Even though I think I slept pretty well last night I was feeling pretty worn out most of the day today. Even so the first third of the day went by quickly and then we stopped for lunch. I ate a bit too much in one meal in an attempt to use up some food before town and that combined with just being tired made the middle part of the day drag on. Right after lunch of course was the longest climb, but we were rewarded at the top by a nice encounter with a porcupine. He was right in the trail as we approached and when he saw or heard us he started running away from us down the trail. Eventually he turned and started climbing a tree while making some whining/squeeling noises.
We’re starting to see the transition to New England forest and trail. The woods feel older and more dense. The trail is often covered with roots, and the weather continues to be cooler. As evidenced by the number of people at last nights campsite we’ve also been catching up to more early starters. A lot of the people we meet now started their thru-hike in April or even March. Of course that means they’re the ones spending multiple days in town, not hiking at all in the rain, or taking long breaks in the middle of it all. It seems like almost everyone has skipped big sections of the trail. None of the three of us have skipped more than a mile so it doesn’t make sense to us that people set out to do something like this and then skip so much of it.
Anyway, we got to October Mountain to find only one other person tonight (none of the other 14 people managed 18.6 miles). He already had a fire going and even let us use the last of his marshmallows for roasting. Nice relaxing evening by the fire.