Hi friends and family! Sorry for the long time between posts. I’ve been enjoying myself since finishing the hike and haven’t made the time to continue sharing my story until now. I’m going to pick up where I left off after taking four days off to help my brother move into our new apartment in DC (which is actually where I’m writing this post from).
Just after noon on July 2, I said goodbye to my parents as they dropped me off at the trailhead at Franconia Notch. After a steep climb up from the notch, I was rewarded with incredible views from Franconia Ridge.
On my way down from Mt. Lafayette I spoke with a southbound thru-hiker (SOBO) who told me that she’d just passed Smiley, a northbound thru-hiker (NOBO) that I last saw before he took a week off at home in New York. The SOBO informed me that Smiley was planning to stay at the Galehead Hut, so I made that my new goal for the night. Smiley was pretty surprised to see me when I arrived at the Galehead Hut, but our reunion was short-lived because I had to hike on since there were already too many thru-hikers doing work-for-stays at the hut.
I moved up the trail a quarter of a mile and pitched my tent a bit off the trail in a nice soft spot. (Stealth camp #1.) As soon as my tent was set up with me inside it, the rain started coming down hard! I slept well and was happy to wake up to sun. Apparently I had a visitor that night, because on my way back to the trail, I encountered a fresh set of moose tracks no more than 15 yards from my tentsite.
As I hiked along Zeacliff Ridge, I was constantly accompanied by some Gray (or Canada) Jays. They were not afraid to sneak up on me, even as I tried to sneak up on them with my camera on.
The views continued to impress from the Whites.
I hiked on to Crawford Notch and was shocked to find Hawk, Bobber, and Les waiting there for Les’s sister to show up with some trail magic. I’d assumed they’d still be days ahead of me, but I was happy to camp with them that night just north of the Saco River. (Stealth camp #2.) In the middle of the night, I heard a yell from Bobber’s tent, followed by a large crash. Apparently, some creature (possibly a moose) snuck up on Bobber, who awoke to heavy breathing a little closer than he liked. He scared it off, but never confirmed what type of animal it was.
By the way, stealth camping is when you pitch a tent somewhere other than a designated campsite. This is strongly discouraged in the White Mountains by the Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC), which charges for stays at their huts and campsites. My goal was to never pay for a night in the Whites. So far so good.
I am alive, and as of yesterday, July 24, I am also done my thru-hike! It took me nearly five months, but I finished with much of the same group I hiked with at the beginning. Gold Bond, Drop, Cliffhanger, Antsy, and I summited Mount Katahdin on Tuesday around noon.
I have many blog posts to write with photos and videos from the end of New Hampshire and all of Maine. I also have some thank-you’s to express for trail magic from friends and family. I will continue updating my blog and let you know how my trip ended over the next week or so.
Thanks for everyone who followed my adventure and supported me!
At the end of our second day in Hanover, Gold Bond and I were starting to feel like minor celebrities. We were just repacking our bags on a bench outside the Salt Hill Pub, where we ate dinner, and half a dozen groups of people stopped to wish us luck or ask questions about our hike. We then made it over to Murphy’s, where we were hoping to meet up with Natalie (the girl from the bakery that hooked us up with free food that morning) for a drink, but we never specified a time and she wasn’t there when we were. We decided to stop for gelato on our way out of town and met three women who just had to have a photo with us.
After gelato, Gold Bond and I night-hiked the mile out of Hanover to the Velvet Rocks Shelter and pitched our tents in the dark around 10:20.
Some shots of Gold Bond from the next day.
At one point, we saw a sign for free water and ice cream and followed a side trail to the home of “Ice Cream Bill.” We sat on the porch with Bill and sipped some lemonade and ate some ice cream popsicles. Then we made the mistake of challenging Bill to a game of croquet, which he first taught us and then whooped us (especially me) at.
Whistler, Bill, and Gold Bond.
Bill admiring a nice shot of his.
