I broke these up (I've heard these blogs are a little long lol), but I (Graveyard) haven't moved or taken a break, so I'm just going to keep prattling on if you don't mind:)
We got to Delaware Water Gap with 5 days left till my Long Island amigos came to meet up with us - and, as we had already picked the location (a nice, flat-looking stretch just inside NY complete with a water fall and a high point from which you could see the City), we had to hike 20 miles per day every day to kill New Jersey and get there in time. We made it 18.5 the first day, and hiking in NJ was suprisingly beautiful - we were up on a nice ridge. However, in that 130 mile jump east (the Trail swings east for that section, rather than north), the temperature had risen into the 90's, the humidity had grown 10000%, and the mosquitoes had multiplied into the thousands. It was pretty miserable. No matter how much bug spray you slathered on, the mosquitoes would hover inches away from you and the buzzing literally threatened to drive us INSANE!! That night I called my parents, and was quite happy to discover that they had a few days off and wanted to come visit since we were so close:D So, not only did we not have to hike 20 miles a day everyday to catch my friends, but we could escape to the comfort of a real, air-conditioned hotel! I was very happy to see them - this was the longest stretch I have gone in my entire life without seeing my parents! They dropped us off on the side of the road by an abandoned building in Bellvale, NY, where my friends were meeting us.
A few hours later, Jenna (aka Castro), Rachel (aka HardRock), Gail (Mansion), Pacik (Porta-Pond), and Tom (WoodStock) arrived in dress clothes totally unprepared for a hike! But, they were just messing with us lol. We camped behind the abandoned building, Jenna almost cried because of all the bugs but successfully managed not to, Gail successfully scared Jenna half to death, and we called it a somewhat early evening in preparation for the next days hike.
I'll note here that 4 of these people have never been hiking in their lives, let along backpacking. Gail and Tom were the only ones with real packs; the others had school bags. Gail had brought a giant tent fit for 4 people, which we were able to replace with a GoLite we found on the trail in PA. Rachel and Pacik brought only canned goods and the DintyMore microwaveable beef stew dinners. I asked what they were thinking with the microwaveable goods, especially since I had sent them an email containing detailed instructions on what to bring and what not to bring, and cans were definately on the NOT list, and Rachel blamed Pacik, and Pacik said he had a plan. Gail and Jenna brought p.b.&j. and a loaf of bread each and nothing else. And, now that I think about it, I have no idea what Tom ate. I went through the girls' packs and tossed the body spray and other assorted goods they wouldn't be needing - Pacik insisted he needed everything, including his giant knife for who knows what and other such just-in-case gear, and Tom... well... he's done this before, and he's a beast anyway, so I figured he'd chug along all right. We had a breakfast of dry cereal, or, in Pacik's case, a can of oranges and instant coffee, which he promptly threw back up. After he recovered, we set off into the woods.
Tom knew what he was in for... Gail and Jenna seemed to have expected to have their butts kicked... Pacik might have... Rachel, however, certainly did not. I guess she was expecting something along the lines of the nature walks on Long Island. In case you don't know, Long Island is essentially a sand bar, with no hills, let alone mountains. They all walk a lot - Pacik and Rachel just had jobs going door-to-door, requiring 8 or more miles a day. And though I had picked a flat looking section according to our elevation profile, our profile is not detailed enough to reveal, say, hundred or so foot climbs - it shows little bumps at around 200 ft climbs or more. So, we climbed up to the ridge line, not too slowly, but requiring many breaks, and I was quite happy to see that there was a very nice view at the top. The top was the kind of ridge that's made of rocks, meaning that instead of there being a "trail" in the traditional sense of the word, there's some huge boulders and a white blaze at the top of them. So we had to scramble up and over boulders, often climbing strait up for ~10 ft (enough to be scary, but not enough to die - unless you fall of the ridge to your death into the forsests on either side 50 ft below). I think that's when Rachel decided we are out of our minds, and that she was never backpacking with us again. Despite this, she bravely soldiered on to the shelter, 2 miles from where we started. Pacik, still feeling quesy, decided he would not be hiking to the waterfall (2 miles and 600 ft down from the shelter), and Rachel and Tom quickly agreed to stay at the shelter with him. Jenna and Gail decided to get a little more in, especially since we could leave our packs with the others. The hike down was kind of hilarious, because at every steep part they would both say something along the lines of "we are going to die on the way back". But, they made it safe and sound there and back again, and promptly passed out, waking up again a few hours later for more hang time.
Meanwhile, Pacik had constructed his Porta-Pond. Apparently, on an episode of Survivorman or Man vs. Wild he had seen the guy cook a meal in a pool of water using rocks he heated in a fire. He was hoping this would be a microwaveable enough kind of action to work. Well... it wasn't. But it was highly entertaining. They ended up heating their meals right next to the fire, as the rocks weren't heating the water nearly fast enough for their appetites.
