With only four hours of sleep last night, Ronald and I were not exactly chipper this morning. I dozed off and on between 4:00 and 6:00, but there was too much activity by then to really sleep. At 6:30, the paying guests, including our peacefully sleeping son, were gently awakened by one of the Croo carrying a boom box playing soothing New Age music, as she wandered through the bunkrooms. The irony of the contrast to our noisy awakening was laughable. It was almost as if the working thru-hikers were supposed to be miserable. I'm sure that's not the intent, but that's the way it worked out this time.

We did have a great breakfast, though, and we got to eat with everyone else. Chowed down on cream of wheat, fruit, pancakes, sausage, juice and coffee. Then we had to hang around and wait until most of the guests had left, so we could finish our chores of sweeping the bunkrooms and dining room. Got on the trail just before 9:00.

The first climb was up and over Mt. Madison, which was steep, but not as bad as it looked from a distance. Coming down the other side was another matter. The boulders were huge, and the trail was a tricky downward rock hop. As I've said before, jumping from boulder to boulder is my absolute worst trail skill. I don't feel confident enough to jump quickly and keep a good momentum going very long. Ronald and Brandon kept getting way ahead. I know they were frustrated, and kept trying to coach me by telling me to "bounce" from rock to rock, or "float like a butterfly" (sting like a bee…?). They only wanted to help, but when I do that, I feel like my knees are going to buckle up under me. I did get a rhythm going eventually, but I'll never be really agile when it comes to rock hopping.

As the crow flies, Pinkham Notch is only about three miles from the top of Mt. Washington. But in AT miles, the trail takes a wide swing north, then back around the Great Gulf Wilderness, before heading over Madison and down toward Osgood Campsite and Pinkham Notch. Once we dove down to Osgood, the going was a bit easier. We stopped for lunch at the intersection to the campsite. The trail signs all said it was only six miles to Pinkham, but it's really closer to eight miles. The trail wasn't difficult, but the day was hot and muggy, and there were a lot of little roller coaster ups and downs. The thru-hiker term for them is PUDs, or Pointless Ups and Downs. We've passed many PUDs along the way. A lot of work with no view as a reward for the sweat.

One really beautiful area this morning was in Great Gulf when the trail criss-crossed a lovely stream (or maybe several streams, but who cares?), for several miles. There were many Kodak moments at the cascades and waterfalls along the way.

We thought we were moving quickly, so were disheartened when we came to a sign telling us we were still 1.6 miles from Pinkham. By the time we got down to the camp, we were really dragging from the heat. We hung out at the Visitor's Center for a while and ate another lunch on the porch with cold drinks from the vending machines. There is a great hiker's room in the basement with tables, a phone, a hiker register and, best of all, free showers! Swamp Donkey and Papasan were there. Swamp Donkey met some friends for the night, but Papasan stayed at the lodge.

It was going on 3:00 when we decided to call it a day and stay here at Joe Dodge Lodge. That would let us rest up a bit before Wildcat Ridge, our next killer climb. We briefly toyed with the idea of riding the gondola up to the top to save the 2,000 foot climb, but figured that would be wimping out. By morning we should be able to make it on our own power. The lodge turned out to be a much better deal than the huts. Our experience here is like night and day from Madison. We were able to get a family room to ourselves for $45, and dinner is $12 for us, and only $7 for Brandon. Plus, the rooms are carpeted and have heat and lights, so we aren't on anyone else's schedule for going to bed or getting up.

For me, the major highlights were the showers and dinner. On the trail, a shower takes on an entirely new aura. It becomes a therapeutic and almost spiritual experience. The showers at Joe Dodge are, without a doubt, the best I've seen anywhere on the trail. Large, clean, tile stalls, with powerful streams of never ending hot water. They even had soap and shampoo. I felt like I could stay in there forever. We all washed our stiff, smelly, salty hiking clothes in the showers, and hung them to dry in the room. It only takes one day of sweating on this trail to get hiking clothes completely gross. Our shorts had gotten so bad, it was no longer a matter of aesthetics. They were so stiff from salty sweat they were uncomfortable to wear, and we're all getting sores on our legs from the pores clogging up. Not a pretty picture, but there you have it. Thru-hiking just isn't pretty sometimes. It's also enduring all manner of cuts, scrapes, bruises, bites, bumps, dirt, grime, sweat, and other bodily functions I won't enumerate on these pages.

With that said, we were finally presentable again, and spent some time relaxing and writing before dinner at 6:00. Dinner, as I alluded to before, was the second highlight of our stay. Tonight we weren't second class citizens, we were paying customers. The food was a feast for the eyes, body and soul. Amid lively conversation, we were served the first course of cream of summer vegetable soup and crusty wheat bread. Brandon raved about the soup, and quickly snarfed down two bowls. This was followed by a wonderful salad, seasoned noodles, and a light flaky chicken pot pie. Dessert was chocolate toffee bar and coffee. We were in heaven! It was the best dinner since Elmer's at the Sunnybank Inn in Hot Springs.

