I come to bury scrubhiker.blogspot.com, not to praise him

Dear reader,

I have recently migrated all Blogger-based journal entries over to a new website, with a better-organized design and the possibility for a little more expansion. Everything with the old URL should now redirect to the new one: http://www.scrubhiker.com.

If you were one of the wretched, ennui-stricken souls who subscribed to this blog's feed in the past, I've made it very easy to subscribe to the new one, but your current subscription won't cross over.

RIP scrubhiker.blogspot.com.

- Scrub

Day 23: Sunday, September 7

Finished the AT today at Katahdin (AT mi 2181.0*), walked 10.4 miles today

Woke up in the dark at 4:30 and by 5 had gotten all packed up and made my way down the street to the cafe. The early-bird crowd was me, some old Mainer guys who I got the sense were regulars at that hour, and a family of four who looked like they might be hiking. After discerning that they were indeed hiking, and that they were going up Katahdin via the Hunt Trail/AT, same as me, they were kind enough to offer me a ride into the park. They were Tyler and Nicki and their two kids, Jensen and (ahh I forget the boy's name, sorry dude, I know you're probably reading this), they were from downeast Maine, and they were total rockstars. We got to the trailhead around 6:45, along with a few dozen other people--7 a.m. is the cutoff for the parking lot so it creates a herd of day-hikers leaving at the same time--at which point the car thermometer only read 44 degrees. 

Left them and got going by 7:00 for the climb, 5.2 miles and 4150 feet of elevation gain, most of which is squeezed into the middle 3 miles. Passed most people in the first hour, though I was passed three times myself by thru-hikers going absurdly fast, each with focus etched into their faces and a disinclination to make conversation. The middle three miles, the ones with all the action, were a ton of fun, especially once the trail got above treeline. All of a sudden it got Arctically cold and dry-windy--I was freezing my ass off despite exerting myself uphill and in my rain jacket, hood cinched up so I could barely see, and tights--and the hike stopped becoming a hike and turned into a full-body boulder scramble for about an hour. The weather could not have been clearer and sharper, or the vistas greener and bluer, and I was alone for most of this time. Eventually I reached the false summit, called the Gateway, which I was wise to already from the maps, then enjoyed a calm final mile and a half over the flatter rocky alpine zone called the Tableland. Made the real summit just before 10 and there were only six people there: a thru-hiker, a dude named Richard from Utah, and four yuppie types. Only one of the latter responded to my request for assistance in taking a summit photo; she took just one, then silently handed my phone back to me and went back to smoking pot with her friends. Luckily, Richard was more alert to the personal significance of the moment and helped me get many more pictures. He and I talked for a few minutes, more people started trickling in, including Dortmund Joe and Eastwood, and by that point I was cold and it was time to get down, as I had nothing more to do or say to anyone up there. 

I really felt immense happiness when I first got to the summit and the sign and I just plopped down leaning against it, as I'd always imagined I'd do; I don't remember nearly the same intensity of feeling getting to the monument at the end of the PCT. But the PCT happened more quickly, cleanly and confidently for me than the AT, which was stretched over three years during which I couldn't say to myself or anyone else that I'd hiked the whole thing, only part of it. I'd spent a lot more time visualizing the final moment when I'd get to the Katahdin sign than I had with the PCT monument, and a lot more time wondering how long I'd have to wait for it to happen. So to get up there on a perfect day, after a really enjoyable time in the 100 Mile Wilderness, with all aspects of planning pragmatically executed (and I get perhaps inordinately self-satisfied with the last one), left me quite chuffed. I stuck around on the summit as long as the warm glow lasted, but as soon as that was gone I knew there was no need to drag out my time and I had a practical concern to attend to, namely figuring out how to get 240 miles south by the evening.

Enter Eric and Laura, a couple I had overheard on the summit saying they were driving back to Boston today; I passed them on the descent and asked if I couldn't accompany them as far as Portland. Much like with the family I asked this morning, they agreed with no hesitation, and later refused gas money. Ended up getting back to the trailhead about ten minutes before them--descending through the rock scrambles was just as fun as coming up, although my knees were starting to hurt. They/I took off for the south lands right away, stopping only so I could get a bite to eat at the WacArnold's on the way out of Millinocket. Three hours later I was being dropped off at a Starbucks in Falmouth, near Portland, and a pumpkin-spiced hour after that A-GAME and her man Steve completed the handoff by picking me up there in their car and taking me to their place on the east side of Portland. After a fine home-cooked veggie pasta meal and a lot of conversation, we were all pretty well whupped--they'd had a ridiculously busy weekend and I'd been up since before dawn--so that was that and I repaired to my futon, where I will sleep like a fat lion tonight. Hiking is now over for the time being and the journal will stop being regular, but I plan to significantly update the rest of the webpage and keep the blog more alive than dead over the winter months. Especially if I give in to Carrot, Spark &co. and make moves toward the CDT next year. Ttfn. 

*All my mileage figures have been from the 2011 AT Guide by AWOL. I think the official total mileage of the trail in 2015 is 2185 or something like that. Regardless of the big numbers, I'm confident I got the small numbers, i.e. how far I walked each day between points, right the whole time.

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Days 21 and 22: Friday, September 5 and Saturday, September 6

Both days slept at the AT Lodge in Millinocket, ME (left AT at mi 2175.8 at Katahdin Stream CG), walked 11.6 miles Friday and 0 Saturday

Woke up on Friday, at first around 5:45, to a decent enough sunrise in the vicinity of Katahdin, though I never got a good photo of it. Snoozed until seven and got walking at 7:30, hiking downhill for a few miles to Hurd Brook; on the way, I met a fellow named Mouse who had just finished his Triple Crown with a CDT NOBO and is now topping off with a "victory lap," an AT SOBO in the same year. Told him I'd put him in touch with Carrot, who wants to do the same CDT-AT meal deal next year. After Hurd Brook the trail rolled a few miles through the forest until popping out at Abol Bridge and the end of the "Wilderness." This turned out to be an arrestingly ugly place, with log trucks and men in very large pickup trucks being the main users of the dusty roadway. There was a store there and an adjacent restaurant, but the restaurant failed to open at 11am as promised because the one cook had apparently cleaned out his trailer and left overnight without telling anyone, and the other employees were just piecing together the facts now. Decided not to bother them by demanding service, as they had quite a pickle on their hands, and ended up hiking on at about 11:30. Also in the Abol Bridge store we (the Swiss and Siesta and I) saw our first weather forecast in five days, and it had become significantly more pessimistic for Saturday--rain, storms, hail, wind, destruction, weeping, gnashing of teeth and what have you.

Partly because of this forecast and partly because I was tired of encountering other people and having the same freaking conversation over and over again ("Yes I'm about to finish the trail. No I did not come all the way from Georgia this year. My injury in 2011 was a stress fracture. I'm from Oregon but not Portland but I grew up in Virginia and went to school in Minnesota. Yep, I guess you could say I'm from all over!" Etc.), I decided to take a shorter, less-used route to the Katahdin Stream Campground via the Blueberry Ledges trail, which turned out to be very shitty and claustrophobic and unrewarding, and a huge error in judgment on my part in general. The AT would've taken me about two hours longer, but I thought it might be best to get to KSC early to confirm the forecast and make a decision about whether to attempt a summit the next day and give myself time to get to town. That all turned out to be unnecessary; I did get there by 1:30 and decide to put off the Katahdin climb by a day--a decision I'm fine with, no point in climbing up there and having my picture made in horrendous weather--but I could have just as easily made that call at 3:30pm. 

