The morning started with hard rain and we ate our breakfast huddled under the hammock tarp. It had slowed to a drizzle by the time the kids and Mama Bear started hiking. I packed up the wet tarp and started soon after. While I was hurrying to catch up, I took the opportunity for a morning swim in rocky pond. The silver mist rose slowly from the ponds surface and the soft drizzle rippled the mountains’ reflections.

I eventually caught them, and we had a beautiful morning stroll to meet Mama Bear’s sister at a road crossing. She brought us back to Williamstown where Mama Bear’s parents, siblings, nieces and nephews all met us to celebrate their grandfather and spread some of his ashes along the section he hiked with us twelve years ago.

The kids and their cousins swam in the streams and goofed off together. The adults recreated some of the photos from our first trip with Mama Bear’s grandfather’s walking stick (cut in Georgia at the end of our southbound hike in 2002) held his remains. The kids built and launched a funeral ship made from twigs bark and leaves to carry their great grandfather down the river.

Back in town we had a picnic at a park. We ran into some old family friends that live nearby. We were an unruly group, but all enjoyed the controlled chaos. RobinHood was thrilled to discover and join a youth Ultimate. Frisbee clinic. And we all had fun in borrowed town clothes while we had a personalized laundry service care for our smelly garments.