The next day we walked back to the road, all escaped unharmed, and my shuttle back to the trail is leaving so peace and love to all:)
Sunday, September 13, 2009
Mediocre in the Middle
Sorry to all followers for the long delay! These blogs always take so long to write; it's hard for us to sneak them in:( As you may have seen from Lorri's comment, Jess dislocated his shoulder recently, but it has healed quite well, and we are currently in Maine. But, I don't want to give too much away. Back to Harpers Ferry!
After the Aqua Blaze, we went to Frostburg, MD to visit with The PHLO's family. We spent a week there repairing the boats that we could - one was unsalvegable, but that was because of damage it acquired prior to our use, so we inflicted no permanent damages in the end (although the canoes are quite a bit uglier). Then we went with the Kennedy clan (Phlo's mom's family) to the Outer Banks of North Carolina and spent a lovely week soaking up the sun on the beach:) Although we were a little sad that we had to spend 2 full weeks away from the trail, knowing how far behind that would put us, by the end of the vacation we were very happy to have had the opportunity - my knees finally stopped hurting, and we were back in full-fledged hiking spirit!
Phlo's parents dropped us off in Harpers Ferry at the Appalachian Trail Conservancy Headquarters. We made the mistake of telling the lady in charge just how much we had yellow-blazed (we just did the math, and were shocked to discover that we had skipped 422 miles out of ~1,000 of trail!), and she marked us down as section hikers and not thru-hikers:( As we walked back onto the trail, NOBO Hobos again, the Phlo came to feel very... dissapointed. He began talking about hitch-hiking home, and eventually even threw off his pack in frustration. "If this isn't a thru-hike, what's the point of hiking on?" I spent the rest of the night trying to convince him to carry on - "What, did you do this just to get your name on some list?" "We came out here to live stress-free after college, and it looks to me like white-blazers have a lot of stress" and so on. I had already made plans with friends from Long Island to hike a small section with them, and I sure wasn't going to give up before I got to hike to and in New York New York! I think this fact was what finally convinced him to soldier on.
The AT we hiked onto was a different trail than we remembered. We were, quite possibly, the last northbound thru-hikers - we had already been behind when we finished the Aqua Blaze, and the two weeks with the Phlo's family sure didn't help. There were no thru-hikers, only section hikers, which to a thru-hiker means lots of identical boring conversations - "yes, we hiked here from Georgia" "we carry about 40 pounds when full on food" "yes, we're going to Maine" "I'm from Long Island, he's from MD" and so on. And they all seemed dissapointed that we weren't doing 20 miles a day and that we had skipped sections - I think section hikers like to fantasize that they couldn't possibly hike the whole trail, and seeing us makes them realize that it is possible, so the only reason they won't is because they don't want to abandon their worldly comforts for so long. We started avoiding shelters, and were generally alone. Which was just dandy for us - it was the first time on this whole hike that it felt like just the two of us were doing this journey together, the way we had expected.
The trail in MD was beautiful and short. It was always two people wide, so we could actually walk next to each other and hear each other when one spoke, and it was nice and flat, with just enough hills to keep it interesting. We were able to meet up with Phlo's cousin, Angela, and his/our friend Jen, who live near the trail, though they didn't do any hiking with us. Then we hiked into PA. We knew by now that we were so far behind that we'd either have to hike 20 or more miles per day everyday for the next 3 months to get to Katahdin before the October 15 deadline... or skip more. It became quickly clear that, despite our best efforts, we are not capable of 20 miles a day everyday. Or, I should specify, I can't. The trail in PA continued to be generally flat and beautiful, so it was easy hiking, but we still couldn't manage to get more than 17 miles in a day.
We arrived at, and passed, the AT midpoint with a kind of melancholy feeling of semi-failure since we hadn't actually walked 1,089.1 miles yet, and were greeted by a laminated piece of paper attached to a sign post that said "AT midpoint. Permanent marker coming." The next store on the trail (in MD and PA and NJ and NY, there are lots of these) is the location of the half gallon challenge, were thru-hikers attempt to consume an entire half-gallon of ice cream in a single sitting. I did not attempt, but The PHLO did and succeded after 51 minutes (Heavenly Hash). Instead, I read Hermann Hess's "Wandering", a short book of his reflections on being a nomad in Europe, which may have been the most well-articulated thing I have read about being a nomad, and if you want to understand our motivations somewhat better, I reccommend finding that manuscript.
