I am staying with Heather & Rockhound at Heather’s Aunt Nancy & Uncle Bob’s home in Proctor, VT. Heather picked us up at 3 after a relaxing 11 mile walk and took us to the Inn at the Long Trail. We had wonderfully poured Guinness with our late lunch, hit the outfitter & fabric shop. Then went and met Bob & Nancy.

We were treated to a ton of pasta for dinner, great blueberry cake, and tasty Kenyan beer. We watched the Sox destroy Oakland 11-0 too! This was Bob & Nancy’s first taste of the thru-hiker community and the first time I had met them as well. They were kind and generous—almost to a fault. I hope I came off anywhere near as well.

My pack broke the prior afternoon! The wire loop stay on my Mountainsmith Ghost disconnected and poked through the bottom of the bag. I’ve had no problems at all with the pack for 1700 miles and even this break was easily repaired once I had good enough light to diagnose the problem. I picked up some tough fabric that’ll hopefully hold everything together.

I am so glad to see Heather again. There are less than 5 weeks left in this hike, I’m only a few hours drive from home and I’d love to go no more than a week without seeing her from now on! Thanks for hosting us, Bob & Nancy!

I also met my first SOBO thru-hiker today, a cool guy name Cobol.