Bastille day, double post.

July 13, 2011

Start: 1298.9 Rattlesnake Spring
End:  1316.7 Gren Anderson shelter.
Total:   17.8 miles.

Today I wake up to see sunny skys quickly turning gray.  My phone says that its sunny though and I choose to believe it.  I meet to photographers shooting Rhododendrens when I exit camp, and I'm surprised that I didn't hear them, they said they were already shooting for an hour, one hundred yards from my tent.

Today is cruising terrain again, but the rocky tread is killing my feet through my worn shoes.  I'm getting a new pair tomorrow though.  It will be like Christmas, new shoes, insoles, and gaiters.  Just thirty nine more miles.   Until then though I must keep wincing on the jagged rocks. 

Trail magic comes in the form of a cooler full of Pepsi.  I'm not that into soda, and though I appreciate a free pop, I don't think these people get what hikers really want.  Super sweet pop isn't really desired.  Hikers really want cold beer.  The carbohydrates, in beer really help. 

I'm not planning to go off trail today, but there is a fishing community surrounded by lakes, that the trail passes through.  The closest business, right next to the trail, Joe to Go allegedly doesn't treat hikers great according to Awol's book.  They're closed, but at first glance they look friendly.  There are scenes of backpackers painted on the window.  A sign by the door though shows them to be jerks, "Hikers park your gear and rear on bench on the side."  Great if you go to they're business, they want your money so little that they make you sit outside around back in direct sun on a crappy bench.  Not a nice place.  I decide to get food at the next business that's open, Gyp's Tavern, named after the Gypper, Babe Ruth.  They have plenty of pictures of him in the place, along with hundreds of police patches.  The big draw is the cheap fried food menu, which I go to town on.  I order Freedom Fries (so 2003), pierogies, mozzarella sticks, jalepeno poppers, a cheeseburger, and a second order of freedom fries.  I wash it down with a Yuengling, and then wait out a monsoon on the back covered deck by a huge lake. 

After heading back a hundred yards to the trail, I run into Charter.  Charter, like most Appalachian trail hikers is someone I'm only meeting once.  He's coming back from the Blue Ribbon restaurant where they make hikers eat outside.  I say I hope you didn't tip them then, he didn't.  Charter and I hang out for an hour, and he relates to me how awful Lyme disease is.  He's got it and it sucks.  Charter says his lymphnodes in his neck and armpits swelled up like golf balls, and he kept falling asleep.  Besides that his joints hurt so bad, his doctor prescribed Vicadin for the pain.  Doxicyclene was the antibiotic. 

My mileage shot for the day, I continue to the next water, which is nearbye at a shelter.  There's too many bugs, so I tent, safe from the mosquito behind mesh.  I can't wait to get my presents tomorrow.

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July 14, 2011

Start: 1316.7 Gren Anderson Shelter in tent.
End:   1342.1 Pochuck mtn shelter.
Total:   25.4 miles

Today I wake up early with one thought on my mind, run post office run.  I'm pounding trail by 7:15, I need to hit the Unionville, Ny. post office by five.  Only nineteen miles away, but I have no clue if the trail will be rocky, or cruising so I just start early and go fast all day. 

Two and a half miles after I start walking on this cool, crisp morning, I come across an awesome ramada at the top of a mountain.  This would be the perfect spot to camp.  The cool breeze would have kept the mosquitos at bay.  There is plenty of graffiti, but it is all peace signs, rainbows, "You are beautiful!", and praises of how hot Justin Beiber is.  Apparently some 13 year old girls found some paint, and also were motivated to hike.  What nice pleasant Beiberfitti.  Such a change from the usual statements proclaiming the need to smoke weed, or the promotion of hate.  A lady comes by with a nice Corgy and we chat a few minutes.

Run town run is on though and I fly down the trail.  At the Mashipacong shelter a trail angel has left three, five gallon cubes of water, and I grab the last liter after dumping the liter I got and didn't touch at a dank stream flowing from a swamp.  The dumped water was the color of very dark tea, or maybe weak coffee.

I get to High Point State Park much earlier then I expect, and take a break in the shade.  The water fountain was a treat.  After leaving, I come to a observation platform that is apparently modeled after a gallows, and I can't get Robert Plant out of my head.  From it I see the 220 foot tall obelisk atop the highest point in New Jersey, a 1700 foot ridge.  You know a mountain isn't that impressive, when you need to build a 1/2 size Washington monument on top to get people to notice.