Next stop of interest was in Boiling Springs, which was a beautiful small town. We stopped at the tavern, planning on hiking out from there. One guy bought us a round, and we ended up having lunch and chatting it up with a lady sitting alone at the other end of the bar. We came to learn that her mother had just passed and that they had enjoyed this tavern together often. After many laughs had been shared, we told her our plans from there - by now, to hike to Duncannon and skip from there to Delaware Water Gap (as we were so far behind, we figured that we would skip the rocky, nasty part of PA rather than have to skip better miles later) - but we had no idea how we were going to accomplish that, at which point she offered us a ride! We're so good at yellow-blazing that we don't even need to stick out our thumbs! We exchanged numbers with Lynn, and made plans to hike on, at which point the bartender told us that there was a resort down the road offering a $25 thru-hiker rate (hard to find this far north), complete with a swimming pool, so we went there instead. Really nice place! The next day, knowing that the stretch out of Boiling Springs was really flat and mostly in farmers' fields, we spent the day watching VHS in the basement of the resort after check out, and then hiked out at 5:30 pm. This 8 mile night hike was incredible - rather than dealing with the scorching sun and no shade in the fields, we instead were accompanied by fire-flies streching for miles, as far as the eye could see. It was magical, and definately the most enjoyable hike through this section.
A few days later, we arrived at the shelter before Duncannon, planning to stay there for the night, when in the register we saw a note from Jen and Ninja that they had been there 2 days earlier, at which point we hiked right into Duncannon and, sure enough, found them sitting in the Doyle, a thru-hiker hostel/bar landmark. They were taking off for Philidelphia the next day to hang out with his sister, and also planned to skip the rest of PA after the short visit. We had a great night hanging out with them, the first friends we had encountered in 2 weeks. The next day we called Lynn and made arrangements for her to pick us up and bring us to Delaware Water Gap, 130 miles (yea, she's awesome)! She said "I hope you don't mind, but I'd really like to stop at Yuengling Brewery on the way, it was my mom's favorite... and I'd really rather take the scenic route than the highway." Well, isn't that just perfect! The scenic route, conveniently enough, also took us right past Columcille, the park The Phlo & I are getting married at next April 17 (heads up!), so Phlo was finally able to see the place I've been dreaming of for so long, so it's official - he loved it! Yuengling Brewery was a dissapointment because they don't serve people who don't take the tour, and the last tour was at 1:30 - who goes to a brewery at 1:30 anyway?!? We went to a local pizza shop and got a taste of Chesterfield Ale anway, their lesser known and quite tasty label, which pleased Lynn because that was her mother's absolute favorite brew. Thank you so much Lynn!!
So the middle wasn't great, but it was great:)
[I can't help but add this note - Lynn told us that she saw a sign in front of someone's house that said "Government stay out of my Medicaid!" Isn't that sick? Don't they see the note on their paycheck - x% taken for medicaid!?! I'm glad we're only getting glimpses of that debate, the frustration of it all might make my heart explode!]
After the Aqua Blaze, we went to Frostburg, MD to visit with The PHLO's family. We spent a week there repairing the boats that we could - one was unsalvegable, but that was because of damage it acquired prior to our use, so we inflicted no permanent damages in the end (although the canoes are quite a bit uglier). Then we went with the Kennedy clan (Phlo's mom's family) to the Outer Banks of North Carolina and spent a lovely week soaking up the sun on the beach:) Although we were a little sad that we had to spend 2 full weeks away from the trail, knowing how far behind that would put us, by the end of the vacation we were very happy to have had the opportunity - my knees finally stopped hurting, and we were back in full-fledged hiking spirit!
Phlo's parents dropped us off in Harpers Ferry at the Appalachian Trail Conservancy Headquarters. We made the mistake of telling the lady in charge just how much we had yellow-blazed (we just did the math, and were shocked to discover that we had skipped 422 miles out of ~1,000 of trail!), and she marked us down as section hikers and not thru-hikers:( As we walked back onto the trail, NOBO Hobos again, the Phlo came to feel very... dissapointed. He began talking about hitch-hiking home, and eventually even threw off his pack in frustration. "If this isn't a thru-hike, what's the point of hiking on?" I spent the rest of the night trying to convince him to carry on - "What, did you do this just to get your name on some list?" "We came out here to live stress-free after college, and it looks to me like white-blazers have a lot of stress" and so on. I had already made plans with friends from Long Island to hike a small section with them, and I sure wasn't going to give up before I got to hike to and in New York New York! I think this fact was what finally convinced him to soldier on.
The AT we hiked onto was a different trail than we remembered. We were, quite possibly, the last northbound thru-hikers - we had already been behind when we finished the Aqua Blaze, and the two weeks with the Phlo's family sure didn't help. There were no thru-hikers, only section hikers, which to a thru-hiker means lots of identical boring conversations - "yes, we hiked here from Georgia" "we carry about 40 pounds when full on food" "yes, we're going to Maine" "I'm from Long Island, he's from MD" and so on. And they all seemed dissapointed that we weren't doing 20 miles a day and that we had skipped sections - I think section hikers like to fantasize that they couldn't possibly hike the whole trail, and seeing us makes them realize that it is possible, so the only reason they won't is because they don't want to abandon their worldly comforts for so long. We started avoiding shelters, and were generally alone. Which was just dandy for us - it was the first time on this whole hike that it felt like just the two of us were doing this journey together, the way we had expected.
