Miles: 16; Elevation gained: 2,300 feet

Frigid night at Stratton Pond, plus we had a violent snorer bunking with us. It was impressive, because he not only kept it up all night, but produced a nice racket on both inhales and exhales. Blasted right through earplugs, and I swear he actually shook the shelter. In the morning, David from Randolph, casting a withering glance at the still-sleeping offender, said “show off,” in reference to how well the dude apparently slept.
We somehow had it in both our heads that we had just 11 miles to hike out to Mad Tom Notch Road, where my wife Marcia was picking us up to take us back to my house for a zero day, but when we got to Prospect Rock, I looked at my Guthook app and saw we still had 10 miles left instead of 5, a stretch that included Bromley Mountain. Oops.

Bromley’s a nice climb – ends on top of a chairlift which always affords good views, even if the natural order of things wouldn’t have had it in the cards. At the top we met a guy who was probably in his early 20’s (could be 30’s I’m too friggin’ old now to discern the nuance of decades). Not only was he from NYC, but he works for the Central Park Conservancy at the Lasker Pool in Harlem, and part of his duties is looking after the Blockhouse, an 1812 fortification in the North Woods that very few people outside of Manhattan know about. The Trail spits out these unlikely nuggets!