I rush on over wet trail.  A elevated stretch on wooden planks lasts at least a block.  Then I cross several glacial morraines.  I finally get to Lott road at three in the afternoon.  Marking a very fast morning, 20.1 miles by three is a personal record.  My package is there, my shoes, gaiters, and insoles.  The gaiters from Dirty Girl Gaiters are pretty awesome, bright tye-dyed, with peace signs on them.  Not only do they look really cool, they will keep rocks and forest debris out of my shoes while hiking.  A twenty dollar bill in the box convinces me to eat pizza across the street at Annabelles.  Like every business run and staffed by our neighbors to the south, the service and food quality were absolutely excellent.  I ate half my large sausage pie, the other half went in a box that I carried back to the trail. 

I'm waiting for crazy glue to dry on my shoes, where I affixed the Telco strip that will hold my gaiters on my shoes, so I head across the street to the small park.  This park, according to Awol, is open for hikers to camp there is even a port-a-pottie.  A new board on the sign with all the parks rules and regs states though, "Absolutely no camping in the park."  Some hiker must have got caught being bad. 

I cross back to New Jersey as I head back to the trail, and soon am walking down the Appalachian trail, pizza box in hand.  Thor a ridgerunner that I meet, tells me about his job for the ATC.  He gets nine bucks an hour, forty hours a week to hike around and ask people how there doing, and report trail conditions.  He says he doesn't have to pay rent either, on his days off the ATC supplies him with a old FEMA trailer left over from Hurricane Katrina. 

The AT turns to a paved road for a while then goes nearly all the way around a large man-made swamp, the Wallkill Preserve which is a avian sanctuary.  Large Herons scatter as I walk around this mile long mosquito pit.  A doe with two spotted fawns also run into the woods, scared by me from drinking the bog water. 

The trail climbs from the swamp lowlands, and a side trail leads me to water from a spigot at a abandoned house.  I climb higher to another side trail, this one leading to Pochuck mountain shelter.  There's a nice campsite at the trail junction, so I take it.  There may be people at the shelter, as I here a dog barking.  Though more then likely it is empty as there isn't a water source here. 

I'm very thankful for the nice cool breeze this evening.

It's a Jersey thing.

uly 12, 2011

Start:  1271.2 Penguin camp
End:   1298.9 Rattlesnake spring.

Total:  27.7 miles

I'm surprised to see a hiker a 6:15am.  Then two more while I'm packing.  The AT is getting user as I advance into the herd.  Today is cruising, level terrain.  There are rocky stretches, but I got over them.  There is an on trail town today, Delaware Water Gap.  I'm cutting across a corner of it.  There is no fast food in view, so I continue through.

The highlight is when Guino crosses the Delaware river, and exits Pennsylvania.  Welcome to New Jersey, I think your going to like it.  I get water at the visitor center, and chat with the interpretive staff.  There really nice. 

After climbing a thousand feet from my I-80 crossing, I arrive at the beautiful Sunfish pond.  A sign claims this glacial lake, to be one of New Jersey's seven natural wonders.  The water is warm, so I treat it like the Ganges and swim around and bathe in there.  Great idea, its been hot, and the water was very refreshing.

Between seven and seven thirty, I see three somewhat small bears.  They would still qualify as the largest dog that I have ever seen, but are small for bears.  None are very interested in me, they all give me space when I sing some Grateful Dead to them.  Funny I didn't yell at these guys, but because of there size in each case, I figured mom might be around and didn't want to sound to angry.  Besides everyone likes hearing a little Dead every now and then.

I'm thinking more and more about taking off from the Appalachian trail in New York in 140 miles.  I really need to find a place to live for school this fall and don't want to be rushed into anything.  Though, I still foresee being able to finish the trail and have three days to rush to class.  It would be an insane transition though, from trail directly into school.  I would like to have time to decompress from the Appalachian trail, and get into school mode.  It requires a completely different thought process from that of rouge hiker.  I have been thinking about it for a hundred miles now, and still have one hundred forty more to hike, about a week, before I come across a train station that leads into NYC for a twelve dollar fare.  This is definitely not a decision that I'm rushing into, I'm putting plenty of thought into trying to decide the right thing to do.  If earning another 4.0 this semester is my priority, this would be the best decision.  If getting to Katahdin is the priority, then I should continue on the Appalachian trail.  That would mean a high anxiety rush to class though, and a week or so where I'm only thinking of sleeping and eating, not studying.  Good thing that I work for Starbucks.  I would also be left with a beautifully rugged 740 mile section of trail to hike in the future.  A section every one tells me will be much slower going, and greatly reduce my mileage.  I wish that I had an extra two weeks to complete my hike. 