Regardless, I got a ride into Millinocket, about 20 miles away, with the AT Lodge hostel shuttle around 4 and chose to settle in here for the next two nights. It's quite a thorough and tidy place, and almost no hikers were around on Friday, meaning I had the communal bunkroom utterly to myself; one of the few hikers that were here was Guthook, he of the trail-app fame. He and I and a few others went out to dinner at the AT Cafe (you may spot a theme in the names of businesses in Millinocket), where I put on an absolute clinic, inhaling a Baxter Peak-sized portion of chicken Parmesan and mozzarella sticks and eliciting comment from some of the seasoned hikers around me by the sheer voracity of my efforts. After that it was off to bed, and Saturday, today, was a fairly nondescript zero day. I ate twice more at the Cafe, lunching with a Brit named Overhaul who used to sell very expensive jewelry on cruise ships and next wants to open a restaurant chain that serves crickets and call it Stumps (the domain name stumpys.com apparently already belongs to a fetish site for amputee porn, otherwise that would be his business name), and later supping with the Swiss couple and Siesta. They successfully summited Katahdin this morning, but it was in heavy fog and then they were chased off the mountain by storms which they just barely avoided before they caught a ride into town. They and I and another successful thru-hiker, Toasted Toad, hit up the bahhhs--or, more accurately, the one bahhh in Millinocket, the Blue Ox Saloon--after dinner, which was at like 6:00. I didn't want to make a spectacle out of it, because I do have to get up at 4:30 tomorrow morning and make a very steep climb of a very important mountain, but it was great to hang out with them. I found out that Swiss Miss spent a year as a high school exchange student in Yakima, Washington, of all places, going to the "ghetto school" there, which certainly sounded like a character-building experience. There was a hint of post-trail blues setting in already, but for the most part everyone was happy, and the owner was kind enough to take care of a few drinks for all the finishers. I left early and came back to the hostel, making a little more conversation with Overhaul and a different hiker who was a former trucker (I've long noticed that there is absolutely a thru-hiker/trucker crossover or common bond, maybe I'll flesh that idea out more later). Then bed. Tomorrow morning: hitch out extremely early, climb Katahdin, get down from Katahdin, start hitching again and with any luck end up in the evening in Portland, Maine with A-GAME. Should be a rare old day.

More pictures on Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/scrubhiker

Day 20: Thursday, September 4

Cowboy camping (whatttt?) on the Rainbow Ledges looking right at Katahdin (AT mi 2160.0), walked 22.8 miles today

Slept a little too well on my soft spongy flat tent spot and got a late and groggy start around 7:45. After three miles, got to the stunningly beautiful Nahmakanta Lake shore, deep in the heart of northern Maine's Hundred Mile Wilderness, to find ... a man in flip-flops walking his golden retriever. We've seen day hikers every day out here in the "wilderness"--a wilderness with suspiciously regular road access--and today was no exception. Also at the beach saw, for the first time, section hikers Ross and his Czech girlfriend whose name I never got (although Czech Mate sounds like the obvious trail name), whom I interacted with quite a bit later. Ross is on a mission to climb all 50 state highest peaks and is 70% of the way there, soon to be 72%, at the tender age of 29, and seemed to share similar interests to me regarding long-distance overland travel around the United States.

Took my first break at the Wadleigh shelter, where there was a memorial to Buffalo Bobby, a 2011 thru-hiker that I had known back in Tennessee and Virginia who died of a stroke not far from that shelter, only 38 miles from finishing his thru-hike in 2011. The trail bounced around most of the day after that, never making its mind up on whether to be flat, steep, rocky, muddy, clear, foresty, rivery, lakey or what. It was hard to get into a rhythm, so music helped ... I found myself recalling in particular the opening lines to Madonna's "Like a Virgin"--"I made it through the wilderness, somehow I made it through-ooh-oohhh"--so that ended up on today's playlist. The weather was impeccable the whole day and the vibes were positive; about six miles in was a stunner of a view of Katahdin from the top of Mt. Nesuntabunt, where I and about ten other people at one point stopped to take a break and have photos taken.

The only thing that cramped my style was my second golden retriever sighting of the day (that's golden retrievers two, moose zero for those keeping track); this one belonged to some fanny-pack-bedecked day hikers and seemed to think I was a bear, so he ran a away from me first and then panicked and barked barked barked inconsolably for a minute or two. It seems like such a small thing but it's so ... annoying to have it happen when you think you've finally made it to the part of the trail that's a little inaccessible, a backpackers-only special zone. But it turns out that there's *nowhere* on the AT that's actually remote enough to keep out the fanny pack golden retriever people, even the most northern reaches of Maine. And by the way, I still haven't had to dig a cat-hole to poop in this year, and I'm coming up on 400 miles. The slogan "a footpath for those who seek fellowship with the wilderness" rings a little hollow when one can walk 400 miles of said footpath and not have to crap in the ground.

/rant. The day concluded spectacularly, with a solo climb up to here, the Rainbow Ledges, an area with oddly sparse vegetation, the apparent effect of a forest fire from 1923 (recovery doesn't happen quickly). There are views all around, and I found a little window to the northeast looking straight at Katahdin, and a flat-ish spot to lay my groundsheet and pad out on. The sky is completely clear and the bugs as absent as they will ever be on the AT--not completely absent, but I can almost pretend they are--so I made the bold move of cowboy camping. My backup plan, should the situation suddenly turn wet, is to pack up and hike like hell through the dark a mile or so til I can find a decent tent site. But in the meantime, I will enjoy looking at the big fella, Mr. Katahdin, and in the morning I should be able to watch the sun rise about 60 degrees to the right of it. Not a bad way to spend my last night of real camping on the AT (tomorrow at Katahdin Stream CG won't count). Tomorrow morning it's six miles down to Abol Bridge and the end of the "wilderness" (and the return of restaurant food), then a quick ten more to the base of Katahdin and camp for the night.

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Day 19: Wednesday, September 3

Tenting at the Nahmakanta Stream Campsite (AT mi 2137.2), walked 24.0 miles today

Slept rather miserably in the shelter last night due to rain, snoring from a mystery person to my left, general stress and a restless brain. I've become such an old man now and can't sleep in the shelters with the kids, even when it's not packed in like sardines (last night there were only five on an eight-man platform); the PCT gave me too much time with solitary tenting or cowboying on soft ground, and now that's the only thing that works for me. Woke up for good at 6:20 and decided the hell with it, got hiking by seven. Literally the only climb of the day happened in the first three miles, a tame 500-footer up Little Boardman Mountain, and afterwards the trail was the smoothest of sailing. With the exception of a few muddy rocky sections at various points, I essentially strolled the whole day and walked the 24 miles with a minimum of fuss--a very rare luxury on the AT. 

My main goal, my only goal for the day, the only thing I cared about in the world, was to get cleaned up, and more specifically get my clothes washed in some body of water and set out to dry in the sun. If I had walked only two miles today but accomplished that, I would've been happy, because putting on my soaking wet sweat-saturated and chafe-inducing clothes this morning for the third morning in a row was one of the worst feelings I've ever had while hiking, a perfect example of the mental game being tougher than the physical game. Ended up getting the chance to clean everything out twice, first in the morning at the Cooper Brook shelter, which had a fine but slightly river-funky-smelling swimming hole directly in front of it, the second at Jo-Mary Lake, where I found a paradisical beach in the afternoon sun. Both times I went in for a swim that felt utterly orgasmic, and was able to get enough sun on the clothes that they got _kind of_ dry after 45 minutes lying out; had to settle for that upon realizing that in Maine I'll never really get the cardboard, tortilla-chip kind of dryness that you get if you try to dry your gear out out West.

