Gorham Day 37 Saturday

My day started with a very rude wake up call at 3:30 this morning. Due to the rain on the fly and other noise, I opted for earplugs. Yet at 3:30 this morning I woke to giggling and laughing from tooth fairy and Frankenfeet. I decided to try to ignore it. The ear plugs stopped none of it, but then the spotlight headlamps came out. Due to my close proximity to the privy, I was caught in the glare of comings and goings. Seems everyone agreed to a 3:30 wake-up time so they could be on the trail by 5:00 to get into town early to hit the Ayce breakfast. Although they were rude and noisy, the upside was there were no bugs at 5:00 sin the morning, the sunrise over the mountain was great and I beat them in town. They all tried to hitch out as one very large group and had some trouble with getting a ride. For once, I got a lift almost right away once I hit the main road. I am staying at the barn hostel which is, surprisingly, a barn.

I met a thru hiker who did the trail several years ago. He is now working as an AMC caretaker at Kinsman Hut. His name is Dingle and on his off days, he likes to come into town and do trail magic in the form of lifts, slackpacking or food drops. He is really nice and gave me some tips on places to stay and things to do. I will have to visit him at Kinsman if I can. I offered to slackpack me 19 miles but I am not sure I can do that in one day. I will take the lift to the trail head at 7:00 tomorrow and thry for Carter Notch Hut and a work for stay. I waould really like to go to Madison the next day as he says Monday nights are Band Night but that would be a long, hard day.

I have been trying new, or rather other, flavours of Ben+Jerry’s ice cream. The New York Super Fudge Chunk was great. Marsha Marsha Marshmallow was pretty good. Right now I am trying chocolate fudge brownie. It is merely okay. The ice cream is fine but the brownies chunks are dry and more frozen than the ice cream. Basically it is a miss.