I really need to take more zero days and just sleep.  Caffeine pills can only help me stay awake for so long.  I really enjoy hiking fast out here though.  I don't think that I would enjoy hiking slow and lazy like everyone else is doing.  The towns that people keep stopping in for several nights and relaxing, are all just kind of a ripoff though.  Unlike the Pacific Crest Trail towns where the locals all seemed like good natured folk who are really into wanting to help hikers get to Canada, out here all the towns people just want to hustle the hikers.  There aren't any real trail angels out here either.  People lie and call themselves that, but then want to charge you.  Hostel employees aren't trail angels, they are in it for the money. 

The PCT is a better trail, but everyone has to do the AT at least once.

My eyes are closing as I write this.  A sleep deprived hiker.

Chinese, but not buffet :(

July 10, 2011

Start:  1247 Blueberry encrusted ridge.
End:    1249.6. ditch next to a highway.
Total:    2.6 miles

Today I intended to hit a Chinese buffet for lunch but found out that they don't serve buffet on the weekends.  So sad. I quickly hitched into Walnutport, Pa. with two older Seventh Day Adventist ladies.  They were on their way to a church breakfast, then service, and asked if I would like to join.  I politely refused saying that I had a lot of homework to do, and got a ride to Burger King for a three hour breakfast.  I did homework for most of that time. 

I got a pizza to make up for the lack of buffet, then hitched to Palmerton.  I ended up walking back to the trail, but only made it half way before falling asleep in a ditch near the highway.

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July 11, 2011

Start:  1249.6 Highway ditch.
End:   1271.2  Penguin camp.
Total:  21.6 miles

I woke feeling dehydrated and hope to soon find water.  The walk back along the expressway is a little overwhelming.  The cars would drive me nuts if I was a biker out here.  I didn't get hit though and make it back to the trail. 

I'm really tired I may add more to this later, bit today was a lot of fatherless walking.  Hot and dried up springs.  I hitched to a China buffet, but no buffet, Awols's guide was wrong.  I had good Chinese food in a very hot restaurant, no ac.  I hitched back walked a little more then set up camp in the woods.  I think that I am going to enter New Jersey tomorrow.  Oh I saw Squatch southbounding today.  It's good to see Facebook friends.

High on the Buffet trail.

July 9, 2011

Start:  1216.7 Pulpit Rock Astronomical Park
End:    1247.1 Blueberry covered ridge.
Total:  30.4 miles!

It was a nice breezy night last night without any rain.  Nights like this I can expect to be greeted in the morning with a dry tent.  Somehow, water vapor did not feel like abiding by this rule though, and when I woke, everything inside and outside the tent was soaked.  There must have been a nice cloud up here around me last night.  No Lehigh valley amateur astronomers fortunately, who may have looked down on my camp site location.  I guess though if they didn't want hikers camping there, they would have posted a sign.  They are in a perfect spot, with a big grassy field.  Everywhere else in the area is covered in boulders.  They even have a really scary spider infested privy with a ceiling that would be perfect for a five foot tall hiker.

Back to the trail, a hiker whose name eludes me is having breakfast which was last nights dinner which she hated but couldn't bring herself to bury at the shelter where she stayed a little over a mile back.  It sounded delicious though, beans, cheese, and rice.  Pink Floyd, with a Dark side of the Moon hat and fluorescent pink duct tape, covered poles showed up, and soon Rolling Stone.  Funny they weren't hiking together. 

I hike on and soon catch Pink Floyd, who didn't stop, and we start hiking and chatting.  He really wants to design a shot based off White Russians.  He also informs me that you can make vanilla sugar by placing a vanilla bean in a tub of sugar, then leaving it there a while.  This he is planning on using to line the rim of his White Russian based shot, just like a Margarita glass is salted.

We hike incredibly fast as the trail turns to nice smooth tread on an old dirt road.  The morning trail is rushing by and I make ten by 11:30.  I believe I can go into Walnutport, Pa. tonight, thirty three miles away, eat at the King Palace Chinese Buffet, resupply, and head back to the trail.  Smooth sailing continues into the early afternoon, then the rocks start.  Pennsylvania is known for its rocky stretches of trail, and I'm entering one.  Some qualifies as scrambling, and on one knife edge of highly angled strata reminiscent of where Captain Kirk fought the Gorn, a fall off the narrow purchases afforded to you by the rock would be tragic.

