Day 40 (Sept 22)

The rain's still pouring in the morning, and we patiently wait for it to stop. The tarp's kept the tent reasonably dry. One of the advantages of the tarp-over-the-tent approach is that we can pack up everything except the tarp and the rope without being exposed, and then lash those to the outside of the pack, after a good shake-off. The system works, sort of, but we're still damp and cold. Looks like it's going to be a sunless day.

No sign of life from the idyllic pigsty down by the creek below. Resisting the temptation to jog down the trail and write "caution: shelter hogs!" on the white Subaru at the trailhead, I'll have to settle for scribbling a nasty note in the next trail register.

That's a Wegmans trail register, by the way. Earlier in the hike I scoffed at the trailside advertising on the Bruce Trail in Canada, but it turns out the Finger Lakes Trail isn't free from this sort of encroachment either. There have been several of these mailbox registers since we hooked up with the FLT, nominally related to some sort of public fitness initiative, all sponsored by Wegmans. They're often located in close proximity to the official FLT registers, so that's a bit annoying. The official Wegmans FLT pamphlet actually has some useful maps in it, though.

If you like rock piles, that pile of rocks around the mailbox may look impressive, but there's more to come:

Has Andy Goldsworthy been hiking out here?

As we get further from Ithaca, the cairn art and private easements peter out, and we're doing a fair amount on the road. We short-cut just a tad of this to dodge a road repair crew on our way into Potato Hill State Forest, the first bushwacking we've done since joining the FLT. (Though of course we've wacked plenty of brambles and nettles in the literal sense, right in the trail.)

During a short stretch on busy Highway 79, we attract the attention of territorial dog, who rouses himself and makes a beeline for us, snapping and barking. We jog across the highway to avoid him, but he bounds fearlessly after us and is inches away from being plowed over by a fast-moving pickup. The dog's owner chases after, screaming in horror. Wow. Tense. Sorry?

Thankfully, we're soon back in the woods, at the next shelter. Tempting to spread out, hang all of our wet items all over, and scare off latecomers, but Deb judges the place is not stupendous enough to be worth the karma hit. So we push on a bit and make a camp in a quiet piney hilltop, cozy enough for now.