I stayed later than expected at Bill’s and felt too tired to hike the extra four miles uphill with the rest of the guys, so I pitched a tent at the base of Smarts Mountain. Even though my reason for stopping was to rest up and fuel up with calories, I was too tired to actually cook a hot meal. Instead I just ate a cold dinner of crackers, cheese, and pepperoni and fell asleep in my tent.
The next morning I climbed to the top of Smarts Mountain and cooked in the fire warden’s cabin the dinner I didn’t eat the night before. As soon as I started downhill from the cabin, it started to rain and didn’t stop until right before the Hexacuba Shelter, where I’d planned to stay if the rain persisted. Since it turned nice, I decided to push on. No more than ten minutes after I’d passed the shelter, the rain returned. I ended up setting up my tent in the rain at the site of the former Ore Hill Shelter, which burned down last year.
The next morning it was still wet for much of the morning so I stayed in my tent before reluctantly packing up all my wet gear and putting on the previous day’s wet clothes.
As I was leaving, I met up with Whistler, who had waited out the rain in the Hexacuba Shelter. My first step hiking with him that day landed me right on the ground in an awkward handstand position as I tripped over my hiking pole. The rest of the day was slightly better. The rain was ever-present and I got pretty chilly climbing Mt. Moosilauke, especially above tree line.
Again I had the pleasure of replacing my warm, dry sleeping clothes with cold, wet ones the next morning. I hiked alone all day and had a really cool climb up Mt. Kinsman. I had to ford an overflowing brook a few times, and often the trail was the path the rainwater traveled down the mountain.
After summiting Mt. Kinsman, I stopped in at the Lonesome Lake Hut to see what the White Mountain huts are like. I was very disappointed to be completely ignored by the five hut employees and the twenty or so guests. Nobody would even look up to return my hello. I hastily signed the guest book and returned to the rain. I stopped at Franconia Notch and shared a shuttle to Lincoln, NH, with a former thru-hiker named Pete and two section hikers from New Jersey. We stayed at Chet West’s hostel, which is a cozy spot in the residential area of Lincoln. After filling up on pizza, I made plans to be picked up the next morning by my parents. I had already planned to take the weekend off to fly to DC and help my brother move our stuff into our new apartment. The disappointment of summiting in the fog the last two days pushed me to head off the trail a day or two earlier.
I spent Thursday washing all my gear at home and eating out at Cole Farms (fried Maine shrimp roll) and Hodgeman’s (frozen custard). Friday I was up at my camp on the lake and saw most of my mom’s side of the family, including my cousin’s new baby Brody and my cousin Ben and his wife Erin who were up from the DC area with their two girls. Early Saturday morning I flew to DC and helped pack up the old apartment with my brother. Sunday we drove everything over in a uhaul truck and unloaded most of the boxes. This morning (Monday) I flew back to Boston and my parents are dropping me back off at Franconia Notch. The weather is much better now than last week, so hopefully I’ll get some views of the White Mountains this week!
The climb out of Killington, VT, and to the top of Quimby Mountain was as difficult as any climb I can think of on the whole AT. We climbed 1,300 feet in just over a mile on a day that was so hot the sweat on my hands made it harder to grip my poles. I was more than happy to rest awhile at the shelter after that climb, so Les and I napped for about forty minutes after the rest of the group left. When we resumed hiking, the heat had died down only a little bit, but we still had some significant climbing to do before dark. A few miles before the shelter, I followed a side trail to an overlook that was essentially a small deck built on top of the roof of an old cabin. Gold Bond and Cliffhanger were already there, and we enjoyed the break from walking and the great views from our perch.
When the sweat had finally dried off our clothes, we hiked the 2.5 miles to the shelter and soaked ourselves in sweat all over again.
Because hiking in 90+ degree weather was not much fun, I got up earlier the next morning and hiked 9 miles with Gold Bond to the Cloudland Market just off the trail. I didn’t know what to expect, but they sold ice cream, sodas, jerkey, and raw meats. I stuck to the first two and ate/drank in the shade of their front porch.
We resumed walking around noon and passed through some neat forest views.
We made it as far as the West Hartford Village Store and Full Belly Deli, where we stopped for some delicious sandwiches and drinks. They even had a spot designated for hikers’ packs!
