In Which I Go Underground, and End Up on a Ballfield

It seems like there’s never time to write. That’s not really true. On the trail the days certainly are full. I wake up, pack up, eat (my breakfast devolved from hot oatmeal to Pop Tarts, deluxe mixed nuts, and beef jerky), and hike. I find I’m spending eleven hours on the trail most days, although that includes breaks. I like to stop at shelter sites for the night, because hikers congregate there and we talk as we set up camp, fetch water, and cook dinner. I relish the time I get to share with this new community of mine. They are my people, the way umpires or coworkers or anyone else I’ve been thrown in with over the past ten years never were, and I like them. Town is a little different. There is down time in town, and I prefer to spend as much of it as possible horizontal, or at least sitting, and focusing not-on-hiking. Ice cream, clean clothes and body, hot greasy food, and more hiker socialization–that is what town is about.

I stopped in two towns recently, and both times I stayed in free, underground hiker hostels. These places don’t want to be listed in guidebooks; hikers find them anyway. That’s when it pays to take a minute or two to chat with passing SOBOs, exchanging information about what lies ahead for each hiker. The first town was Dalton, MA, where Rob Bird opens his home for hikers and other wayward souls. He calls the place the Bird Cage. I limped into Dalton after my second consecutive 20-mile day and followed some hiker friends to Rob’s place. Waiting for us were cold drinks in the fridge and hot showers with clean, fluffy towels. Later Rob drove us to a shopping center with buffet and grocery store. The next day he slackpacked me and another hiker 23 miles, over Mount Greylock. That means he drove us ahead, dropped us off, and we hiked back to his house carrying only borrowed daypacks with food, water, and other essentials. The following morning, Rob dropped me off where I started my slackpack so I could continue north. He does this all out of the kindness of his heart, and refuses to accept a dime from hikers.

A few days later I hitched into Bennington and found the Happy Hippies, Arla and Chris, who let hikers stay in the converted carriage house behind their house. They call it the Vortex. Both the carriage house and their own home are always open, and hikers have the run of common areas: kitchen, dining room with laptop, bathroom, and music room. Arla is an amazing sculpture artistand a real firecracker, and chatting with her is inspirational. They have three bikes for hikers to borrow, and when I was there, Twoper and I rode out to the movie theater for popcorn, soda, and Harry Potter–what a treat!

I was picked up in Bennington by my friend Perry Barber, and I’m tking a few days off the trail to umpire and teach at Baseball For All’s second annual Girls Baseball Academy. This year there are 14 girls from all over the country, and they’re having a great time. There’s instruction and a game daily, the coaching staff is excellent, and the extra activities are really cool. A few days ago we went to a minor league game in the evening, and yesterday took a trip to Boston. The girls participated in a physics lab with the MIT Science of Baseball Program, then scrimmaged with the MSBP boys. After that we toured Fenway. Woo! Now it’s back to the noemal schedule. I umpire a game and teacha session every day–a couple of days ago it was balks, and today we’re going to talk about plate work and have the girls do some soft toss and actually call some balls and strikes! And, NPR’s Only A Game is doing a story on the academy, so listen for that a week from Saturday.

Time to go work. When I get back on the trail, I’ll redume hiking through VT. I’m having a great time there. All the plants are really familiar, and the trail feels like home.