Walked alone the whole day while constantly leapfrogging the Swiss couple and Siesta; they ended up camping with me here along with Dortmund Joe, who lit out early and whom we never saw until the end of the day. They may end up as my Katahdin summit-mates, although the foreigners aren't sure if they want to summit Saturday or Sunday, while I'll almost certainly go up Saturday regardless. Today the trail was so benign and sun-dappled and cool and breezy that it was hard to see it as anything other than nature rolling out the red carpet as we move toward Katahdin. In the evening we got our first view of it, from across a minor lake, and it's quite an impressive massif. It didn't seem very far away. If I ever do the CDT and do it northbound, I'll be able to comment on Katahdin's merit as a trail terminus vis-a-vis Waterton Lake--those two seem to be in the running for the title of Most Awesome Way to End a Long-Distance Hike--but I have a suspicion that Katahdin wins. Something about ending on top of a mountain, one with such a good history--Thoreau losing his composure and all but yelling "What is this Titan that has possession of me? Who are we? WHAT are we?"--upon climbing it. I probably won't be doing the same on this blog, but who knows ... It could knock me for a loop just like it did for him. We'll see on Saturday.

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Day 18: Tuesday, September 2

In the East Branch Lean-to (AT mi 2113.2), walked 16.3 miles today

Got hiking a little after eight and was immediately forced into a treacherous ford of the ankle-deep West Fork of the Pleasant River. Having survived by the skin of my toes, I was rewarded with some cheap miles after that--four of them in an hour and a half on a clear, well-graded trail! Incredible. Still managed to sweat a ridiculous amount despite the relative ease of the trail, to the point where my clothes were all wetted out; this ended up causing big problems with chafe later in the day once it had cooled down. After the four easy miles came the six that looked brutal on the elevation profile, up and over four different peaks in the White Cap range, but they did not have the same degree of difficulty as yesterday's ascents and descents. Part of that was due to unbelievably good trail-building, with hundreds of rock steps on each peak ... I thought back to how hard a single rock step was to build on Konnarock Crew in 2007 and was very impressed, especially considering the remoteness of all this area.

After the first of the four peaks, clouds took over and socked in everything, leading to a sensation I realized I only remembered from New Hampshire and Maine on the AT in 2011--that of being on a mountain in a cloud, in really dark dense forest of short spruce trees, and hearing the wind whoosh around but not make much noise since it doesn't have leaves to catch hold of and rustle. It's a hard sensation to describe, or explain why it's special, but it's distinct and I'd forgotten all about it until now. The being-in-a-cloud also meant that everything, pack clothes and skin, got cold and thoroughly damp, and I stopped sweating, so the chafing really started to kick in at this point. My armpits even chafed, which has never happened before, ever. The views from the top of White Cap, allegedly stunning on a clear day, looked about like the picture below. I could not see Katahdin, as had been promised to me in my LYING, FULL OF SHIT guidebook.

Came down from White Cap to the Logan Brook Lean-to, where I spent a long break chit-chatting with all sorts of people, the usual suspects from the past few days plus some SOBOs, and two NOBOs named Captain Rico and Yote who caught up and will soon overtake us. No one northbound was headed past the next shelter, three miles on, so I walked most of that at an amble with the German Dortmund guy, whose trail name I learned today is Joe (because apparently no one in this country can pronounce Joachim, his real name). We talked about soccer some more. Got to the shelter around 5:30 to find the nearby grounds overrun with college freshmen on an orientation trip from a school in Portland, Maine. Awwright awright awright! The hiker trash took over the shelter itself--the crowd is me, the Swiss couple (Swiss Miss and Nobody), Siesta, Yote and Captain Rico. Thunderstorms are imminent, but again it barely rained on us hiking during the day. Tomorrow the terrain gets much much easier and I'll try to hike somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 miles.

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Day 17: Monday, September 1

Tenting by the West Foahhk of the Pleasant River (local pronunciation) (AT mi 2096.9), walked 15.3 miles today plus about .8 extra for water at one point

Got hiking around 8am after a great night's sleep and the first climb, a little blood-circulator that gained 1,000 feet in less than a mile, swiftly brought me to the conclusion that I couldn't hike 21 miles today like I'd been planning. Other climbs and descents in the next few miles bore that point out even further, but I didn't worry about it and set a more modest goal, this riverside camp, which still ended up taking me all day to make. The terrain was extremely challenging and the hiking laborious, appropriate for the holiday. Still, everything stayed just as beautiful as yesterday and I was in a great mood the whole time.

Took two breaks today that have to go down as all-time classics, shoe-ins to the Hiking Breaks Hall of Fame--the first at Cloud Pond Lean-To and the second on (stay with me here) Third Mountain. The one at Cloud Pond was born out of necessity, since it was the only water source for miles and my Moxie bottles were getting empty, so I made the trek .4 miles off-trail. Once I saw the pond I was extremely grateful I'd gone, because it was a pristine north-woods affair, with some ideally situated rocks for reclining and relaxing and gazing at the lake, and only me to enjoy it (presumably the distance off-trail scared other hikers away from stopping). I spent about 45 minutes there lazily munching Snyder's flavored pretzel bites and finally moved on to continue the parade of brutal ups and downs that was the trail today. Got rained on with medium intensity shortly thereafter, enough to scare me into battening down all hatches and covering my pack up, but it only lasted ten minutes and that was it for the day; more had been forecast but we escaped yet again. In fact, this whole AT experience this year has been surprisingly free of rain--I realized that in the mid-Atlantic section it never rained on me once while I was hiking, only at night, for 15 days. That's unheard of on the AT. 

The second break, on Third Mountain, was gloriously unplanned and happened when I stumbled upon a panoramic view just as the sun was coming out. Thunderstorms were off in the distance--I got cell service and Instagrammed a picture of it--but I was able to sit in full sun for a half-hour straight and dry everything off and eat a bunch of cheese. It was important to dry my hiking shirt off because I've sweated an unholy amount in it, especially today, and it's starting to fall apart already, being made of tender merino wool. Today I sweated so much that the pinholes at the bottom of the back panel of my pack started to let in sweat and it ended up pooling at the bottom of the inside of the pack, which I only discovered to my disgust (things *inside* the pack being soaked with my own sweat) at the end of the day. That never happened once on the PCT, or in the mid-Atlantic of the AT this year, with the same pack and same pinholes.

A thru-hiker named Siesta (not the most original trail name; I've now met four in the past two years) caught me up towards the end of the day and he and I walked and talked for a bit before he outran me. Even though I feel strong, I don't have true thru-hiker speed yet and won't have time to build it up this year. He ended up camping in the same spot, as did most of the other crew from yesterday--the Swiss couple, the German Dortmunder guy, and Eastwood. They all started out ahead of me intending to go 21 miles but, like me, were cowed by the incredible difficulty of today's trail and decided to end well short. I have no idea how anyone, like Shorts from the PCT who tried to set a speed record out here SOBO this year, hikes 30+ miles per day in this terrain. It seems physically impossible to me. Everything else about speed-hikers' pace seems feasible, like once I'm in good hiking shape I could keep up with them for at least one day or part of one day, but not 30 miles over this. I would collapse after half a mile at that pace.

Tomorrow is a 16-18 mile day, and then the terrain finally eases up and we're into the promised land, the much kinder second half of the 100 Mile Wilderness.

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Day 16: Sunday, August 31

Tenting near the Long Pond Stream Lean-To (AT mi 2081.6), walked 18.6 miles today

Slept in my tent in the side yard of Shaw's, as I had done three years ago, for the same reason as then, which is that it seemed a lot more restful than the bunkroom. Proved to be true: slept great and the first time I woke up was at 6:30am, just in time for breakfast at 7. Filled up on the standard breakfast foods while talking to my tablemates, a trio of 50-something south-Georgia-born siblings who are out to do part of the 100 Mile Wilderness. The brother has lots of backpacking under his belt, including an AT thru-hike and some adventures in Alaska, while his two sisters have zero. None of them look physically fit for backpacking, and the brother seemed just a bit imperious with his own expertise; they are heading southbound so I will no doubt run into them in a few days and see if they have injured themselves or one another yet.

