August 1, 2017. First Planned Rest Day. Applebrook B&B in Jefferson

August 1, 2017 -- Our first planned "zero" day.

I know, a rest day already??  We had only three full days of hiking behind us...but when we planned this thru-hike, I wanted to make sure we didn't go full speed ahead right off the bat.  I feel the best way to protect against injury is to balance the long miles with appropriate rest, especially in the beginning of a hike when your body isn't quite used to cranking out the miles day after day after day.  Also, these thru-hikes are our vacation days and we enjoy pampering ourselves from time to time.  Therefore, I booked two nights at Applebrook B&B for the first part of our trip during our planning stages.

I had actually booked two nights for August 1 and 2 (instead of July 31 and August 1), but the wonderful and kind owner of Applebrook, Priscilla, allowed us to shift our reservation up a day since we were a day ahead of our original schedule (we started on July 29th instead of July 30th).  We were grateful for the fact that she had room early and that she is flexible.  

By the way -- if you want to leave a resupply box here, contact Priscilla (603-586-6008).  I dropped one off before we began our hike.  There was no charge for us since we were staying there.  I do not know if there is a charge if you are not spending the evening.  Call Priscilla and discuss your situation with her.

I highly recommend staying here if you want a nice break from the trail.  This is a beautiful, spotless, warm, and welcoming B&B with comfortable beds, fantastic food, gorgeous grounds, and homemade soap.  The owners, Priscilla D'Amico and her husband Renny, are what I call Good People.  They're sweet, generous, funny, and overall just a pleasure to be around.  We enjoyed our conversations with them and we absolutely loved their establishment.  I live just an hour and ten minutes away from this place but I am seriously thinking of staying here again in the near future just to enjoy their lovely home and Priscilla's amazing cooking.  The cost to stay here in the room we had (the Lupine Room) is far, far less than you'd expect -- just $115 a night for two people and $125 for three people.  I have paid two to three times that much in other, less nicer B&Bs in other parts of the country.

On our day of rest, I took a bunch of photos for this blog (with their permission).

I should have removed my plastic bag from the chair before taking the photo!  Oops.

Heading up the lovely wooden stairs to our room

This room (Lupine) is bigger than this photo makes it seem

The bathroom is also much bigger than this photo makes it seem

Some history on the wall leading into the kitchen area

The eating area.  The food here is amazing.

Just outside, on the property

There is currently an archaeological dig going on in their backyard.
That's a crew from Plymouth State University way back there by the tarp. 

Beautiful flowers...and there's a raspberry bush.
The owners allowed Sage to pick and eat raspberries to her heart's content.

Sage and Alex with the owners of Applebrook B&B, Priscilla and Renny D'Amico.

Another thing I did on our rest day was monitor the forecast; we had planned on taking three relaxed days to go from Jefferson to Stark along the Kilkenny Ridge Trail, but unfortunately, when I checked the forecast on August 1, it looked like there was a good chance of afternoon thunderstorms for the 2nd and a fantastic chance of severe thunderstorms for the 3rd and 4th.  Therefore, we decided to change the plan and hike to Stark in two days instead of three, and to get a very early start the next morning so we could get as close to Cabot Cabin as possible before the potential thunderstorms arrived.  It looked like if we could get over the Weeks by noon or 1pm that we would be in decent shape.  I called Nancy Spaulding at Stark Village Inn to see if she had room for us on Thursday or Friday night, but unfortunately, she didn't.  She did say she could drive us into Lancaster Thursday after we came out of the mountains if we could get rooms there, and that she would pick us up in Lancaster and drive us back to Stark on Saturday.  Since that plan would keep us off the trails during the worst of the forecasted storms, I agreed and was grateful for Nancy's shuttle service.  After talking to Nancy, I secured a room at the Lancaster Motor Inn for Thursday and Friday night.  That would give us one more rest day than we had planned, but oh well, life could be worse.

A note about Nancy Spaulding -- she is The Woman of the Cohos Trail.  If you need a ride from Point A to Point B, she's your woman.  If you want a place to stash a resupply box and/or spend the night at her friendly and comfortable Stark Village Inn, she's your woman.  If you want some recent news and updates on current thru-hikers that have passed by or that she has picked up or dropped off, she's your woman.  She's truly a dynamo -- efficient, 100% dependable, and fun to speak with.  I'll write more about her and her lovely B&B later, when I post about our arrival in Stark.


I will try to publish another post this evening -- that will be of August 2, our hike from Applebrook all the way over the mountains Starr King, Waumbek, the three Weeks, Terrace, North Terrace to Cabot.