After lunch, we headed across the street to the White River, where we cooled off and watched locals jump from the bridge into the water ~25 feet below. Gold Bond had to try it out for himself.
Since the weather was so hot and the location so nice (and Antsy and Drop were both feeling especially under the weather), we decided to eat dinner at the deli and accept the offer to camp in the backyard of a couple just down the road.
The next morning was another hot day, though not as bad as the days before. Gold Bond and I hiked together again until we caught the others on the section of trail that passes through Norwich, VT. In the first mile along the road, we passed two instances of trail magic set up for hikers (a cooler of watermelon and banana bread and a plate of homemade cookies) and a water dish for hikers’ dogs. It was hard to leave Vermont, but we were excited to enter New Hampshire!
We soon learned why Hanover, NH, is considered a much-beloved, hiker-friendly town. In the first 24 hours in town, I received a free Snickers bar from the outfitter where I bought my fourth (and hopefully last) pair of shoes, a free slice of pizza from the pizza place down the road, free drinks courtesy of a couple sitting next to us at dinner, and free French toast, bread, and pastries at a bakery thanks to a nice girl that works there! We tented behind a softball field by the trail and then took a zero in town today. It was a relaxing day of eating, sleeping on the Dartmouth green, and rehydrating.
Drop and I hiked three miles to VT 11 and hitched into Manchester Center, VT, with a man from Florida passing through the area. He dropped us off at the edge of town and we walked to the post office where I received a letter from Lowra with a cool puzzle, a new Steripen that actually emits UV light, and an awesome care package from Julia with the following “health foods:”
We met up with the rest of the group and resupplied at Price Chopper, where I met my friend Liz who studied abroad in New Zealand with me. She was nice enough to let five of us cram into her car, and she drove us all to the trail head where we headed north.
We made it up to the top of Bromley Mountain where we rested on the ski lift for a while.
We hiked on and played Drop’s variation on 20 Questions until that got old. Near the end of the day, we came to a section of the trail that was flooded and required some balance and patience to cross. The boards to walk across looked ok until you stepped on them and realized they were just floating on the water. When you put your weight on them, though, they sunk to the bottom and your feet got wet. Here’s Liz standing in the “trail.”
We spent the night tenting by Griffith Lake where we swam and then enjoyed dinner around a campfire with a large group of section and thru-hikers. The next morning Liz dared to hike back alone wearing a Yankees jersey in New England.
I made sure she got back across the flooded section, but I couldn’t promise her protection from Red Sox fans farther south on the trail. Luckily I later heard that she survived the solo trip back to her car. Thanks for joining me Liz!
After she left, I thought it would take me a while to catch up to the rest of the group, so I was surprised to see them all again only ten miles up the trail at Little Rock Pond laying out in the sun. The group spent five or six hours hanging out there swimming or wading in the pond, paddling the canoe that was there, or basking on the sunny beach. I spent some time creating an aquatic “zoo” of salamanders, frogs, and crayfish that I caught and collected in the flooded canoe. After I released them and headed another five miles up the trail, I made dinner and called it a night.
Last night I made it into Killington with Hawk, Bobber, Les, Gold Bond, Drop, Antsy, Cliffhanger, Alien, and Swiss Miss, where most of us stayed at the Inn at Long Trail and celebrated Hawk’s 34th birthday. I was surprised to run into three Colby grads hiking the Long Trail, including my COOT leader John! I spoke to him and his two friends and they gave me some trail magic of some extra breakfast foods they had. Small world!
Now I’m off to hike north in what is forecast to be a 90 degree day. The plan is to be in Hanover, NH, on Friday!
Antsy and Cliffhanger met us as planned in North Adams, MA, but we ended up taking another zero day in town rather than hiking on. We made this decision after overindulging at the Mexican restaurant Desperados Mex, at which hikers eat free (excluding drinks and desserts)! They didn’t advertise this deal; the waitress just slipped it into conversation casually as we were ordering the daily special: “I’ll just take the dollar off your drinks since hikers don’t pay for food.” Once we actually understood that our meals would be free, we were quite happy to take our time and order extra drinks.