Got a ride out from Shaw's to the old AT trailhead on Pleasant St., from whence I'd departed the trail for good in 2011, with Dawn the owner and Eastwood, the hiker I'd met and dined with last night. This saved two miles of non-trail that I'd assumed I'd have to walk this morning, which is good, because the 18 miles I did do took all freaking day. Right away the vast differences between the PA trail I'd just left and the Maine trail were apparent: it looks and smells deliciously sprucey; there are great water sources every mile or two; the trail is not especially rocky but definitely very rooty, although everything that isn't exposed tree roots is spongy soft organic matter; there are lakes and ponds everywhere, and north country lakes get me all hot and bothered, so I was really excited all day; and every now and then, unseen from one of said lakes, a loon would call out over the still Maine woods. Loons also get me hot and bothered. It was quite a day.

The trail was very crowded with hikers going both directions; not even counting the gaggle of day-hiking ladies I saw right after starting, there might have been two dozen other people I encountered today. The trail was slow going, but I didn't mind and no one else seemed to either because it was so wild and tranquil and north-woodsy, not just miles of fucking shit like Pennsylvania. Only took two substantial breaks, one at each intermediate shelter, after six then thirteen miles respectively. Met several NOBO thru-hikers who are finishing up and are for now on the same hiking schedule as me: Swiss Miss and Nobody, a young Swiss couple; the aforementioned Eastwood; Speedo and Grunt, an Alabaman couple who like me are finally finishing the trail after a failed thru-hike bid in 2011; and a German middle-aged banker whose name I haven't caught, but he and I talked about soccer for about two hours straight ... He is, first and foremost, a HUGE Borussia Dortmund fan and he was telling me about American prospects in the BvB youth academy that I've never even heard of. That and many other soccer-related things; I got the sense he hadn't met too many people on the trail with whom he could talk about the sport in much detail. I know I haven't met those people very often either, and when I do I tend to blurt soccer things at them nonstop until they come up with some excuse to stop "for a second" and ditch me completely.

The miles, as mentioned, took the full day from 8:15am to almost 7pm, by which point it was getting twilighty. The shelter seemed full and I wanted some quiet time, so I tented off away from it by myself, which I'm more comfortable with the routine of anyway (after the PCT). Tomorrow is a big test day, ideally a full 21 miles over some large elevation gains and uncertain trail to the Carl Newhall Lean-To. If it works out, I'm in better shape to climb Katahdin in the beautiful forecasted weather on Friday; if not, I'll readjust and aim for Saturday. Not a huge problem to have to spend an extra day out here.

More pictures on Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/scrubhiker

This sign means absolutely nothing in 2014

Friday, August 29 and Saturday, August 30

Walked a big fat ZERO miles

My dad came to pick me up from the Hamburg Microtel on Friday morning, fresh off his own personal pilgrimage to the Martin guitar factory in Nazareth, then he and I took one more quick tour of the Cabela's before leaving town. Via Swarthmore, where we lunched, he got me to the Philly airport around 12:30 whereupon I wrote emails and played a lot of backgammon on my phone and then departed for Portland, ME at 4. When I landed, Coyote (from the AT in 2011, a lifelong Mainer), picked me up and took me to his house in central Maine. Spent a fairly raucous evening with him and his family in Jay, eating a lot of good food and drinking Shipyard Pumpkinhead and shooting the shit around the fire. Coyote and his family are good people, fantastic people, and they also live in a completely different world from mine and I was extremely thankful to have experienced all of those things. 

Stayed on the couch in his pad, which he shares with his girlfriend Bri, for the night and in the morning we got a champion's breakfast at the Mill St. Cafe in Jay before setting out for Monson, maybe two hours away. On the way, I got a personal tour of a part of the country that I'd probably never visit otherwise, and that few people besides the locals and the more adventurous set of Boston tourists probably ever do. We talked a lot about Maine, and the trail, and Coyote wanting to do the PCT sometime. When we finally got to Shaw's in Monson we were both in more than a little disbelief, happy disbelief. For me, it was another "How the hell did I actually end up back here?" moment; Coyote texted me later and said standing at Shaw's he realized exactly how much he missed the trail. He started talking to Dawn, the proprietress, who remembered him and Bronza and Fishhead and their bizarre conclusion to their 2011 hike, which revolved around Fishhead quitting after 2000+ miles in Caratunk because his girlfriend back in Michigan had waited until then to dump him (and now they're getting married this coming week). We posed for some pictures in front of the building and then that was that; Coyote went back to Jay to work in the evening, I set about killing an afternoon and meeting hikers, even though there are only about a half-dozen around, much fewer than I was expecting at this time of the thru-hiking season. Three of us did trek over to an outstanding barbecue dinner at what must be a newish place in Monson, then I came back and set up my tent and reorganized/thinned down my food bag (bought a little too much on a grocery run earlier today). That brings us to now, writing this in the Shaw's common room. Tomorrow morning, the well-known Shaw's breakfast and then out into the Wilderness. 

Side thought: Maine, even the more decrepit areas, is a place that has left such an overwhelmingly positive impression on me that it can almost do no wrong now. I have had universally good experiences in Maine with Maine people. I will have a residence either here or on the North Shore of Minnesota one day. 

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Day 15: Thursday, August 28

At the infamous Microtel in Hamburg, PA (left AT at SOBO mi 971.7), walked 18.0 miles today

As expected, there was serious rain not long after going to sleep last night, but the storm system apparently brought much colder temperatures in its wake, because we were cold waking up and cold walking the first few miles in the morning. Couldn't have been more than 55 degrees; it was also breezy and thus very autumnal-feeling. My legs, after yesterday's failure at pacing, could proverbially have had a fork stuck in them--they were done, and I was mentally done with the shittastic rocky trail, to the point where I proclaimed in the first shelter register I came across that four of the previous miles were "unquestionably the shittiest of the 2185." Probably not the proudest thing I've ever written in one of those books, but I was not a happy hiker for most of today. All I wanted to do was _walk_, have some kind of peaceful consistent stroll on my last day of non-Maine AT, and the trail wouldn't allow it. I had to skip, jump, slip, hoist, roll my ankle five more times, etc. I actually have a blister on my right foot now, the first one in 4500 miles. Thank you, mid-Atlantic Appalachian Trail.

Took a really nice break after 7.5 miles (three hours of nonstop hiking, i.e. really slow) at the Eckville Shelter, which is in someone's backyard, then about three and a half trail miles later noticed a shortcut in the guidebook, which I took. Had a feeling that there wouldn't be much reward in staying on the white-blazed AT, which was on a gravel ATV/snowmobile track through dense woods for about five miles; at the end of the day I talked to Princess, who had been well behind me and followed the white blazes, and she concurred and wished she'd taken the shortcut instead. Even now, lying in a hotel bed and not in a bad mood at all, it's hard to see the point in sticking to the pure trail in that environment when you have faster alternatives. It really is pretty goddamn worthless. At any rate, the shortcut saved me about four miles and was a nice mental boost. The last five miles, back on the real AT, shouldn't have been a breeze (they were rocky and steep) but they were because I had my headphones in, was ahead of schedule thanks to the shortcut, and was in general feeling much better about everything.

