Pack shopping – After arriving back at the hostel, Zen told us that he would drive us back to the outfitter with my pack! At Outdoor 76 (https://outdoor76.com/), the owner helped me identify possible packs. There was a large area where I was able to load my gear into each pack and try it on.
The winner was the Osprey Exos 58 which was on sale for 20% off. Zen and Serpent waited, patiently, while I worked with the owner on finding the right pack for me.
The Outfitter had a large sign for 2020 thru-hikers to sign. They create one each year. Here is my signature.
It was nice to be in town. The temperatures were cold, but not as cold as in the mountains. Also, we didn’t have snow in town – while the mountains were getting steady snow fall. This presented a problem for hiking the next day – Zen was not going to be able to get us back into Deep Gap to continue hiking. The road was a Forest Service Road that doesn’t get maintenance. However, Zen did come up with an alternate plan for us. He could drop us off at Rock Gap. We could slack-pack 9.6 miles to Wayah Gap were he could pick us up. (Slack-packing is essentially a day hike – you only need to carry gear/food for one day and as a result, you can typically hike more miles.) Then, the following day, Zen thought he would be able to get us back into Deep Gap. We would be able to hike from Deep Gap to Rock Gap in 2 days where he would pick us up. We would stay another night at the hostel and he would shuttle us to Wayah Gap. This plan meant that we could keep hiking without having to take a day off. We loved the idea.
Dinner – By now, Ready was gone. Dinner was with Serpent, Roadrunner, Atticus, SpiceRack, and Wardrobe at the Lazy Hiker Brewing Company (https://lazyhikerbrewing.com/). This business also had a sign for thru-hikers to sign. All of us put our names up. I suspect that these signs will have few names this year due to Covid-19 – although none of us could predict that we would be leaving the trail anywhere south of Katahdin. This was the last time that we say this crew.