Today water is also scarce made more so by poor signage, I run out for a while and am low all day.  The Bake Oven Knob shelter supposedly has springs on a trail leading down below it.  The shelter is crowded with weekend backpackers, and tents are all around.  Its three hours too early to stop, I'm here for water.  The springs are dry below the shelter, so I descend the steep path down for half a mile to a beautiful one and drink two liters at the spring.

It takes an hour all together to leave the shelter and continue on, and my hopes of China buffet tonight die.  My new plan is to camp up on this ridge before the trail descends to the valley below, and let the breeze dry my wet tent.  As my goal of doing thirty miles then looking for a site approaches, I spot a large black bear northbounding the Appalachian trail just ahead of me, unaware that a determined piece of hiker trash is coming up on his tail.  I yell at him to get out of my way, and he just looks at me like, huh?  So, I yell and swear at him and raise my arms above my head, then he trots a bit down the trail.  I repeat this process again until he finally gets out of my way.

I walk fifteen more minutes, then find a nice breezy spot to camp surrounded by blueberries.  I actually camp on blueberries bushes that are taking over an old camp site.  They'll be fine.  I hope the bear doesn't continue walking this way, or he will be here in a few minutes to check out the beef Souper Ramen I got at a truck stop a few days ago.  Deliciously filled with MSG.

Pennsylvania flats.

July 8, 2011

Start: 1185.7 Applebee campsite
End:  1216.7 Pulpit Rock Astronomical Park
Total:   31 Miles!

A thunderstorm was over me last night.  Well probably several different ones, it was starting and stopping.  There was no wind in the trees where I was though, and I remained nice and dry.  I figure the German count mentioned last night, who with the Moravian missionaries who were going to Wyoming to meet the Shawnee, being out here wasn't that weird, there is a heavy German influence in the area.  I will even be passing close to Hamburg, Pa. today.  That happens to be the home of the Yuengling brewery, a very popular beer here on the east coast.  It is also the nations oldest brewery.  If I had more time, I would go take a tour.  The Coor's brewery tour was interesting. 

I wonder this morning how I can complete the whole trail, and still make it in time to Flagstaff for school.  I could exit at mile 1440 where a train station is on trail that serves New York City.  I do want to complete the trail though, I am just nervous about time, and finding a place to live in town.  If I did show up early, I would probably be able to get hours at Starbucks, my job.  Though that isn't guarenteed.  Enough of that destructive line of thought.  I start making miles.

Today is mostly flat and I anticipate making a thirty mile day.  Sure enough I do cruise, even with start and stop drizzling rain all day. It's still warm though, and sort of feels like rain in Hawaii, where it isn't a bother because its not cold.

There's a monument I pass around noon, memorializing Fort Dietrich Snyder.  This fort was a post in the French and Indian War.  The trail is flat and I soon pass.  Occasional rocky stretches slow me down though. 

There are not many good water sources today, which also helps me maintain a good speed.  Too many water sources, and I stop more, less and I just keep trucking to the next one, a dozen miles away.

The Appalachian trail goes through another small town today, Port Clinton.  There are no businesses seen from the trail, so I just rush through.  I do stop to pet three dogs for a few minutes who are wondering around.  I also use the time to chat with a local.  The southern accent is truly gone now.

I take a break under a highway bridge, and note how it would be an awesome spot to camp in a storm.  There would be the noise of trucks to get used to, but that beats a wet sleeping bag, and a huge covered area may make for a good trail party spot.

I'm pushing for a thirty miles today, and pass this mark before dark.  There aren't any good places to camp, on the rocky route up to Pulpit rock that I'm heading, but my data book shows an astronomical park with privy at the top of the climb.  It sounds like a place to camp on grass, and sure enough it is.  So now as I lay in my tent, I'm surrounded by large telescopes on a hill top.  Needless to say I do hear thunder now and again.  Weather.com shows this storm to be ending though, and I'm not very worried about a big lightening storm tonight.

DQ always saves the day.

July 7, 2011

Start:  1174 Days Inn Lickdale, Pa.
End:   1185.7 Applebee campsite
Total:  11.7

The Days Inn in Lickdale, Pa is the quietness hotel that I have ever slept in.  I got to sleep in until eight.  Then there was even a waffle maker included in the continental breakfast.  The waffle maker wasn't even located in a spot messy with waffle batter, syrup, and butter.  The breakfast bar was clean.  After that was a rerun of the Daley Show, and Robert Report.  I did some homework to today which took hours.  I finished one assignment, and got a start on my final two.  Overall a productive morning. 

