Day 143

This was a big and painful day for me. I’ve been keeping something secret so my friends and family wouldn’t get too worried but today hit a new level of pain so I couldn’t even keep it from the people I’ve been hiking around. If you look back to when I stayed at Stanimals in Waynesboro, you’ll remember I had to order a size small hip belt for my pack because I lost so much weight, it was maxed out and I had hurt my shoulder. Well, it’s never healed and I now maxed out my size small hip belt. Guess I should have ordered the extra-small. (That’s just nuts!) The last three days have been the worst pain-wise and I’ve only been letting Jason know. This morning, I could barely walk 10 feet with the pack on before I had to stop a readjust the strap or bend over to take pressure off my shoulder or raise my arm up and back to stretch it. I’m constantly fidgeting with my pack trying to get it comfortable. I’ve simply lost so much weight and I believe my body has changed so much that this pack just isn’t working for me anymore. It seems too small and the back padding near where the hip belt slips in has creased oddly. The pain in my shoulder has brought me close to tears. I talked with Wizard who was PA instructor and it looks like it is a re-injury of my rotator cuff, which I had torn about 13 years ago. Anyway, I’m going into town tomorrow and will try to get into a walk-in clinic to see what we can do about it. I am too close to finishing this hike and I will not stop. If I took off the weeks necessary to heal it, I wouldn’t come back. I must finish so maybe they can give me a shot or something to manage the pain for the next month. We’ll see. I’m also considering changing to a new pack. We’ll see what they have at the outfitter. So here’s what I teased about in my last post. I’m going to try to hitch a ride into Manchester Center, which I hear is really easy as everyone around here is hiker friendly. In town, I will be asking the local VFW if I can put my tent up behind their building. Apparently they let hikers do this. The hotels in this area for a Saturday are $325 a night. NOPE! I will sleep in my tent behind the VFW, resupply at Price Chopper, do laundry at the laundromat next to it and get a free shower at the community center.

Okay, back to today other than the pain. I pushed through it to get the necessary 19+ miles done over Stratton Mountain. I wanted to do the blue blaze trail to see the ski lifts where, when running, they let hikers ride it for free to go to the restaurants. I skipped it because it wasn’t running, it would be adding to an already long day and I was pushing through too much pain and just wanted to get to camp. I set my tent up near Stratton Pond Shelter. The Green Mountain Club that runs this shelter has a caretaker here and charges $5 to stay here. For thru-hikers though, they gave us a card so at the other pay sites, we can show the card and not pay again. My plans have me going to two more of the pay sites so $5 for three campsites isn’t bad. I met Ramdino here. He does a YouTube channel giving out AT Trail News & Updates. Guess I’ll be in the next one. It was a pleasure meeting him and most of us at the shelter then went down to the pond to watch the sunset. Man, was that pretty! So worth stopping here at a pay site.