Day 11-16 - 2025

Days 17-20 - total miles hiked in Vermont - 153

This week: Woodstock, VT to Hanover, NH - crossed the state line!!

We’ve made such huge strides; whoa, let me rephrase that, (because our stride is anything but huge!) more like we’ve come a long way from our first day out on the trail this year to our last.  Day 1 went down in the books as a pretty miserable day all around.  We set our goals way too high and because of that we had to spend two nights out on the trail instead of one, our expectations of each other weren’t met, we compared physical abilities, it was so hot and humid, and we weren’t ready for the rough terrain.  Frustration was at an all-time high, we were on each other mercilessly and left wondering if we should even be back out on the trail once again.  Day 2 much like the first. It was on Day 3 when everything changed for us.  As many know about us, we believe heavily in the power of prayer and when Jonny Shofar blew his shofar and prayed over us, we knew we were right where we were supposed to be. We didn’t know it yet, but we’d soon find out, God gave us a huge gift all wrapped up in a pretty little bow that we had yet to open …

Charity, Joy and Hope.  Who knew my plea for help a year ago would ever materialize into one of the biggest blessings for us out here on the Appalachian Trail? We sure didn’t!  All the pieces of the puzzle during planning just kept falling into place, Denise’s (Charity) excitement to experience life on the trail was contagious and she even convinced her college friend, Kathy (Joy), who lived in the area, to join in on her mayhem, as she called it.  Although we were excited to be getting assistance, we were somewhat skeptical in how it would all unfold.  Will she like being around us, will she find us and life on the trail boring, will she have regrets - just so many unknowns.  But once we untied the pretty little bow and opened the box … the blessings began to flow. All we had to do was hike, Charity took care of everything, with much assistance from Joy, as Hope tagged along for the ride.  It was a great arrangement and we will forever be grateful for this glorious gift! The CHARITY bestowed upon us gave us JOY and filled us with HOPE! (What fitting trail names!) We had been revived! Life on the trail went much smoother.  We knew we’d finish Vermont and finish strong!

Trail Angel turned Trail Demon.  Unfortunately scammers have even joined us on the trail.  It was reported on our trail app to watch out for someone posing as a trail angel (someone who gives out food and drinks FREE [called trail magic] to hikers). This imposter was giving hikers drink and food, and then insisting that they pay for it.  He’d give them a story about how he is feeding hikers and needs their money to continue feeding other hikers. It’s a bait and switch move to make you feel obligated to pay.  You never have to pay or feel obligated to pay for trail magic.  You hope to go out on the trail to escape those types of things that are happening in the world only to discover its followed you in.  Sigh.

One of the logistics that Charity made sure to scope out was ice cream shoppes in the local area.  After a hot, hard days hike, one needs to cool off.  What better way to do so than with a milkshake or here in Vermont they have “creemees” you can also get as a milkshake.  It’s a Vermont thing, so when in Vermont do as the Vermonters do.  As we’re standing in line at Woodstock Scoops to order our first creemee, an elderly lady taps FROG on the shoulder and makes mention of his Appalachian Trail shirt he has on.  He stands there all proud to say we’re hikers and we’ve travelled 1700 miles of the trail.  She politely congratulates our accomplishment and then proceeds to burst our bubble (in the most sweetest of ways); we find out she’s 85 years old and when she was 75 years old she hiked the trail from Georgia to Maine and turned around and walked it back down to Georgia, that’s called a “yo-yo” hiker.   4400 miles!  Now THAT is ahh-mazing!! We may have ordered a creemee, but we also had a dose of humble pie!

For the most part the trails in Vermont are well maintained but the last two days had us shaking our heads and wondering if this section was even being looked at.  The tick population is huge in this area and they had us walking through fields and a lot of them we had to bush-whack our way through weeds that were well over my head (I know! You’re thinking well that’s not that tall!) and you really didn’t even know if you were on trail or not.  I’ve had a history of Lyme Disease so of course I’m weary walking through.  I know firsthand the pain associated with a tick bite.  The other thing that left us wondering about maintenance is that there was poison ivy right on the side of the trail.  I have to admit, neither one of us knows what that plant looks like so we had no idea and could have walked right through it.  We met up with Crazy Wolf who informed us, or rather warned us, to avoid it.  FROG wasn’t so sure he was correct, I mean after all, he is CRAZY Wolf, of all names.  After he left, we took a picture of it and had the plant identified: yep, poison ivy! Guess Crazy Wolf knew what he was talking about!  I think that section warrants some attention for the safety of the hikers.  But I also think we need to take some responsibility and learn our plants and be well protected against ticks!  Thanks for listening to my rant, I’ve been “ticked” off about it and “itching” to complain to someone about it!

Once a teacher always a teacher! “I can hear the road ahead,” I say.  FROG responds, “You can’t hear the road, you may hear cars on the road but you don’t hear the road.”  Oh my goodness! Whatever!

It was our last day on the trail, we had only 3 miles to go to bring an end to Vermont.  We tried so hard the day before to tackle the whole 13 miles but after 10 we knew we needed to stop, we couldn’t push ourselves to do anymore.  It was good we stopped, it started raining the moment we got into the adventure van.   The morning of our last hike was gloomy and threats of rain in the forecast but we weren’t going to let that dampen our spirits.  Today was a big day! Joy was celebrating her birthday today so Charity pulled out her kazoo and FROG and I tried to carry a tune by singing Happy Birthday as she was kazooing.   She’s a better Kazooer than we are singers but we tried.   Anyway, back on topic.  We got dropped off for the last time, took our last day pictures, and headed into the woods for the last time this year.  All this build up to tell you it was a totally uneventful hike UNTIL we reached the end …

There standing at the end of the trail, after finishing those 3 miles in the rain, stood Charity blowing her kazoo and Joy holding her umbrella cheering us on in congratulations of our accomplishment of finishing Vermont!  We had a lot of lasts this day but THIS was a first for us.  We have never had anyone greet us and congratulate us at the finish line (that we knew anyway).   Thank you Charity and Joy for making that moment so special for us!  We will always hold that memory close to our hearts.   Your generosity and willingness to cater to our every whim did not go unnoticed, you two are truly the definition of trail angels!!  You have become lifetime friends! Thank you for answering the call from God and being our gift to open.

Our other Trail Angels: Many thanks to our good friends, Ann & Hugh Porter for picking us up in Vermont and bringing us back to NY.  You are always there for us and support all our crazy ideas.  We can’t imagine doing life without you in our lives; your friendship means the world to us. 

Goodbye Vermont, it was fun and a lot of memories made; but it’s time to say “hello” to your neighbor, New Hampshire.  God willing we will see you in 2026!