I hit subway, then as I'm leaving a storm hits, so I go to DQ and get a Blizzard.  It passes in fifteen minutes, So I head over to the road that I need to hitch, and start thumping it.  A glamorous dressed lady walks by me on the sidewalk, I'm perplexed at why she's dressed so nice.  I say hello, and am greeted back with a very deep and masculine hello.  Looking closer, I see that she isn't really a she, but a transvestite on her way to either the DQ, or the truck stop next door.  I don't get a chance to see where she heads, as a pickup is pulling over for me.  Small town people are an interesting bunch.

I get a ride back to the trail and cross a nice 131 year old iron bridge while Bonnie Tyler's, Total Eclipse of the Heart is stuck in my head.  Both Subway and DQ had awesome 80's xm stations playing, and I can't get it out of my head.  A quick cross under I-81 makes me realize, that under interstate bridges is often much nicer then on them. 

It's poison ivy from hear on out today, but I make great time on flattish trail.  Some gnarly rock sections are present though, where the trail literally turns to a pile of rocks.  Darkness comes soon and I camp at what's named the Applebee campsite. An odd name considering that there are no Applebee's nearbye. 

I head on another trail to water from the Pilgrim's Rush spring.  According to a stone monument placed like a large gravestone in the woods was, "named by Count Nicholas Ludwig Von Zinzendorf.  Who with Conrad Weisser and Moravian missionaries rested here on their way to visit Shawnee Indians in Wyoming."  That was back in 1742.  What were they doing?

Applebee camp seems like a nice spot, near some old mine, in the forest.  The ground is even, and holds only a few small roots to camp on.

The picture is a rocky stretch of trail, that I encountered today.

July 5,6

July 5, 2011

Start: 1134.6 Past Cove Mountain shelter.
End:  1162.  Campsite in the woods.
Total:  27.4  miles

I enjoyed my relatively high spot to camp last night.  True I was only at 1250 feet, but I was higher then anything else around and got a nice breeze.  High camps and breezes mean that moisture from my respiration and perspiration gets blown out of the tent.  Otherwise my tent would have condensation in it in the morning, forcing me to carry a wet tent all day.  A wet tent means not only a heavier tent, but also increases the formation of mildew, something that a thru hiker is constantly battling. 

It's run town run this morning.  I'm just outside Duncannon, Pa. a town that the trail passes through for several miles.  Home of a hiker hotspot, the Doyle hotel, a cheap hotel above a bar.  I'm just passing through town though aiming for a Pilot truck stop on the other side for a Subway sandwich breakfast.  After a thousand foot descent, I'm walking along market street in this river front town on the Susquehanna river.

I notice many powerless crisscrossing the roads here, a ridiculous testimony for the need to properly zone for beauty in town.  The Doyle is a old monstrosity of a hotel.  Several stories tall, with a Victorian look.  A hiker I see walking out says it was nice, but the bar closed at six in the evening yesterday, which he thought was odd for the fourth of July.  He said that a large group of hikers decided to go to the Pennsylvania state run beer store, liquor is sold in a separate state run store, and take a two mile round trip walk to a bring your own beer gentleman's club. 

I continue walking through town, sprawling in the valley along the curve of the half mile wide river.  It's a nice old town, with an incredible amount of hair salon's.  I notice to that the southern accent is gone.  Since coming into Pennsylvania, people have been speaking like yankees.  I wonder if it will resurface.  To tell the truth, there wasn't a lot that was very good about the south.  The land was fine, but the people mostly appeared disheveled, absolutely uncaring about they're appearance until central Virginia.  I didn't even see a girl that I thought was marginally pretty until I got to Daleville, Virginia mile 719. 

As the Appalachian trail crosses the Juniata river, which feeds into the Susquehanna river here, I see hikers camped in a beautiful spot along the embankment.  Directly behind the on trail gentleman's club that the hikers went to last night.  The tents are hidden from view by trees, and are in a spot that would be considered park like.  Through the trees a hiker emerges, Four Beard, he tells me there's a breakfast buffet at the Pilot's Iron Kettle restaurant.  He also says he enjoyed the entertainment last night as there are two more gentleman's clubs, a bar and fast food all within a three minute walk from the trail.  Beer sales are not allowed at the truck stop though, as it would endanger the moral character of the community.

The Iron Kettle would fail a health inspection.  The staff are hillbilly's.  I found the southern accent again.  After four plates I get bored with eating and decide to get caffeine pills, I'm out and it is sad.  The truck stop store doesn't have No Doz, or any other name brand.  They do have Truckers Luv It though.  The smiling truck driver with leather jacket and cowboy hat, standing in front of his rig gives this product credibility.  The ingredient list shows that it has twenty five more caffeine then No Doz, and also includes quality ingredients like guarna, ginseng, yerba mate, and other legal stimulants.  The funniest ingredient was cayenne pepper, for that extra kick.  Ten bucks for forty pills.  That should last three weeks or longer.