Got to the road in Port Clinton around 4:30pm and after about 10 minutes was given a ride to the Cabela's in Hamburg by local hero Chris (such a euphonious name). Even though I knew what was coming, having been in there with Perro three years ago, I was still taken aback by how enormous and excessive it is, and how many mounted animals there are in that store. It's in the hundreds, not the dozens. I didn't actually need anything in Cabela's, I just wanted to reminisce a bit--in 2011 Perro and I were given a ride there on a very rainy day, looking like drowned rats, with me on my stress-fractured leg, and then the AYCE buffet upstairs really did seem like a promised land, albeit a weird one with things like the 11th-largest polar bear ever shot standing nearby. Walking over from Cabela's to the Microtel--taking 20 minutes because of the pedestrian-unfriendliness of the whole megaplex--also brought back memories from three years back, namely of me being unable to walk more than a minute or so on pavement without a break. The front desk of the hotel still had me on file as a returning customer from then. Got set up in a decent room, cleaned up, did laundry, then headed over to the Taco Bell once I had a text from Princess saying she'd reached the highway, figuring that she'd ask to be dropped off South of the Border by whomever she ended up hitching with. That was correct, and we rendezvoused over Cool Ranch Doritos Locos Supremes (I'd never had a Dorito Loco before, and now I see what all the fuss is about). Then her boyfriend, Brian, showed up, having driven up from DC, and I retired to my room at the hotel. After an hour or two messing with the blog and the internet and whatnot, I got a very unexpected phone call from Mr. Perro himself. He a) couldn't believe that I was finishing out the AT and back in the fuckin' Hamburg Microtel--to be honest, I barely could either--and b) expressed some interest in flying up to Maine from NC next weekend to climb Katahdin with me and maybe go camping with A-GAME (2011 AT friend of ours who lives in Maine now) afterward. I said fuck yeah to both, and now maybe that's going to be a thing.

The length and looseness of this post should be an indicator that this is a different type of day for me. I was very tired of the trail at the beginning--more upset with it than I've ever been at any point on the AT, never mind the PCT which I love almost unconditionally and simply didn't have bad days on. And once I got to town, I also had a whole bunch of strong and kind of funny memories of how utterly miserable it was when I was here before. This highway megaplex in Hamburg really is an odd place to be making a triumphant personal return to, since it has absolutely nothing to do with the trail and is in fact pretty antithetical to the aesthetic of the trail, just happens to be a mile or so from it. But I'm here now, I'm calling the shots instead of a dumb broken leg, and now I'm about to fly up to Maine and finish the AT beeyotch! That's about all I have to say now. Two days of transit, and then the Hundred Mile Wilderness begins. 

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Day 14: Wednesday, August 27

In the Allentown Hiking Club Shelter (AT SOBO mi 949.4), walked 20.7 miles today

Woke up around 6:30 and was walking by 7:10, waiting for Princess because we both knew I needed her for the hitch to Walnutport in a few miles. Whatever horrible environmental things they did to the Superfund hill to get it mostly devoid of trees, I'm not complaining (kind of like how wildfires out West, even though they suck, make for dramatically and eerily lit photos sometimes), because the views down into the fog bowl of the Lehigh Valley were prime. We got to watch the fog burn off over an hour or so, then it was time for the fun stuff--the ridiculous boulder scramble at the top of the Lehigh Gap climb that is somewhat legendary on the AT. Got some more vertical vistas and a couple of great photos, then made it down by 9am or so to the road for Palmerton/Walnutport. We chose the latter because it met our needs (breakfast and light resupply) better and seemed like an easier hitch. All goals were indeed accomplished, although we spent wayyy too much time in the McDonald's, where we got several not-so-subtle side glances walking in with our packs, and it was past 11 before leaving town in the back of some dude's pickup. 

By then it was oppressively hot and windless, and would remain so the rest of the day. Less than a mile up from the road was the best water source of my whole CT-PA section, a veritable fire hose of a piped spring with ice cold water shooting out, so we stopped and luxuriated there along with Shinbone, a young whippersnapper of a SOBO whom Princess already knew. Then it was noon and time to do sixteen more miles. It happened, but there's not much more to add than that. Most of the time it was easy, sometimes it was hard, the whole time it was really really hot and still. The last four miles started in the gloaming and ended in more or less total darkness (I forget what the stages of twilight are; it was the last one, whatever that's called). Around 8 we rolled in to this shelter--I personally would've stopped earlier except for ominous rolls of thunder above--and found it gloriously unoccupied, meaning we didn't have to disturb and apologize to people, which I was all geared up to do. Rain hasn't started yet but it seems only a matter of time. Feeling a bit exhausted after making a production out of what ought to have been a comfortable day, but the fact that I'm taking two or three zero days starting Friday, in transit up to Maine, means it's less important to be steady and sustainable right now. 22 miles to Port Clinton tomorrow and then I'm finished with the southernmost 2063 miles of the trail.

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Day 13: Tuesday, August 26

Tenting on the trail somewhere in the Palmerton Superfund site (AT SOBO mi ~928.7) walked ~21.3 miles today

Got up at 7 sharp and by 7:30 was out and moving, well ahead of Princess. After about four miles I was at the road for Wind Gap, PA, with a hankerin' for some breakfast and some laundry, but no one in their car would pick up dusty old Scrub so I had to walk about a mile into town before stumbling upon a laundromat with a gas station/c-store across the street. "That'll do," I said to myself, and proceeded to get most of my clothes clean and consume some gas station food and a quart of whole milk for breakfast. While I was being trashy huddling in the corner of the laundromat in my rain gear with my milk carton, hogging the one electrical outlet to charge my phone (hikers will recognize this scene), Princess texted to ask where I was; she had been picked up within 30 seconds of sticking her thumb out and had been taken to a different laundromat a mile away, so she stuck her thumb out again and in 30 seconds got picked up and taken to the one I was at. After a quick and very unhealthy resupply at the gas station (Snickers and Swedish fish being the two staples), local hero and friend of the trail Keith offered us a ride from the parking lot and we were back on around 11.

The trail, to put it bluntly, was shit for about eight miles south of Wind Gap. Not content with letting it be just rocky, the maintaining club in that section (the AMC again, surprise surprise) had left it overgrown with weeds, narrow and winding through dull featureless forest. The abject shittiness let up after a time and the final few miles down to the next road/landmark, Little Gap, were manageable. There was no natural water within a mile of the trail all day, so I relied on Gatorade from the initial town stop and H2O caches (one at a shelter, one at the road at Little Gap) to get by.

After Little Gap, where we supped, it was a short climb up to this odd environment, the Superfund site, which has something to do with a century of (probably poorly regulated) zinc mining and smelting in the area. It's dry and rocky/dusty and there aren't many trees, which gives it a bit of a Hat Creek Rim feel (PCT), except it's three miles long instead of twenty. It was great for walking in the evening because the sun was setting and we could see for miles in many directions over civilization. The trail itself was the only flat and soft place we saw after about a mile of looking, and we know no one's hot on our heels and we're getting up early tomorrow anyway, so we pitched our tents right in the middle of it like bosses. This has to rank as one of the most scenic, maybe *the* most scenic, tent sites I've had on the AT, this year or in 2011 when I hiked most of it. It doesn't quite touch some of the spots from the PCT last year, but at any rate, it was a fantastic evening walk and it'll be easy to get up tomorrow morning and make some miles, camped out in the open light as we are. 

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Day 12: Monday, August 25

Tenting somewhere in the eastern Pennsylvania wilderness (AT SOBO mi ~907.4), walked ~11.7 miles today

Slept in until 9 in the dark hostel bunkroom and then after some idling, slid to the town bakery for breakfast. Polished off an entire small blueberry pie and a large latte, then returned to the church and commenced the somewhat complicated process of figuring out how to get to Monson, Maine this weekend (this Labor Day Weekend, when all transport is under-supplied and over-demanded) once my PA section is over. After many transportation options were explored and all auxiliary parties were contacted, multiple times each, I came up with solution that is reliant on finishing in Port Clinton/Hamburg Thursday night. Then several people and travel legs later, I will be in Monson on Saturday. More details when that bridge is crossed.

