Jamaica, VT (Continued and Finished)

June 15 - After Mrs and I returned to camp, Luna was still acting up, so I decided to take her down to the playground area and walk along the rail trail.  She did well here.  Not a peep and she received lots of praise and treats for her good behavior.  We reached the point on the rail trail where the Scenic Overlook Trail intersects, coming down off the small mountain, so I decided to go up to the overlook and then down the other side which enters the campground near our site.

All was going very well and I was enjoying the hike.  I had worn my Vibram Five Fingers so it made the hiking light and effortless.  We were getting fairly close to the overlook when Luna suddenly spun around and started barking madly.  She caught me a bit off guard, but I was able to quickly make some corrections and get her attention.  At the same time I heard the reason for her outburst.  A woman was running the trail and coming up behind us.  I got a little more control of Luna and stepped off the path to let her pass.  She made a comment about Luna being a lovely trail running companion, and she continued on her run up towards the overlook.

We both stopped short near the top as we heard something someone howling.  Wait.  What?
As we reached a clear view of the small rock outcrop that overlooks Jamaica we saw the trail running woman with her hands to her mouth howling over the valley below.  Ok.  So, I stopped and worked with Luna again to keep her from barking and interrupting this woman's moment of wolfiness, and she soon turned and continued running down the trail towards the campground.  This is about when I made my mistake.

I decided that it was less than a mile or so to the campsite, so I thought I would give trail running a try in my Vibrams.  Luna seemed ok with the quickened pace, too.  We scampered down the rocky trail and as it leveled out and was about to enter the woods and turn for the straight shot to the campground, I pretty much simultaneously saw, felt and heard a root end was sticking up out of the ground.  As my left foot came down and was in motion forward for the next footfall, I caught the root between my pinky toe and the next one up...  Snap.  The funny thing is (or not so funny, I guess) was that I never missed a step.  I knew that I had likely injured the toe a bit, but I just kept the pace and continued down the trail, but did start to feel something was not quite right.

Back at camp, I removed the Five Fingers and found my poor little pinky toe was no longer pointing straight ahead, but off to the left in a 45 or better degree angle, sort of floating there.  Hmmmmmm.  I was pretty filthy, so I left the pups with Mrs and hit the shower.

I broke out the first aid kit and taped the toe to the non-damaged neighbor.  It began to swell but was not overly painful.  We didn't do too much more that afternoon.

I wished I had taken an image with the toe not taped.  Eventually the bruising and swelling made it over to the big toe, but quickly went away.

On Sunday (6/16) with my cartoonish purple toe keeping us from doing any distance hiking, we took a drive up to Ball Mountain Dam to see if we could see the peregrine falcons that nest there.  We hiked up to the dam, but could only hear the peregrines, likely the young, hidden somewhere in the rocks.  We hiked back to the car and while loading Harry, I stepped and turned (without thinking) using the screwed up foot, and felt a snap and almost instant relief, some anyway.  I think I had just straightened the little bones, or maybe it was dislocated and it popped back in.  I don't know.  I never went to a doctor, so I will probably never know.  As I type this (on 7/11), I still have it taped, but it is considerably better, though still tender and a bit swollen.  I ran two miles on it the other day and it felt ok.

With the pups at Ball Mountain Dam

Anyway, after the Ball Mountain peregrine miss, we drove over to Townshend State Park to have a look around at their campsites again.  The campground is small and only has a few sites in a small open area for our little pop up camper.  But we like it and there is good hiking there.  Someday, perhaps.

Monday (6/17) was our day to head home.  We broke camp and were on the road sometime after 11 am.  Not the greatest trip, but still nice to get away from the sand pile.

 A shot of campfire smoke in the trees taken by Mrs.

 Luna is a great camp dog.

 Harry in the leanto shelter.

Pups on a zooming on the Overlook Trail.

Until next time, Jamaica.  (We already booked the trip....)