The trail in MD was beautiful and short. It was always two people wide, so we could actually walk next to each other and hear each other when one spoke, and it was nice and flat, with just enough hills to keep it interesting. We were able to meet up with Phlo's cousin, Angela, and his/our friend Jen, who live near the trail, though they didn't do any hiking with us. Then we hiked into PA. We knew by now that we were so far behind that we'd either have to hike 20 or more miles per day everyday for the next 3 months to get to Katahdin before the October 15 deadline... or skip more. It became quickly clear that, despite our best efforts, we are not capable of 20 miles a day everyday. Or, I should specify, I can't. The trail in PA continued to be generally flat and beautiful, so it was easy hiking, but we still couldn't manage to get more than 17 miles in a day.
We arrived at, and passed, the AT midpoint with a kind of melancholy feeling of semi-failure since we hadn't actually walked 1,089.1 miles yet, and were greeted by a laminated piece of paper attached to a sign post that said "AT midpoint. Permanent marker coming." The next store on the trail (in MD and PA and NJ and NY, there are lots of these) is the location of the half gallon challenge, were thru-hikers attempt to consume an entire half-gallon of ice cream in a single sitting. I did not attempt, but The PHLO did and succeded after 51 minutes (Heavenly Hash). Instead, I read Hermann Hess's "Wandering", a short book of his reflections on being a nomad in Europe, which may have been the most well-articulated thing I have read about being a nomad, and if you want to understand our motivations somewhat better, I reccommend finding that manuscript.
Next stop of interest was in Boiling Springs, which was a beautiful small town. We stopped at the tavern, planning on hiking out from there. One guy bought us a round, and we ended up having lunch and chatting it up with a lady sitting alone at the other end of the bar. We came to learn that her mother had just passed and that they had enjoyed this tavern together often. After many laughs had been shared, we told her our plans from there - by now, to hike to Duncannon and skip from there to Delaware Water Gap (as we were so far behind, we figured that we would skip the rocky, nasty part of PA rather than have to skip better miles later) - but we had no idea how we were going to accomplish that, at which point she offered us a ride! We're so good at yellow-blazing that we don't even need to stick out our thumbs! We exchanged numbers with Lynn, and made plans to hike on, at which point the bartender told us that there was a resort down the road offering a $25 thru-hiker rate (hard to find this far north), complete with a swimming pool, so we went there instead. Really nice place! The next day, knowing that the stretch out of Boiling Springs was really flat and mostly in farmers' fields, we spent the day watching VHS in the basement of the resort after check out, and then hiked out at 5:30 pm. This 8 mile night hike was incredible - rather than dealing with the scorching sun and no shade in the fields, we instead were accompanied by fire-flies streching for miles, as far as the eye could see. It was magical, and definately the most enjoyable hike through this section.
A few days later, we arrived at the shelter before Duncannon, planning to stay there for the night, when in the register we saw a note from Jen and Ninja that they had been there 2 days earlier, at which point we hiked right into Duncannon and, sure enough, found them sitting in the Doyle, a thru-hiker hostel/bar landmark. They were taking off for Philidelphia the next day to hang out with his sister, and also planned to skip the rest of PA after the short visit. We had a great night hanging out with them, the first friends we had encountered in 2 weeks. The next day we called Lynn and made arrangements for her to pick us up and bring us to Delaware Water Gap, 130 miles (yea, she's awesome)! She said "I hope you don't mind, but I'd really like to stop at Yuengling Brewery on the way, it was my mom's favorite... and I'd really rather take the scenic route than the highway." Well, isn't that just perfect! The scenic route, conveniently enough, also took us right past Columcille, the park The Phlo & I are getting married at next April 17 (heads up!), so Phlo was finally able to see the place I've been dreaming of for so long, so it's official - he loved it! Yuengling Brewery was a dissapointment because they don't serve people who don't take the tour, and the last tour was at 1:30 - who goes to a brewery at 1:30 anyway?!? We went to a local pizza shop and got a taste of Chesterfield Ale anway, their lesser known and quite tasty label, which pleased Lynn because that was her mother's absolute favorite brew. Thank you so much Lynn!!
So the middle wasn't great, but it was great:)
[I can't help but add this note - Lynn told us that she saw a sign in front of someone's house that said "Government stay out of my Medicaid!" Isn't that sick? Don't they see the note on their paycheck - x% taken for medicaid!?! I'm glad we're only getting glimpses of that debate, the frustration of it all might make my heart explode!]
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