The long and short of it was that I needed to hike today, so Princess and I set forth from town around 1pm, I with practically no food in my pack and she with about six days' worth because of a maildrop she just picked up. The climb out of the river gorge was quite tame, or at least I thought so, but led to some pretty dramatic views from the top, straight down on the river and the interstate and the bridge we'd crossed the afternoon prior. There were other dramatic views later, around what the guidebook says is Fox Gap. Those were nice until they were marred by the arrival of Car People, complete with Rambunctious Children and High-Strung Rude Parents, but in the few minutes of peace we had up there I was reminded of a great thing about the AT's vistas, at least in the southern half of the trail: they often look down on the civilization that one has just climbed up from, and as such give a real feeling of progress and remove from the hubbub down below. Of course there's also something to be said for looking out over endless untrammeled wilds--I was just reading the end of Carrot's 2014 PCT blog last night and there's a lot of endless untrammeled wilds in there, and I'd all but forgotten about that being a thing after almost two weeks on the mid-Atlantic AT--but to look down on school buses and semi trucks moving around like little toys a thousand feet beneath you is nice too.

After the late-afternoon break there, we weren't sure how much farther we wanted to go and the AWOL guidebook didn't give away much about landmarks between there and Wind Gap, 10 miles on, so we figured we'd go until we saw a nice place to camp just before dark, or until we got to Wind Gap if we were feeling up for a spot of night-hiking. The former ended up happening, and my mileage estimate is based only on very imprecise time-based reckoning. The last few miles were a taste of what everyone complains about in Pennsylvania--extremely rocky trail tread that forces you to hop and skip your way forward with an irregular stride for hundreds of yards at a time, then a one-minute or so break, then repeat. It's mentally exhausting more than anything and would have been awful to night-hike over, hence the throwing in of the towel early. Tomorrow, the town of Wind Gap in the a.m. for food and laundry and then miles and miles of rocky progress afterward. 

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Day 11: Sunday, August 24

In the Church of the Mountain hostel in Delaware Water Gap, PA (AT SOBO mi 895.7), walked 24.8 miles today

Woke up around 6:15 to my Sufjan alarm and, with all that quasi-holy piano music ringing around in my ears, couldn't bring myself to be remorselessly loud and dickish to the two guys who had showed up late to the shelter last night and were still passed out. Was out by 7:15, along with Princess. Just downhill from the shelter was the first nice spring I've seen so far in the section this year--ice cold water gurgling right up from the rocks--so I made sure to fill up there and drink untreated, with gusto, all morning. The right ankle felt mighty stiff at first, but after about an hour all pain and problems had utterly dissipated and I felt pretty strong for the remainder of the day.

Old Princess was not doing as well; she always has issues with foot tenderness and arch pain and all that hit peak intensity at about midday and she literally couldn't walk anymore, so we ended up stopping for a bit and going slower. I was going to make it to the DWG regardless of her progress today, and even with the delays we were still in good position to do that after breaking at a place called the Mohican Outdoor Center (Run by the AMC. 20oz Cokes for $2.75 each. Gag me.) and leaving around 3, with ten miles to go. Her feet got their act together after that break, aided by a large dose of ibuprofen, and we absolutely flew down the last 7 miles to town. We walk the exact same pace assuming normal health and it's the main reason I've ended up around her so much the past three days. Walked next to I-80 for the final two miles, including the crossing of the Delaware into Pennsylvania, and she waved at all the traffic with a regal wafting of the hand for almost the entire way. 

Got to the hostel to find the usual odd mix of characters who claim some association with trail. A possibly intoxicated local floated in to use the restroom, play me a tune on the guitar, then float out again; I later saw him walking down the street carrying only a cheese grater. Got showered up then ate a gargantuan eggplant parm plate for dinner from an Italian joint down the street. On the way there, stopped and watched Louie Setzer and the Appalachian Mountain Boys, a great bluegrass outfit of old men, playing a free show for the town in the park--it was a very Appalachian experience, hearing that high and lonesome music on a muggy night in a small-town park, something I couldn't have imagined happening just across the river in the New Jersey section of trail. But everything about it and the town just seemed to fit right; it's hard to describe, but the DWG already feels like much more of a real AT town than anything from the NJ-NY-CT sections ever did. It, or more properly the people at the hostel, also has a shady feel to it, enough that I'm not sure I'm interested in taking a zero tomorrow, which had been on the table as an option earlier.

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Day 10: Saturday, August 23

Tenting in the Brink Road Shelter (AT SOBO mi 870.9) like a motherfucking boss, walked 19.6 miles today

Woke up late with Smiley already long gone, aiming for a 30-miler, and didn't end up getting on the road til about 8:30. Soon got a look at High Point, the highest point in New Jersey, with some sort of Washington Monument-esque shelter on top of it, then started to descend to lower elevation before supplemental oxygen was required. As promised, the number and density of rocks on and in the trail increased dramatically south of High Point. Things came to a head when I rolled my right ankle worse than ever before, and there have been many times ... Thought I felt a little twinge or pop, sat on it for ten minutes and was able to continue, though for the rest of the day if I took a break off my feet for more than a minute it was stiff getting started again.

Stopped at a shelter for lunch, meeting a NOBO thru-hiker, surely one of the last, who talked to me in particular a lot about his career as a newspaper reporter. Since the morning, Princess and I had been eyeing the Dairy Queen in Branchville, NJ as a late-afternoon stop, so that became the focal point of the next eight miles or so. Branchville and its environs turned out to be among the least attractive town areas around the AT--I was trying to think of more charitable ways to describe it that didn't use the term "redneck," "trailer trash," or "wow this part of Jersey looks like absolute shit," but I failed, so there you go. Nonetheless, the Dairy Queen was a Dairy Queen, a large Oreo Blizzard is still a large Oreo Blizzard, and we hitched in and out easily thanks to local heroes Wendy and Julia, respectively.

It was very gray and threatening rain upon our return to the woods, and it wasn't very warm, so all that Dairy Queen was actually making us shiver, but the three remaining miles to the shelter warmed us back up and it never actually rained. Encountered a copperhead snake in the middle of the trail once Princess had stepped over it without even noticing. The shelter turned out to be an absolute palace in the woods, rebuilt only last year according to Princess' rather more recent guidebook. It also has plenty of flying insect life, and we were the only ones here, so we decided to pitch our tents inside, that most indulgent of camping experiences. 

Some real toolboxes, who sound like they're from Boston, showed up well after dark, having walked the 25 miles north from Delaware Water Gap, and crashed the shelter--they're still awake talking right now as I type this and one just called his mother for about ten minutes on his cell phone, literally three feet from me. So it won't be as peaceful a night as planned, but we'll give them a little turnabout by waking up at six and being as loud as possible on the way out.

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Day 9: Friday, August 22

In the High Point Shelter (AT SOBO mi 851.3), walked 19.0 miles today

Woke up around eight to find everybody in the hostel still out for the count; eventually bodies started to stir and Princess and I perambulated to the grocery store a half-mile across town for a resupply run. Bagels were consumed from a bagel place soon after, then we moved back to the church to pack up and leave. Since nothing was happening especially quickly, we didn't make it out of town until about 10:45, and that made us the clear leaders among the hostel crowd. Rain seemed to threaten, and it was dark and gray all day, but the radar and weather forecasts suggested it wouldn't be much of an issue, and that ended up being correct.

Local hero Kyle gave Princess and I a ride out of Vernon, although he revealed his ulterior motive for giving us a lift by blurting out right away, "Do you guys smoke? I like to blaze on my way over for work." We told him he'd struck out and picked two of the ten-percenters who *don't* smoke regularly on the AT. Once he'd dropped us off at the trailhead, it was a flat boardwalk next to wetlands for a few miles, then up into the hills, such as they are in New Jersey. There was another wetlands section later, in the early afternoon, but for the most part the trail rambled around through the most nondescript of nondescript Eastern forested tunnels for the day.

