Vermont Long Trail....www.greenmountainclub.org
Filmed with my Sony DSC HX-80 digital camera.
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The Vermont Long Trail is something I have had my eye on for quite a while. My wife Meg and I have visited Vermont many a time as my daughter Aerial was a trouper with Circus Smirkus for 3 seasons. www.smirkus.org/about-big-top-...
I would always drive to a trailhead to put my feet on the trail. It looked magical as it went up and over the Green Mountains.
So Hickery and I just did 8 days on it and found that the magic is real.
Fall was a bit late in Vermont this year due to a dry September. We hit it at peak! So Vermonty.
After a 24 hour drive for me from Minnesota we started at the Northern Terminus that starts at Canada. I will say now that the trail goes up and down and up and down. The builders of the trail do not believe in switchbacks. Straight up. Straight down.
A tougher trail than I anticipated and the North end is known to be the more difficult and isolated end.
The first day proved to us that we would not be making the milage I expected us to make. My normal pace is about 2.5 miles an hour. But not on this trail. More like 1 mile per hour. The Long Trail was leafy and wet and rocky, rooty and slippery and steep. Dig in boys!
My new Salomon Quad boots that I went up a half size in (normal shoe 10…new boots 11) since bad feet on my Border Route thru hike proved a stellar move. My feet were good and happy the whole trip with no toe discomfort or blisters.
I used my DIY Blackcrow tarp, Dutchware Chameleon hammock, my DIY Frankenquilt UQ and Hammockgear 20º Shug Special TQ. Also used my UQ protector a couple of times.
A tip of the Shug hat to my Black Diamond flick lock hiking poles. They were my most useful and helpful piece of gear! Saved me many a time and helped me up and down the mountains. I used a new-for-me push/pull pole technique by planting my right pole behind me to push up the rocks and my left pole up in front with my hand slid down the shaft to pull me up. Some very high steps up the rocks and roots of the trail in many places.
On this trail you are not just walking and sauntering down the trail. It is very technical in places and you are really more climbing than hiking. Putting trust in a root to help you up and if you were to slip and fall back it could be a game changer. Seriously.
The Vermont woods are amazing. The moss alone is worth the walk. The cabins and shelters the Green Mountain Club provides along the trail are really nice. Now…I usually dislike shelters. Find them gloomy. But the Long Trial cabins and 3 sided shelters are really pleasant and interesting. I never slept in them but it is where you want to stop to camp as that is where you can find reliable water. The water sources along the trail are few and far between. We had torrential rain so that helped for sure. Weather was everything from muggy to cold. A low of 31º one morning.
Also the Long Trail privys are great. They are mouldering privys www.greenmountainclub.org/pri... are well built. So fun to have the morning constitutional in one.
Many trails could take a note from these. I love when poop is all in one spot and not dropped hither and yon in the woods with toilet paper dropped on top for all to see. Nasty!
We had two cars since both of us drove up to Vermont so we did the car to car thing. We re-booted and shuttled once and it does eat up most of the day to get to a car…drive back to the car on the northern trailhead…re-boot the meals, fuel, toilet paper and such…..drive to next end point trailhead and then drive back to where we first egressed for the day. All the while being distracted by food and maple syrup. But no one would ever pick us up to hitch into town to re-supply so this was good for us.
It was a real treat to see how the maple trees are tapped and the sap runs down tubes hanging in the forest pulled by gravity and helped with vacuum pumps. I spoke with a Sugar Man at length about the maple syrup life. Very interesting. We sipped syrup and chatted.
In the end we made about 50 hard-earned miles. From the North terminus to Codding Hollow Road Trailhead.
But this trip was about just spending some time together as this is usually the only time we see each other all year. We have been friends for over 40 years.
It was about enjoying the woods. But the competitive walking spirit still wants to make more miles.
I found the home of the Maple King in his Kingdom. As usual thrilling and disturbing.
What a walk. What a time.
All secure in sector seven and sticky from maple syrup,
Shug