Hot Nasty Day to Climb a Mountain

7-29-09 day 57
start: Moose Mountain Shelter, NH
end: Hexacube Shelter, NH
daily mileage: 17.7
total mileage: 752.7

We got up really early, 6:00. We both kinda liked it actually, we made good morning miles. We had a pretty stout climb early on but it came with the promise of popsicles on the other side. We found the popsicle house but there was no one home to hand out the treats. Lame. We hung out with Whisp and snacked from our own supply for a while anyway before pushing on. We climbed Smarts Mountain before lunch, and it was a beast. It was a hot, steamy, humid day to climb but we made it up the huge rock. It was defiantly our biggest climb in a while. It was so humid all a the views were obscured by big clouds of hazy mist, yuck. We ate at the summit with our Dutch friend Micha (prncd, 'Mee-sha') under the fire tower. The only water supply at the top was basically a mud puddle, but you got to go with what you got I suppose. Giardiah, bring it on! From the top we only had 5.3 to the shelter and all down hill. I stopped about a mile out to bathe in the river. I found a natural pool and eased into the cold water. Washing the nasty salt off was great and the cold water on tired muscles was better. It started sprinkling as I got moving again and after my cool down I was moving slow. I met back up with Disney at Hexacuba Shelter, which is in fact hexagonal, and the privy is pentagonal.