Rutland, VT to Hanover, NH—Full of Special Shelters & Great Memories

Day #: 52

Miles Since Last Update: 46 mi.

Total Miles Hiked: 731 mi.

Miles Remaining: 1,467 mi.

This post can originally be found here, on The Trek

The Lookout Shelter

Thanks to the fun events of the previous day, a group of us hikers headed out from Rutland all with the goal to meet up again at The Lookout Shelter on trail that night (The Lookout Shelter is really cool, it is an unofficial AT shelter on private land but the owner allows hikers to use the cabin, and it has an upper deck platform where one can watch stunning sunrises and sunsets, or in our case, Lizard almost got hit by lightning).

Enjoying the Trail

In another stroke of kindness, Shorts (the same hiker who bought a round of beers for us at the brewery) bought a 12-pack of beers with the plan to hike them out to The Lookout Shelter (17.3 miles down the trail). I ran into Shorts on The Bus and knew how much those beers must be adding in weight to his pack, so I offered to carry some of them to try and lighten the load. This is how, a few miles into the trail that day, Shorts and I ended up hanging out in a waterfall drinking 2 of the beers in the name of lightening the load and enjoying the trail.

Here I met Geisha Girl and Blue, two women thru-hikers I had heard about, but not met before.

As Shorts and I hiked together, Shorts mentioned having a bit of a cough. We discussed how the recent rainy weather, and stress of hiking all day, every day for months, can really wear the body down. I wished him a speedy recovery from, what I believed to be only a fleeting cold, and I didn’t think of it again.

The Magic of the Trail

After getting out of the waterfall, I hung my wet shorts on the outside of my pack to dry as I hiked. So I was shocked and dismayed when, miles later, I took off my backpack to get a snack and saw my shorts gone. I thought that was it, and I would have to go shopping in Hanover to buy new ones, when Mando walked up, a big grin on his face, ad my shorts attached to HIS backpack. The trail really has a way of making things all work out in the end.

The Blue Barn

The next day, that same group of hikers, composed roughly of myself, Shorts, Jukebox, Lighthouse, Roadrunner, and Nope, made plans to once again meet up at the same spot at night, another unique “shelter” on the trail: The Blue Barn. The Blue Barn is just that: a barn. Owned by a family who graciously let hikers stay in the loft above the barn. For me, this day was a rainy day, so I was grateful to have somewhere to hide out. I arrived to the Blue Barn relatively early in the day (around 3PM) with Cali Roll, GORP, and Jukebox. Cali Roll and GORP ordered pizza from Dominos and we spent the rest of the rainy afternoon watching a VHS of Back to the Future on an old TV. It was great. Later on, Roadrunner, Nope, and Lighthouse arrived to the BB. Apparently Lighthouse had not been feeling well since Rutland, and he had a decent cough. Assuming the cough was from all the rain we had been hiking through (not to mention the exertion of thru-hiking), I was happy to know he had a place inside to stay for the night.

Hanover

The following morning was a quick hike to Hanover, NH, a town I had looked forward to since the inception of my idea to hike the AT because one of my best friends lives there and so does my cousin and her family. Right before I made it in to Hanover, I ran back into Cali Roll and GORP, both of whom asked me if I was feeling sick, because they TOO had a cough… and while I had a tad sore throat, I had associated it with not sleeping well the previous night and I did not have a cough… that being said, I did not like all these hikers around me getting sick, so I sent a message to my cousin (who I planned to stay with) explaining how some hikers around me were getting sick and that I had a sore throat. And then, as I hiked into the adorable town of Hanover.

My cousin asked if I would take a COVID test, just to be safe. So first thing I did upon arriving to here was take the test. It came back negative. Therefore I felt free to go about my life as normal.

Some great things about Hanover include its food! All hikers should know that:

• Lou’s will give a free gourmet pastry to thru-hikers
• Ramunto’s pizzeria will give a free slice of pizza to thru-hikers
• Molly’s serves $3 Margeritas

Since I knew I would be spending a couple of days and most of my time with family, I planned to spend my first night with my hiker friends. First, we got DELICIOUS FOOD.

Then, as luck would have it, some of them had met a trail runner as they hiked into Hanover, who invited us over for drinks. We spent almost an hour at his apartment hanging out until his roommate came home (I imagine he walked in, smelled us, and was like whaaaaaat is thissss?!!).

We then went to Molly’s where we celebrated making it this far.

After Molly’s, my cousin picked me up and we went for ice cream!!!

Life was good….

That was until I woke up the following morning feeling that my sore throat had gotten worse, and I opened my phone to messages from other thru-hikers who had stayed at The Yellow Deli with the news that they had tested positive for COVID…

I was shocked, considering I had tested negative the day prior. But with this  new news I went and took another test… It was positive…

Luckily, my cousins house had a basement with a bedroom which is where I was staying, essentially isolated from the rest of the family. They gave me a COVID test and I tested positive 🙁

Thus began a week in which I isolated in my cousins basement. All things considered, I got pretty lucky that I came down with COVID in Hanover. My cousins family was great to me, passing me down trays of delicious food (far better than I had eaten in weeks on the trail

MAPLE SYRUP ICE CREAM

Also, my good friend Maddie came by and brought me a tasty breakfast which we ate, sitting far apart from each other out in the backyard.

In all, I ended up taking over a week off the trail trying to recover from COVID. Sadly, since the others I had been hiking with (Jukebox, Shorts, Roadrunner, Lighthouse, Nope, Cali Roll, and GORP) did not have a place to isolate in town, they moved on without me. As time passed I learned that they mostly stuck together through The Whites as a Tramily, which made me happy

…my time in The Whites was yet to come…