Day 26. 4K!

Mile 1691 – Governor Clement Shelter To Mile 1704 – Rutland

With our first peak over 4000 feet on the horizon today and the possibility of real food for lunch, we were excited to get going this morning. It was a beautiful day for hiking and we had a nice morning walking up Mt. Killington.

Steep climb to the peak

We made it up to the highest shelter on the AT in Vermont at 3885′. After leaving Rocket’s pack inside, we took the side trail up to the peak at 4236′.

View from Killington

View from Killington

Lunch with Three Socks

Killington is part of a pretty large ski resort and the peak is accessible by a gondola that runs even in the summer. We were fortunate that the resort restraunt at the top was open so we stopped in for a long lunch. We’ve been overlapping the last few days with Three Socks and we’re happy to have lunch with her. She is also having trouble keeping her weight up and we laughed because she ordered three meals for herself including four containers of ice cream.

Her name comes from three socks that she keeps pinned to her backpack – one from each of her grandchildren. She says she wants to frame them when she completes her hike to give her grandkids a way to remember what their crazy “nanna” accomplished. She started in Georgia and has less than 500 miles to go.

Rocket with Ben and Jerry’s

View on the way down

After slowly eating lunch we hiked back to the trail, collected Rocket’s pack, and then continued into Rutland. We’re staying at The Inn at Long Trail tonight, pretty close to the trail and planning a quick trip into town in the morning for supplies.

Leaving the LT

We were happy to find that several other hikers that we know are staying here as well, so we had fun chatting with them, and the owner of the inn in the evening at dinner. It was a long, eventful day!