Hiked with Princess most of the day, except for the time when a SOBO named Smiley overtook us and I whipped forward to keep up with her for a bit at her extremely brisk pace. Everything about her gear (Gossamer Gear and Altra cap-a-pie) and mannerisms screamed California hiker, so I was not surprised to find she was from the Santa Cruz area and knows the West Coast hiking scene pretty well. She lives with Bobcat, a hiker known to almost everyone who was on the PCT in 2013 as the first and most distinctive SOBO they ran into. She eventually scurried ahead when Princess and I took an afternoon break at the very nice Murray property, a private cabin left open to hikers by the proprietor, a Mr. Jim Murray. From there it was five fairly tame miles to this shelter, where Smiley had decided to fetch up for the night anyway. Only us three, plus whatever bears are probably lurking in the nearby forests waiting to break into my peanut butter jar once I go to sleep, at the shelter site for the night.

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Day 8: Thursday, August 21

Sleeping in the St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Vernon, NJ (AT SOBO mi 832.3), walked 14.7 miles today

It rained solidly for hours last night, but I stayed warm and dry and happy and psychologically unscarred in my tent. Got up and felt fairly strong; unfortunately, the trail was dastardly hard for the first few miles. The elevation profile didn't give away much, but it turned out the trail wound up and over countless bare rock humps along a ridge, and with the rock wet from the night before I couldn't afford to hurry lest I slip and destroy myself. After a while that ended, and coming down from the ridge I encountered Clam and Bugout, two SOBOs I'd never met before. Estimable Virginians (as most Virginians are), they and I walked and talked for several miles, until we stopped together at New Jersey's Wayawanda State Park and I ended up leaving before them.

Got to the road to Vernon a few miles later, and just a hop skip and jump from the trailhead was a farm selling incredibly good homemade ice cream at its store. After pausing a half-hour to gorge myself there, Clam and Bugout rolled up and we all scored a ride from the parking lot into town and this church hostel. At the church were several new faces, most of them SOBOs. Another, named Princess, rolled in soon after and five of us ended up going out to dinner at the Vernon Inn, the only establishment in town serving beer. It happened to be Taco Thursday at the Inn, so everyone stuffed his or herself with tacos, margaritas and Yuenglings (not quite Mexican, but it was on special), and then to top things off, a man at the table next to us, apparently a respected figure in the town, picked up the tab for our entire table of hungry hikers. This is the first time such a thing has happened to me on the AT, although it happened several times on the PCT, and then, as now, I don't really understand what I or any other hikers have done to deserve it. We all were all profusely thankful, and then sort of speechless (and, speaking for myself, confused) afterward once he had left.

An incredible thunderstorm, with one of the heaviest cloudbursts I've ever seen, passed over while we were in the Inn--I cracked open the restaurant door to get a look at it, not getting the chance to see many storms back home in Oregon, and water started flying in immediately so I shut it right away--and the walk back to the church was done in the dark on utterly soaked streets. Tomorrow I think nearly everyone has the High Point Shelter, about 20 miles south, as their goal, so I'm expecting more company for the next few days at least, which is great. The AT in this part of the country doesn't have much to reward the solo hiker.

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Day 7: Wednesday, August 20

Tenting a little past NY 17A near Greenwood Lake (AT SOBO mi 817.6), walked 16.6 miles today

An odd, somewhat taxing day with a pleasant ending. Got started a little late with my goal being only 14.3 miles away at the Wildcat Shelter. Knew from the elevation profile and what people had told me that all 14 miles would be ridiculously slow going, all up and down and rocky, and that turned out to be true. Hot, humid and stagnant weather didn't help, nor did being a little tired in the legs and in the brain, nor did being completely alone all day, so I ended up taking things very slowly, breaking about every two miles and staring off into space a lot. Some of the roads had volunteer-stocked water caches at them--no longer just a West Coast thing--because most of the water sources around are either dry or extremely unappealing if they do have water.

Saw and took a video of a huge black rat snake, maybe eight feet long, in the afternoon but that was it for excitement. Made it to the Wildcat Shelter at 5pm exhausted, pretty thirsty and thinking I was done for the day, but the water source there turned out also to be totally dry--more unusual for a shelter, since they're almost always intentionally located by reliable water--so I went on another two miles, thankfully easier, to a road. Wasn't sure how the hitching would go, but got my answer when the very first car I saw missed me, stopped 200 yards later, pulled a 3-point turn in the middle of the highway in front of a blind curve causing about 10 different people to slam on their brakes and honk, and came back to get me. It was local hero Kira, who works at the Renaissance Fair all summer, and she dropped me off in short order at a CVS where I stocked up on water and Gatorade. The CVS happened to be next door to a Subway, so I availed myself of a footlong, Sun Chips and several big cups of fizzy water, plus the chance to charge my phone and catch up with the world. The fourth car to pass me as I thumbed my way back out to the trail picked me up, and I camped soon after getting back into the woods, fat, happy and hydrated again. Tomorrow, another new state: New Jersey! 

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Day 6: Tuesday, August 19

In the Fingerboard Shelter (AT SOBO mi 801.0), walked 15.6 miles today plus about one to get water off-trail

Ate a bagel with schmear from a spot across he street from the hotel, then the owner Doug drove me back to the trail around 9. Was disappointed to find that, at that hour, the Trailside Museum and Zoo next to the bridge, featuring the lowest point on the official AT, was closed, so I walked along the official alternate route in what amounted to a ditch next to the highway then eventually started the climb up Bear Mountain. Chatted with some knowledgeable locals on the way up, made it to the top by 10 and had the run of the place ... Was in the observation tower all by myself and could see, wayyy off as a speck on the horizon, the NYC skyline, which must be invisible on a cloudy or even a generally humid day. Met my dad in the parking lot soon after and we drove to nearby Peekskill for groceries and lunch ... I found a Caribbean place on Yelp that said it was open, and I was excited to try Caribbean food for the first time (spicy stewed goat's head!) but they were closed and we ended up with overwhelmingly sized, underwhelmingly flavored pizza from a cheap Italian joint next door.

After he dropped me back off, the area around the mountaintop was considerably more crowded with people. Not ten minutes after I mentioned to my dad that I hadn't had a conversation in awhile with someone who had no idea whatsoever about the existence of the trail and thru-hiking, I casually mentioned to an orthodox Jewish family who asked me for directions that the path they were on went all the way to Georgia, and we had a rollicking discussion about the AT, and hiking in general, from there. Escaped the Bear Mountain crowds after a mile or so and had things pretty much to myself after that; the trail was, as promised by many people lately, pretty challenging south of Bear Mountain but it also led to easily the most expansive views I've seen so far on this section, and in fact they're probably some of the best between Maryland and Vermont on the whole AT.

Got to my initial goal, a shelter that would've put me at 10 miles for the day, around 5 but there was no one about and the register indicated a SOBO leaving about 10 minutes before I'd gotten there, so I decided to push on to the next shelter five miles further in hopes of finally having a social life on the trail. Got here and got more society than I'd bargained for: the SOBO, who is a Swiss guy named K-9 (although it used to be, and absolutely still ought to be, Hikin' Burger, a bastardization of his real last name of Eichenberger); two med students from New York on a bike/hike tour; and a man named Paddy O, who claims to have provided trail magic to over 2,000 thru-hikers in the past few years. He was not without provisions today either ... Ended up drinking root beer and eating donuts for dinner on account of him. He moved on to camp by himself after an hour of talking at the four of us almost nonstop, and I called it a night myself shortly thereafter. More pokey trail ahead, so probably only another 15 miles tomorrow. 

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Day 5: Monday, August 18

In the Bear Mountain Bridge Motel in Fort Montgomery, NY (AT SOBO mi 785.5), walked 24.7 miles today

Slept surprisingly well for how uneasy I initially was about being utterly alone in the RPH shelter right next to the parkway. Woke up around 6:15, tested the legs out and they were a go. Decided 25 miles to the Bear Mountain Bridge would not be an unreasonable goal, provided I went about it the right way--keeping things consistent, fueling myself properly, not getting caught out too late and being forced to hurry, etc. Ended up pulling it off with plenty of time to spare, getting here at about 6pm.

