on a grassy knoll with a wonderful view.
The last day of the heat wave was not as brutal so far as the temperatures were concerned, but the humidity could be cut with a knife. We found ourselves being chased off Bear Mountain by a severe thunderstorm, which necessitated yet another unscheduled motel night in Fort Montgomery.
It was about this time that it seemed to dawn on us that maybe we could just simply plan on staying at motels every night, and forget all this camping stuff! In the meantime, we had also discovered that every day at noon we seemed to cross a road which inevitably had a deli within a half mile. We took it on ourselves to sample every deli, for the good of trail. Thus between the motels and the delis, who needs to carry food? Dewey was particularly enthusiastic about the delis; prompting our theme song:

back to back

deli to deli

well I don't give a damn

about PB and jelly

back to back

deli to deli

it was pastrami jamboree

With any luck we should be to the New Hampshire line in 12 to 14 days, covering the 150 miles that Vermont has to offer. We may slow down a bit, now that we are in the interesting part of the AT. More updates to come!