Intermission – July 8

Ah. Yes. I feel like the Count on Sesame Street tonight!

Heh, heh, heh! ONE father, ONE aunt, ONE sister in law, TWO brothers, TWO brothers in law, THREE cousins, FOUR nephews, FOUR nieces, FOUR sisters…

You could, I think, safely conclude that a huge chunk of the family attended my brother’s retirement ceremony. And it was a truly fun event, with being proud of him, and seeing family I have not seen in years! His CO mentioned my hike during her acknowledgments of friends and family, which was unexpected and ego-boosting, and a lot of people had questions later. I promise, no swelled head. 🙂

My cousin Jean wants to hike the second half of the trail with me, which would be great… He has much longer legs, I suspect it won’t take long before I am struggling to keep up with HIM. 🙂

Very itchy tonight on the arms, not sure why; very annoying. Tomorrow I drive back to Rutland, turn in the rental car, and hopefully cover another 11 miles or so of trail. The AT actually crosses two roads, VT 103 and Rt. 4, about 17 miles apart, that both lead into Rutland, so I will hike that section over Saturday and Sunday, setting me up to rent a car again Monday to visit my little sister up north. (may be repeating myself, my apologies)

It was a truly great day, and I enjoyed singing loudly off-key with the radio on the drive to and from Amherst from Chicopee. I kinda missed my loud offkey singing.

But now I have to sleep.

I hike on.