Leaving the truck stop, I cross the wide Susquehanna river, on a highway bridge, and start my days hustle down the trail.  I'm forced to kick myself a little for taking two hours to eat, and not making miles, but food is important.  The trail is smooth too, and I'm ablle to easily travel down the long low range the trail follows. 

Later in the day, as I hike, A-10 Warthog military jets fly constantly over head turning just as they get over me.  I figure this mountain must be part of a practice bombing run from the local base.  I want to make a marathon today so I pass the campsite at a water source, which just like last night is a good spot to camp 26.1 miles into my day. 

Passing this site forces me to hike into the night.  The ground on the ridge I walk is mostly made of boulders but there is some dirt to be found.  I find a spot below a pine tree that has seen use before, and set up before nine thirty.  That's the way it usually is, I walk till dark, turn on my headlamp, and keep going until a good spot appears.  This style let's me use the whole day.

For the second time on the trail, a chorus of yips, yowls, and howls erupt nearbye, and I have the luxury of letting the coyote's sing me to sleep.

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July 6, 2011

Start:  1162. Camp in the woods.
End:   1174. Lickdale, Pa.
Total:   12 miles

I sleep in late today.  I decide when my 5:30 alarm goes off that I need to bathe, and try to keep my increasingly worsening heat rash from getting infected.  It's been two weeks since my last shower 315 miles ago.  I sleep till eight.

It's only twelve miles to town and my food is almost gone.  The Truckers Luv It pills get my feet flying.  The energy from them and the extra two and a half hours of sleep have me feeling great.  My pack can't get lighter and I fly down flat trail to Swatara Gap where I unsuccessfully hitch PA 72 to Lickdale, Pa. before deciding to walk the two miles in.  Half way in though, a car pulls up along side me and tells me to hop in.  How can I refuse?  The driver, Dave is a Appalachian Trail hiker who I believe thru hiked before, or at least did big sections.  Today he is dayhiking, a style he is practicing now.  Do another thru man, have you heard of the Pacific Crest Trail try that do something new.

The Days Inn sells me a room, and I get to business off the bat, a large M&M Blizzard from DQ.  Then it's laundry in the sink, there's a washer here, but I don't want to pay an ATM fee to get cash out for it.  I find myself watching Anthony Bourdain, and hunger pains hit, so I go to Wendy's for a triple quarter pounded meal, and Frosty.  After that I walk over to a truck stop store to resupply for the next seventy five miles.  The Truck stop has a McDonald's so I get four McDoble's for the evening.

Back at the hotel I watch the Cubs lose to the Washington Nationals, whoever they are, eat two McDoble's and plan on doing homework.

Happy Fourth of July!

July 4, 2011

Start:  1111.4 South side of Cumberland Valley.
End:   1134.6 Ridge just pass side trail to Cove mtn.  shelter.
Total:   23.2

Last night it barely rained, and I stayed very dry, my bag was soaked with sweat though when I woke up.   Also, a friendly frog came by to visit with me.  Walking around then hanging just outside my tent screen, chilling with me.  A spider really liked my shoes, umbrella and tent too.  Miss spider, decided to make a huge thick web around all of them.  She hates me now.

I want to hit the buffet at the Allenbury Playhouse, that I saw in my guidebook last night, early.  Then charge my phone, and engorge my belly to a whole new level of full.  Then use that to fuel me throughout the day. 

I make it to the backpacker campsite side trail, surrounded by farms, in twenty quick minutes after a pleasant though shoe soaking walk down a grassy trail between fields of strange plants growing, I can't identify them, but I'll assume that they are soy plants.  Next its corn, knee high by the fourth of July.  Some is already head high.  I prepare for town just before getting to my road walk through town, and make my pack better for a restaurant by placing my stanky socks inside my pack. 

The trail passes a misty resevoir, Children's lake, just after the ruins of another old furnace.  Then the regional ATC office.  I calculate that the trail goes a half a mile further just to hit the office, and make it convenient to hit the hikers up for a donation.  If it went the logical way, down Butcher rd., it would still be on pavement, but much more convenient and sensible.  I am able to snag two breakfasts and more tp from the hiker box outside of it and get hose water though.

Allenbury Playhouse has a great breakfast for the $6.83 price.  It's a resort centered around a theater, and has a great hiker rate of $40 a room.  That's where I'm writing this entry.

