Day #26, Boom boom pow and an exciting night--miles hiked: 10.5

This morning, we woke up in the clouds at Green Leaf hut, but it cleared off by the time we had finished our work for stay and polished the leftovers from breakfast.

So if you're wondering what's going on with all this hut business...here's your answer:

The Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC) owns and operates 8 huts in the Whites. They are wooden structures with kitchens, tables, composting toilets, and bunks for 40-90 people. They function completely off the grid and are spaced roughly a days hike apart (or half a day if you're in thruhiker shape). We have been using a special privilege they offer to long distance hikers only: work for stay. This means that we do some chores (dishes, sweeping, etc) in exchange for dinner and breakfast leftovers and sleeping on the dining room floor...pretty good deal if you ask me (being an actual guest costs over 100 bucks per person per night).

We had some miles to cover to reach our final destination for the day, so off we went back up to Franconia Ridge and then up and over Mt. Garfield.

By the time we reached Galehead Hut (the halfway point), we could already hear the thunder rumbling...

But we had to press on with 6-7 more miles to go. The trail took us up on a ridge and the storm followed. We waited for awhile below one of the peaks and then carried on with what sounded like distant thunder. A mile or so later, there was a cloud-to-ground lightning strike that was way too close (Shabbat guessed 100 yards) to keep going towards another exposed peak...so we pulled out the tarp and hunkered down on an exposed ridge line (in a deluge, of course).

'Twas an exciting night trying to cook and stay dry while the White Mountain wind whipped over the ridge. Thankfully, I had been carrying a treat from Quebec...maple butter, anyone?

We did survive the night...so another blog post is coming soon!