The morning started off very serene and the trail almost felt wild, since for long stretches I didn't see anyone else and, unusually, couldn't hear any road noise. Took my first substantial break after ten miles by a rural road where there was a potable-water spigot, took the next one eight miles later when the trail intersected a major highway, US 9 by Peekskill, and right at the trailhead was a 24-hour convenience store, the Appalachian Market. Having walked alone all day in my own little zone, I was essentially a helpless old lady inside the store, totally confused by how fast things were happening and how crowded it was. I ended up, when all was said and done, ordering two slices of pizza from an absolute New York goombah, a caricature of a human being, eating quickly at the picnic tables outside the store as all manner of industrial traffic snorted by five yards away on the road, and then heading off to the woods again ASAP. Descended to the Hudson River and the huge Bear Mountain Bridge just before six, did some hotel shopping on the phone, and ended up getting picked up by Doug, the owner of this friendly little joint, in his car and set up with a nice room for myself--complimentary laundry, a few restaurants and c-stores nearby, just what I needed.

Saw very few other hikers today--the southbound traffic seems very spread out, and none happen to be right with me, while there aren't many NOBOs left anymore--but one stands out, the inimitable Mr. Sky Eyes, whom I knew on the PCT last year. Before I even saw him, I heard him screaming (to himself), then when I saw him charging uphill at me in his kilt and screaming some more, apparently because of the Van Halen in his headphones, I knew exactly who it was. I told him what section I was doing and he literally almost fell over laughing: "AHAHAHAHAH thatsliketheshittiestfuckinpartofthewholefuckintrail Ahahahahh!" So it was good to catch up. He and I are both Oregon residents and we agreed that when you tell people in this part of the country you're from Oregon, it's not that far off from saying you're from Mars. He's northbounding and will undoubtedly finish in time, because he is manically fast.

Tomorrow I will see my dad, on his way back to Virginia from a family bereavement in Boston, and then probably take it easy, no more than ten miles or so. Out of New York in three more days.

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Day 4: Sunday, August 17

All alone at the RPH Shelter (AT SOBO mi 760.8), walked 9.0 miles today plus about one to another deli

Woke up a little after six with the Wolfpack (the collective name for guys at the shelter, last name Wolf or Wolff for two of them, who are father and son) but left ahead of them by 7. Had a calm four miles to the first road, down which was--surprise!--another deli. Being New Yorkers, of course they could make a sandwich for me at 8:45am, so I sat outside the store and had that for second breakfast along with a quart of milk, then ordered another for the road. Another hiker was there about the same time as me, a NOBO thru named Cardio Man. What's he like? It's not important. Cardio Man. Actually, he and I chatted for awhile--a Colorado outdoorsmanly jack of all trades who has for some reason decided to do the AT instead of one of the Western trails for his first and, according to him, only long-distance hike. He was about as impressed with this section of the trail as I am (read: not especially). 

Felt so physically beaten down at the end of yesterday and most of this morning that I thought a half-day would do me good, so I rolled into this shelter, the RPH Cabin, around 12:30, took a nap, then stuck around the rest of the day. It's not a typical shelter; it appears to be a converted cinder-block outbuilding from possibly an old farm or estate, and it's very close to a road and has a grassy lawn and a shady picnicky ramada around the back. I knew already that you could order delivery pizza from it (which I did not), and I assumed it would be chock full o' hikers come evening time. Instead, the last people I saw here passed through around 3:30 and it's been oddly deserted since. Passed most of the afternoon reading Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited, which I picked up in Kent at the book sale. It's a bit of an odd one to be reading on the trail, since it's about gay Oxford boys in 1920s England. Tomorrow with the right start time and rejuvenated legs I may be able to make it to a much-needed hotel stay around Bear Mountain in 20+ miles.

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Day 2: Friday, August 15

Tenting by the Ten Mile River Shelter (AT SOBO mi 731.3), walked 15.7 miles today plus at least two more on the road to, from and around Kent

The guy with the dog also happened to snore like a jake-braking semi truck all night long, to the point where I had a dream that Stan Mordensky (a friend who thru-hiked the AT last year) was in the shelter in between the snoring guy and me and I was telling Stan to elbow him as hard as possible in the ribs. Then as soon as I sat up in the morning, his dog Flicka of course started growling at me and baring her teeth. Then he set part of the shelter floor on fire lighting up his stove for breakfast. This is a man who probably should not be allowed to use shelters, but I doubt he can be stopped now. I tried to break camp quickly and forget about how annoyed I was with him, succeeding on both parts. I quickly had to divert my frustration toward the trail itself, which took me on an absolute bitch mother of a climb up to a point called the St. John's Ledges; it was an almost-vertical, hand-over-hand scramble over jumbles of boulders at some points, the type of thing that just doesn't happen on a "trail" not maintained by the Appalachian Mountain Club (the AMC has a Connecticut branch that maintains this state's section of the trail and their influence shows).

The day was, thankfully, cool and a little cloudy, meaning I felt great once I'd worked up a sweat and it chilled me down afterward. After the initial nastiness it was a few miles of descent to the road that goes to Kent, a town usually accompanied by a groan and/or an expletive from hikers, because it is a touch precious and hikers often seem to feel they're given a colder shoulder there than most other towns. I saw no reason to complain, though. I got everything I needed taken care of promptly--decent pizza at a decent price, my phone charged, Instagrams uploaded, full-fat Skippy procured (I'd made an amateur's mistake two days before and gotten reduced-fat peanut butter, which is inedible), a damn good mocha consumed, my water bottles filled, and Aqua Mira purchased from "Backcountry Outfitters." I also picked up a used book--Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh--for a buck and had some great interactions with other hikers--these were unexpected bonuses. All my business with the townspeople was conducted with a smile rather than a scowl, and everyone went on their merry way at the end of it, doubtless humming Kumbaya to themselves.

I left around 3pm to take care of the next nine miles, which started out pretty rolly (in a bad way; it doesn't help that my legs are sore from the first day) but ended with a gentle stroll along the Ten Mile River and to this shelter. One thing I really enjoy about the AT compared to the PCT is the rich variation in the human spectrum that you encounter among the hikers; the people of the PCT, as much as I like them, seem *very* homogenous and single-minded in their goals and approach to hiking by comparison. There are people that I think are idiots, like the guy in the shelter last night, or the guy in the shelter tonight who made it an easy decision for me to tent, or the guy in the Mt. Algo Shelter in the afternoon who was terrorizing everyone else with his incessant talking and boasted about having gotten heat stroke three times in Virginia this year and then stuck to his claim when I asked if he was sure he didn't mean heat exhaustion. But there are also a lot of brilliant, happy and expressive people ... Some NOBOs I had just met in Kent (who were smoking joints on a park bench) sang me a really awesome song they had written about the AT, which I videoed but promised not to publish until the singer could do it first. There are ridiculously interesting and varied entries in all the shelter register books, too many to remember. People on the AT in general seem to come from vastly different walks of life and have vastly different ideas about why it's good to be out here. I don't think I'm denying the PCT a fair shake in saying all this, because I noticed it right away when I was out there, the relative homogeneity of that crowd.

Met my first SOBO thru-hikers, Walkie and Talkie, at the shelter tonight along with several others. Most of us are camped to escape the prattle of Grandpa George, a section-hiker in the shelter. It's a cool clear night; tenting with no rain fly. Tomorrow, maybe 20 less taxing-looking miles to the Morgan Stewart Shelter in NY (crossed into NY for ten minutes today, then jumped back into CT for the night).

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