Now I'm back in my tent, and it's after ten at night.  The food was great this morning and I was way to full to even hike the fifteen flat miles crossing Cumberland Valley fast.  I thought that I would fly across level trail, but to full of a belly really can slow a hiker down.  I was looking and walking rather Penguin like afterwards. 

The trail tendered between farms most of the day, never gaining more then a few dozen feet in elevation until it climbed roughly seven hundred feet out of the valley to a ridge that the guide describes as really rocky.  It is rocky, but I believe now they meant this whole mountain is just a big pile of rocks.  The trail itself is a little rocky, but not bad at all considering the scrambling that I have been occasionally required to do.

I decide to camp right after the Cove mountain shelters side trail.  The shelter itself would be a bug feast and add .4 miles round trip.  I'm happy to see a large enough spot just after, and set up camp.  I decide not to cook a meal tonight, instead I eat bagels and pepperjack cheese, which have both been in my pack since Harper's Ferry.  I have to get rid of my oldest food first, there is a resupply opportunity tomorrow in Duncannon, Pa.  There are more and louder fireworks tonight, then the last few combined.

Hiker feed. July 3

July 3, 2011

Start:  1083.8 Birch Run shelter
End:   1111.4 Cumberland Valley, 100 yds before farms.
Total:   27.6 miles.

Was there a storm last night?  I have the image of lightening and think I heard rain last night.  I slept like a rock.  Having a nice huge comfortable shelter to yourself is really a luxury.  I even sleep in, until seven.  It takes me until eight fifteen to finally leave.  I'm out of caffeine, and that is really bad.  I thought I had more Stay Awakes when I gave three away yesterday morning to my fellow on trail partiers.  Not happy fun times. 

The trail goes fast, though it is quite rocky.  I am still in a section maintained by the PATC.  I believe that I am finally understanding their approach to trail maintenance.  On trail they do extremely little to maintain the Appalachian trail, resulting in it becoming a rock patch.  However, they invest a great amount of time building and maintaining a series of remarkably nice shelters and other near trail amenities, today I will pass an Appalachian trail museum they run.  They also rent out cabins to groups near the trail.  I understand this concept, for I was in the resort biz for a while.  The PATC is a nonprofit organization, that can pay its officials whatever it wants.  Trail maintenance is profiles, actually costing a great deal.  If funds are invested into maintaining vacation rental properties and other income generating businesses like museums, then salaries can go up for the officials, and volunteers who can't make it deep into the woods can physically see the rewards of their efforts.  Plus they have nice shelters.

It's only ten when I cross a road and written in chalk on the ground is a message saying, "Hikers!  Free PATC BBQ at Pine Grove Furnace State Park Sunday July 3, 11 AM."  Now that's. good way to get a hikers attention.  I decide I should go since its on trail and free.  These PATC people are starting to grow on me. 

I arrive at the park and say hey to a group of a dozen hikers sitting on the porch of the general store eating ice cream.  The store is home to the half gallon challenge, a food challenge involving ice cream.  Though its not free if you eat it all.  I ask where's the bbq, they point, I then say something like, "why should I hang out with all you dirty hiker trash when there is free food over there."  Then head to the bbq. 

There are people lining up for food and one angry hiker is saying that these guys are all piers and the food isn't free, that we need to teach people about the trail or something in an hour.  This unnerved me so I walk away and see a PATC shifted guy who I ask, and he says, "cool you saw my sign, eat up, please help yourself."  So I do.  I eat way to much.  In an hour though a lady comes by and says, are you all ready to tell your Appalachian trail stories to the twenty hikers there.  So the angry hiker was right, the food wasn't free.  It was for me, as I am already packing up to leave.  I thank people for the food and bust outta Dodge.

The furnace the park is named after, is a huge smelter, several stories tall and made of local stone.  There are hundreds of people here, at the park celebrating the holiday weekend.  I'm on a bike path for a few miles, and quickly come to a lake and another large recreation area with families partying.  The lake would be nice to jump in, but its a little crowded.

I walk past with the goal of making it to Boiling Springs, Pa. tonight.  There is nothing there that I need, it ust seems like a good mileage destination.  Approaching Boiling Springs though, I see that there is no camping from 3.5 miles south of town until 14 miles south of town, the whole Cumberland valley.  There is one designated campsite which I assume will be surrounded by farms, in a field, a half mile south of town.  I don't want to stay there, so I set up in the forest just before the farms of the Cumberland Valley begin. 