I sat next to a man who we had chatted with briefly at Madison the night before. His name is Alan Wiersba, and he's a Product Manager for Oracle, near San Francisco. He and his friend from Boston (who's name, I'm sorry I didn't write down), planned to hike the huts for about a week. But, they've been whipped by the Whites even worse than we have. Yesterday, it took them seven hours to go from the top of Washington to Madison. They got in so late they missed dinner, and ended up eating leftovers with us and the Croo. All evening they wondered what they did wrong that took so long. Anyway, they made it as far as Pinkham Notch today, and decided to see rest the Whites by car. Sounds good to me! Had a pleasant conversation with Alan all through dinner. Talked partly trail stuff, and partly computer and Internet stuff (because of his connection with Oracle, the Net PC people).

After dinner, being comfortably stuffed, we sauntered back to the lodge to find a quiet, cozy corner to write. A family now occupied the big fireplace room, where we sat before dinner, with little girls banging on the piano. We went exploring, and found a wonderful library with a spiral staircase to a secluded loft. The perfect spot for writing! We're catching up on journal writing and cards to friends and family. We decided today that this section of trail leaves us too exhausted to keep up the daily entries for the e-mail and Web site updates. Ronald wrote a weekly summary to send off. Short summaries should be easier to keep up until we get home.

A good night's sleep was not to be our destiny for last night. In fact our destiny lay in virtually no sleep and what we had, wasn't restful. I guess that's the price you pay for being a member of the hiker hut croo. We had decided to go on the cheep (big mistake) and avoid the high cost of a hut stay by working as a crewmember. That way Linda and I could stay free.

Unfortunately Madison didn't have enough extra bunk space so we had to sleep in the dining area. Which meant we had to wait until everyone else had gone to bed. One family decided they wanted to stay up late. First they kept banging the door going in and out to do star gazing. When they got bored of that, they decided that tonight would be a good time to learn scrabble. So for the next hour they proceeded to try to learn and play scrabble at the same time.

After they retired, another hiker arrived and proceeded to make lots of noise in preparation for sleep. Then early this morning he decided to get up and hike before light. So before five he was up and making a lot more noise getting ready to leave. I doubt that I got four hours of sleep. When we did awake this morning, we had to wait until all of the rest of the paying guest left before we could perform our cores. All we had to do was sweep out the bunkroom. Still it was after 9:30 before we shouldered our packs and set out.

I had wanted to avoid the climb up Mt. Madison this morning. The obvious choice was the Gulf Hagas Trail that Easy 8 had taken yesterday. After looking at the profile map closely, it appeared that the Gulf trail would be extremely steep. That would not be good for either Linda's or my knees. The climb up Madison wasn't really that bad and the views were great. The hike down was one long rock hop. Linda was progressing very slowly on the trip down. I tried to teach her to walk lightly and not so stiff legged. I'm not sure it did any good.

We made it down to the Osgood Tentsite by lunch. From there it was a relatively flat five miles through the Gulf Wilderness to Pinkham Notch. The notch was our scheduled stop for the day, but the last couple of days I felt we could make it further. If we stopped we would have covered less than eight miles. As we were hiking through the wilderness, we toyed with the idea of hiking over and taking the gondola up to the top of the ridge and skipping the climb up Wild Cat.

By the time we reached the comfort of Pinkham Notch, our lack of sleep from last night was taking its toll. It really didn't take much for Linda to convince me of the need to stay here. It's been five days since our last shower and bed. Unlike the Hut's we could have our own room. The only things the Notch lacks to make it a great stop over are laundry facilities and a reasonable camp store for supplies.

We're staying tonight at the Joe Dodge Lodge. Deep in the bowels of AMC (or Appalachian Money Club as it is often referred to) land. Only a few more days until we are out of their clutches. Well at least with a good dinner this evening and a good night's sleep tonight we should be in better condition to tackle Wild Cat Ridge in the morning.

Today was a great day after a well deserved, relaxing, and yet so satisfying great nights sleep. My parent's night was not as good. The breakfast was good but we had to hang around after breakfast till all the people left so we could clean out the bunks. We left after all the bunks were clean and climbed up Madison. The climb was steep but going down the other side was steeper. We made our way down out of the Presidentials and we were back into the trees. I liked being above tree line but it was a little too rocky. The trail to Pinkham Notch was beautiful we crossed stream after stream and the trail was fairly flat we made it there in great time. When we got there we decided to stay. My parents were tired after their bad nights sleep last night. The rest of the afternoon we sat around and talked. We had a great dinner then we wrote and then I went to bed.