**Facebook Post 100217 at 6:42AM**
On The Road Again
It’s almost 6:30AM, and I have been laying in bed thinking of all the ways I could possibly freeze to death on the trail. Ha! No, really… I was writing a letter home and naming all the ways. I have a good imagination.
Actually, I’m sure I will be just fine, but as a Floridian, you never quite get used to the cold that northerners learn to live in. I’m always carrying extra gear I’m scared to mail home because I just know the moment I do, I’ll end up in some freakish snow storm that just happened to come early.
The weather in general has been odd. Although to the warm degree through most of Vermont, not the other way, but finally that broke a few days ago, and ever since I have been basically bundled in three sweaters daily. I have a feeling these last 500 miles are going to be me running as fast as I can south praying for warm air (chasing the sun – what the north-bounders say about south-bounders). Yeah. Good times.
It’s funny though. You do adapt and move past it. You have no choice. Notice I didn’t say get used to it. You just learn to put up with it is all. Other issues I foresee include the very real fact I think I may have done something pretty rough to my left foot. I’m thinking it’s broken in some way. I was teasing my aunt and told her I was going to keep hiking on it of course, because it’s only excruciating the first hour or so. After that I learn to ignore that too. And with enough Alieve I won’t notice it again unless I stop walking… Then I told her nothing says “I Love Hiking” quite like a permanent limp… Yes, I have a morbid sense of humor.
I’m soft again. Clean sheets and warm blankets. Showers and coffee and food and and and… This is going to be a hard return to the wild. Now I know why so many hikers get sucked into the hostel vortex. In the woods everything is a luxury. Being warm and dry is a luxury. You are constantly clinging to the thought that in so many miles you can get more food or water, or wash your clothes or yourself, or maybe they can charge your phone. It’s constant. Here, in the world, life is easy and comfortable, but I have a mission. And that mission isn’t over.
Returning to the dirt. Today it’s a love hate thing. Tomorrow a lifestyle.
4:45PM Start Day 44 (100217)
•4:45PM MA Rte 2 (Mile 597.6)
•5:15PM Pattinson Road (Mile 598.7)
•7:30PM Notch Road (Mile 600.8) sleep
•7:00AM Wake up, pack
•8:00AM On Trail
•10:00AM Williams Mountain (Mile 601.6)
(Got lost and went down the wrong side, 1.2 miles there and back)
•11:30AM Thunderbolt Shelter
•11:40AM Mt. Greylock (War Memorial)
(Mile 603.9)
•2:10PM Mark Noepel Shelter (Mile 607.2)
•4:45PM MA Rte 8 (Mile 611.8)
4:45PM End Of Day 44
APPROX 14.2 Miles