Bored and looking ahead in my data book, I see that there is a six dollar breakfast buffet four tenths of a mile off AT leaving Boiling Springs.  I decide to hit that.  These buffet ate actually saving me money.  I get disgustingly full for eight dollars, then don't eat my more expensive trail food for most of the remainder of the day.

I can hear the sounds of two large fire works displays as I eat dinner in my tent filtering through the forest from opposite directions in the Cumberland Valley.

Mason Dixon line, double post.

July 1, 2011

Start:  1046.1 Ensign Cowall shelter, in tent
End:    1057.6 Old road bed, trail party.
Total:     12.5 miles

Last night Bluegrass music was blaring below me from homes along the road that I crossed .2 before arriving here.  Either it was a big party, or just someone jamming out to good tunes.  Thankfully my pizza has not juiced through it's box, and I choke down the three huge slices of sausage that I have left.  I pack and wander over to the shelter to be social with the guys just waking up over there.  There not in a hurry to get anywhere, so the can afford the luxury of peacefully enjoying a morning. 

My schedule is set in stone.  I need to be in class at NAU in Flagstaff at nine in the morning August 29th.  This tight schedule is forcing me to average 21.85 miles a day for one hundred days of hiking, six zero days, and a few travel days.  So far I'm ahead of tagged tight schedule by two days.  I have already taken seven zero days, including combined nearos, but have made them all up except for one by walking hard. 

I leave late, nine o'clock, but the miles whiz by.  Then the trail gets rocky.  It is more of a boulder scramble then trail.  The only way you could tell it was the Appalachian trail were the white blazes on the trees.  It's amazing that some areas of the trail are built well, then other areas were never even constructed in the first place.  They become more like scrambling.

When I cross into Pennsylvania, I also cross the Mason Dixon line.  This line which separated North from South, I believe, also was the northern boundary of slavery.

I tell myself that I will not go to the Chinese Buffet in Waynesboro, Pa., but I'm hungry when I get to the road crossing plus the temperature is already ninety and climbing.  After a few very hot minutes a car turns around, that pas sed, and drives me straight to the Old City Buffet where I stay nearly four hours.  I use this time not only to practice for the competitive eating circuit, but also to do homework and email it in for my summer's Practicum at NAU.

My fortune, "You are coming into your own power - enjoy."

I hitch back to the trail and see Sky High and friends setting up camp early I chill with them for a while, full in buffet, before realizing that I have to make more miles.  I climb over a six hundred foot hill then descending, here some girls yelling at me to come over.  I say, "I have to make miles."  Then a guy yells, "we have Whiskey."  Now they were speaking ky language.  The girls, Guinea, and Shag Bark are sobo doing a twelve hundred mile section.  The guy is Jesus, a nobo. 

Needless to say, I made no more miles.  Tue four of us killed the bottle, and tried really hqrd not to burn down the forest with the three dollar brick of spinny fire works I bought today.  We would through a string, then go running around like wild men stamping out all the burning forest debris.



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July 2, 2011

Start:  1057.6 Old road bed.
End:   1083.8 Birch Run shelter
Total:     26.2 miles

Today was another late start day.  The two girls got up and went to get us all more water before six.  Jesus and I didn't muster till seven, when we were surprised with fresh pumped water.  An awesome treat when everyone is out.  Jesus almost decided to go sobo with them, even leaving, but returned fifteen minutes later.  I was talking to Red Stripe who had just completed the four state challenge.   This forty two mile challenge takes you through the states of Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, across the Mason Dixon Line and into Pennsylvania.  Jesus returned, and I was perplexed at why he would turn around and go sobo for a girl.  The two girls were probably a little confused as well when he announced that he was going to hike south with them, I definitely was.

Today is hot, but the trail is flat.  I only lake a marathon, but spend time socializing with other hikers along the way.  I even take an hour break at Caledonia state park with Spicoli and Jesus.   I eat mac n' cheese that Spicoli made and doesn't want.  Then we lighten my pack blowing off the remaining, pathetically weak fireworks.  We wonder if a large family gathering consisting of forty people with hate tatoos, recreating in a Ramadan nearby would feed us if we went over there and yelled, "white power" every time we threw a fire cracker. 

None of us go to the large swimming pool at the park.  For five dollars entrance, just the opportunity to shower and do laundry would be worth it, yet alone, use the water slide.  After a much to long break, I speed down flat trail and make a marathon to a rather large, very clean, new, and empty shelter.  I wasn't going to stop until dark, but the opportunity to get a shelter to myself cannot be passed.  Dinner is Beef flavored Ramen and instant potatoes, while the thunderous booms of distant fireworks displays, rock the night.