Another hike!

I'm getting ready to go on another hike! This time it's The Long Trail in Vermont. It is 272 miles (438km) long, starts at the Massachusetts border and ends at the Canadian border in Quebec. When I've finished I will be able to say I've hiked from Georgia to Canada! It's the oldest long distance trail in the US and it is on one of the mountains (Stratton Mountain) along this trail that the idea of the Appalachian Trail was conceived. I have actually already hiked a large portion of the Long Trail as it overlapped the Appalachian Trail for 105 miles but I chose it as it is fairly close to home and is so similar to the Appalachian Trail that I thought it would be a great way to give Michael an idea of what I did last year. He is coming this time and we are bringing both of the dogs! I had hoped to be hiking earlier in the season so I'd get to meet this years AT thruhikers but I wasn't able to get the time off of work until September. By then the thruhikers will be long gone and I'm not even sure how many End to Enders (that's what they call thruhikers on the Long Trail) will be on the trail in the fall. I'm not upset about it though because it will be the perfect weather to hike in (not too hot during the day and not too cold at night) but I hope we meet other hikers for Michaels sake. So much of what made the AT great for me was the people I met. I will be happy if he gets to experience even a small fraction of what I did last year (except the rain, he can do without all the rain)! I'm sure it's been hard for him since I've been back constantly referring to the trail, or my trail friends or the many trail angels who helped me out so much. It's not that I've totally changed but some of my "far out there" ideas about living off the grid in a tiny house or "travelling the world living like a hippie" were just passing thoughts before the AT hike last year and now they are real goals for me. I would love to spend a year being a trail angel of some sort just going around helping people but when I talk about it, I'm not sure he can relate. I feel like he is just going along with what I want. I hope this trip does to him whatever the AT did to me last year!

"The most dangerous risk of all - the risk of spending you life not doing what you want on the bet that you can buy yourself the freedom to do it later."