CT said, "I ain't done with you yet, boy." So I stayed.

Day 87 - 7/13/10
I can't for the life of me wake up before 7am now. I used to start
hiking by 7, but now I'm lucky if I start moving around by then. It's
not like I avoid waking up because I dread the day. It's more a sign
of how physically and mentally tired I am. I just can't do it. So I
hope the few days off in Boston will help me recoup and allow me to
start early once again.

I left around 8:20 after packing up then eating. Nothing much exciting
happened until I came to US 7 (road) and saw a big orange sign saying
Appalachian Detour. The trail is supposed to cross the Housatonic on
some bridge, but they are doing construction on it so basically I did
a long out of the way road-walk for about 4 miles. Not very fun. When
I made it to Falls Village (where the detour picks up the AT again) I
took a break in this park with some picnic tables. It was necessary
for me to regroup after the annoyance of detours, and it made me feel
better.

After that I passed by these crazy waterfalls that feed into a hydro
plant in Falls Village, then I came to a nice spring and stopped to
refill on the good water. Springs are always best because it's fresh
from the mountains. They are what I prefer. I hustled along and came
to some nice viewspots (Rands View), then this crazy stone that juts
out of the ground called Giants Thumb. It almost looked like it was
from outer space, with strange textures and the just the way it stuck
out in the middle of nowhere. I took some samples for further
analysis. (Kidding about that, but now I wish I had the more I think
about it.)

I came to the road you can take into Salisbury pretty soon after that,
and so decided to head into town for something to eat. I ended up
doing a really nice lunch by first going to a bistro and ordering a
panini, then going to the grocers and getting 4 plums, a bag of chips,
chocolate milk, and a Dr. Pepper. I took all of that to a small park
area nearby, plopped down, and enjoyed my feast. The panini was really
good, and again I was reminded of food from the Piano Row cafe at
Emerson. Remember those sandwiches Jen? We used to get them all the
time. When it was time to leave I realized I may have eaten a little
too much because it was tough going for a while. Too much pressure on
my stomach from the hip belt.

From out of Salisbury it was a good climb. The only bummer was that
it started to rain as I was going up, not heavy like the other day but
still enough to get you wet. So I made an unplanned stop into Riga
Lean-to to dry off a bit and get out of the rain. That stopped after a
while, but this place has an amazing view down into the valley, and
since I was the only one here I decided to stay. It's a few miles
short of where I wanted to be (I'm still in CT), but because I made it
in early I'm hoping I can get to bed at a decent time and maybe get in
one of those early wake ups that seems to evade me now.

I made dinner here, some mac and cheese, did some reading, and even
played around a bit with the harmonica and jews harp Evelyn gave me.
It was fun to get a chance to play finally, and since no one was
around I was free to be as terrible as I want. I wish I knew how to
play the harmonica a little, it's such a nice instrument but I don't
have any real knowledge aside from tinkering around. Guess I'll just
keep messing with it and see what happens. Still fun though. And I
also love the crazy sounds you can get out of the jews harp. It's a
litte past 8 now, not quite bedtime, so that means I'll probably do a
little more reading and playing. It's been a really nice evening, and
a great end to my day.

P.S. to Dad. We should go to Santapio's when I'm in Boston and we meet
up. Tell Mike B to come too.

Total miles: 1493.5