Massachusetts AT Day 4 (4/21/21)

Today was always going to be the hardest day on trail. It was the day that I planned to go over Mt. Greylock, the largest mountain in Massachusetts at more than 3500’, and it was the day that the weather was supposed to turn bad, crashing from a high of 67 yesterday to a low below freezing today, with thunderstorms to boot. I knew that I needed to make it over Greylock as quickly as possible to avoid the worst of the weather. However, that wasn’t going to be easy, as it was 14.5 miles from Cheshire, on one side of the mountain, to Williamstown, on the other side of the mountain.

There was good news right off the bat, as it didn’t rain overnight as some outlets had predicted. Packing up camp in the rain is the pits. However, there was bad news: condensation. Double wall tents, which are tents that have both an inner tent and a detached rain fly, don’t suffer too much condensation. However, single wall tents, where the tent is all one connected piece, tend to have more significant condensation problems. Before this trip, I had been lucky and never had condensation issues. During this trip, though, that all changed.

I think there are two reasons for the change. First, the temperatures were colder than my previous trips, and I think that contributes to condensation. Second, the colder temperatures led to having to close my tent up tighter to retain warmth, and this also led to the retention of condensation. Thus, when I woke up in the morning, my tent ceiling was covered in water. I wiped it down the best I could with a small pack towel, but it didn’t totally solve the problem, and I packed up a wet tent.

As I left the Father Tom camp site and got on trail, I walked for about a mile through the town of Cheshire. I didn’t see any cats, though. (Sorry, bad joke)

I did see a woman out walking her dog. She asked me if I was hiking the AT. I proudly told her that I was, and she pointed out that I had just missed the turn. Feeling a little less proud, I thanked her and took the turn to start the hike up Greylock. I didn’t know it then, but she was the last person I would see until I was in Williamstown on the other side of the mountain.

Right when I entered the woods, I saw my first large animal of the trip, a deer. This was exciting, because believe it or not, this was only the second deer that I had ever seen on trail. I had actually seen more moose than deer prior to this. Interestingly, both deer I have seen were right outside of towns, where the moose have always been deep in the woods. I am not sure why deer hang out near towns, or if it’s just a statistical anomaly based on a small sample size.

I climbed to the Mark Noepel Shelter. Mark Noepel was apparently a young man who was an avid supporter of the outdoor community in New England. He was a contributor to the local AMC, and he had thru-hiked the Long Trail and the Appalachian Trail. Unfortunately, he met his tragic end in 1987 while working in Shenandoah National Park. From what I can gather, no one is entirely sure what happened to him. Sad story.

I decided to get water at the shelter, and as I did it started sleeting on me. I rushed back to the shelter to get under cover. I had a snack and filtered water and waited for the weather to pass. Once it did, I hiked out, and ten minutes later got hit by another sleet storm.

This time there was no cover, and it soaked right through my shirt. It stopped before long, but with the cold temperatures and the wind, I was pretty miserable with only a soaking wet shirt for top cover. I thought about putting on my rain jacket, but I didn’t want to trap the moisture in. Eventually I figured it was either the rain jacket or hypothermia, so I decided to take my chances with the rain jacket.

Talk about a good decision! The rain jacket’s breathability was able to combine with my body’s natural warming to actually dry the shirt out. I kept the rain jacket on the rest of the day.

Overall, if I had to pick an MVP piece of gear for the trip, it would be that rain jacket, my Marmot Essence. It’s only 6.4 ounces, and it did everything I would expect a much heavier rain jacket to do. Marmot makes great rain jackets. It’s too bad that they discontinued the Essence.

As I approached the summit of Greylock, the mud and blowdowns got worse. I suspect that Greylock is maintained by a different organization than the rest of the AT in Massachusetts, because the trail maintenance was definitely not as good. Probably the craziest thing I saw was a bog bridge that was completely underwater. As you might imagine, that makes it pretty useless.

I eventually summited Greylock in relatively decent weather. I was grateful for the lull, but I wasn’t going to dally. I took some pictures and hurried on my way. I was very impressed with the tower, which might well be the nicest monument that I have seen on top of a mountain. It was designed to look like a lighthouse, and it apparently serves as a war memorial.

As I descended from Greylock, I had to cross over several more mountains that were part of the same ridge, including Mt. Williams. The weather continued to worsen, and I did my best to pick up speed, but it was hard to do so while descending wet rocks. I did stop in at a shelter for a quick lunch to refuel my batteries, but for the most part I just kept moving. As they usually do, podcasts helped.

As I made it past the wonderful Prospect Mountain viewpoint and started getting close to Williamstown, the trail turned into switchbacks and the sleet returned for its third appearance of the day. When I was going one direction on the switchbacks and the wind and sleet were at my back, life was okay. When the trail turned and I was facing into the wind and sleet, life was fairly miserable. 

On the way down, I noticed that a lot of the trees had numbers on them. I tried to think of reasons why that might have been the case. It was probably some type of forestry project, but I like to think that someone was playing “Lost in the Woods Bingo.”

Eventually I got down and ran into another hiker who was just starting up. I was surprised to find that there was someone else as crazy as me out there that day.

Once I got into town, I called the motel to arrange a shuttle. We agreed on a 3:45 pickup. He asked me to call again and confirm when I got near the pickup point, which I obligingly did. I arrived at the pickup point at about 3:30.

The weather was miserable at this point. The temperature was around freezing, the wind was howling, and it was raining. Before long, the rain became sleet, and then snow. I was no longer moving, so I was getting very cold, very fast.

I hoped the shuttle might be early given the conditions, but by 3:50 he still hadn’t arrived. I called the motel and discovered that he hadn’t even left yet! I have had bad experiences with hotels before, but I think this was the first one that actually put my life in danger, as hypothermia was a real risk out there. He finally showed up at around 4:15, and even then I had to go to meet him! Suffice to say that I will never be staying at that motel again.

The good news is that the motel was next to a really good Greek/Italian restaurant that I had previously eaten at right before I did the Long Trail, so at least I was able to get a good dinner.

Getting the food was a bit tricky, though. The restaurant was right next to the motel, so I could easily walk over to pick up my food, but I only had one set of clothes with me, and they were thoroughly soaked. I didn’t want to put on any more wet clothes than I needed to, so I ended up going out in public wearing nothing but trail runners, pants, and a rain jacket. I probably looked as ridiculous as I felt. The things hikers do...

Tomorrow we will finish up with the one remaining piece of the trip. Until then, always remember that you can’t take flight until you spread your wings.