Due to some other plans falling through, instead of spending a weekend on the Long Trail in Vermont, R3l@x and I decided to stay close to home and test some modified rain gear on Mt. Greylock this past weekend. (Sorry LRR, I will see you next weekend) On our hike up to the summit on Saturday, it rained cats & dogs! We walked thru a trail become stream most of the way. As we got closer and closer to the summit, it rained harder and harder. For a short bit of time, the thunder and lightning were getting pretty close, and even though we tried, we were not successful catching the show on film. Both of my dogs really enjoy hiking, but they were not exactly happy with the soaking downpour. However, they were troopers and had a really nice evening once we got them dried off.
The Raiffnuke Zipper mod that is on both Ponchos, that can be seen in the videos worked really well. They made a huge difference in the comfort level of the ponchos.
We stayed at the Peck’s Brook shelter Saturday night. While we were there a couple that were planning on starting the LT the next day stayed with us. We ended up converting the same guy twice…once, to being a hammock lover, and second, to becoming a dog lover. He was also a budding gear junkie….he couldn’t have spent the evening with two worse people for his budding addiction, me and R3l@x! He ended up dedicating an entire page in his journal to all of the cottage vendors and websites he needs to check out when he gets back from his trip.
The storm abated late Saturday afternoon and we had a thoroughly comfortable night in our hammocks, only to be woken up early Sunday morning by two well rested and playful dogs. So, after calming the pooches down and feeding them, we packed up, had our own breakfasts and headed to back to the top on our way home.
The view was slightly better on Sunday morning, but the low lying clouds/fog had not entirely burned away, leaving the view a little foggy. The rest of the hike out was pretty uneventful, but there were many more hikers out in the better weather.
After getting home, cleaned up, and our gear dried out, we headed back out, this time to Mohawk Trail State Park to spend the evening with the Jersey Bears before they started their trip up the Long Trail. We came bearing gifts courtesy of Sam Adams and had a really great afternoon visiting.
The attached videos are some of the first that I have shot using my new Stick-Pic, and I have not had any experience yet with video editing, so they are kind of rough. They are not very exciting, and I found that I need to talk more! They do show some of the conditions we hiked in and they show the zipper mod in action. I will add some photos when I finish uploading everything.
Thanks for watching.
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