That night we took advantage of the pool and hot tub at the Holiday Inn and then watched a Law and Order marathon. Finally, the next morning we hitched back to the trail and entered Vermont. Here’s Drop (left) and Gold Bond (right) as they crossed a walking bridge in North Adams.
The AT in Vermont overlaps the Long Trail for 105 miles.
Unfortunately the first day we learned why Vermont has the nickname VerMUD!
On the second day I climbed a tower on Glastenbury Mountain and had great views of much of Vermont.
I passed many beaver ponds and lots of moose poop, so hopefully it won’t be long until I see a moose. Here’s a shot of my foot next to some moose tracks on the trail.
At the end of the day I tented to avoid the bugs. When I woke up the next morning, everyone else was long gone. Apparently while the early bird gets the worm, the late hiker gets the trail magic! I left the shelter close to 10am and met trail angel Paddy-O at the first road crossing. I stopped for an hour and was treated to great conversation and delicious food from the back of his truck. I enjoyed ice cold milk, honey buns, hot calzones, root beer, and a can of beer for the road.
After that, I climbed to the top of Stratton Mountain, where Benton MacKaye conceived the idea for the AT. I climbed a fire tower and was treated to more great views of everything around me.
I also met three older women on a section hike who recommended that I stop at Stratton Pond on the other side of the mountain. I took their advice and enjoyed my beer while dipping my feet in Stratton Pond.
When I showed up at camp that night, people were glad to see me alive but not happy to learn that they missed Paddy-O.
After I crossed into Massachusetts I hiked with Chef Boyardee for a while over some neat rocky ridges. I lost him temporarily on a very steep uphill that was nothing more than bare rock with the occasional stream of water running across it. At the top I caught up to the Swiss and met a girl name Halle who’s out for a few weeks. I said goodbye to the Swiss because I planned to go farther than them for the day in an effort to catch up to Gold Bond and Drop a few days later.
Whistler and I then hiked together 8 miles and caught a hitch into Great Barrington, MA, with a girl one week out of high school who was the only person to stop and pick us up. After telling us that Baba Louie’s made the best pizza in the world, she dropped us off at the Gypsy Joint, which “also has great pizza.” The place was one of a kind! The first thing we noticed upon entering was a pan of giant (as in 10″ x 10″ x 3″) cinnamon buns. We then observed that everyone working there really was dressed like a gypsy (think Hunchback of Notre Dame) and they all had the same long red hair. It turns out they’re all family!
Whistler and I managed to each eat a cinnamon bun and half of a large pizza, which was very good! As he remarked after, “No normal people could have eaten all that.”
Quite full, we asked about a place to buy more food for the trail. A nice couple that was sitting near us offered to give us a ride to the local grocery store, so we accepted another hitch. After shopping, we somehow arranged a ride back to the trail even before we left the parking lot. Both of our last two hitches wished us well and told us to “pay it forward.”
After a couple hours in Great Barrington, a fun little hippie town (Jess, you’ll love it there), Whistler and I hiked the remaining 6.5 miles (of a 23 mile day) up and over a mountain. We ended up hiking well into the night and barely finding the shelter in the dark. After arriving later than 9:30, I was surprised to see Chef Boyardee show up just minutes behind us. Apparently he’d passed by the trail to the shelter and turned around to find it once he heard us talking.
I did snap a couple good shots as Whistler and I climbed in the evening.
The next day I was pretty lethargic and the uphills were hard for me. The climbs in MA are still small compared to those from the southern section of the AT, but it’s been so long since we’ve had any sustained uphills that it’s almost a shock to the system. Massachusetts should at least be a good warmup for the real mountainous states of VT, NH, and ME!
The highlight of that day was meeting my friend Peter at Upper Goose Pond Cabin. He parked a mile and a half north and hiked south to meet me after driving from his office in CT. Peter arrived with trail magic, which made his pack pretty heavy. I helped lighten his load by drinking a bottle of beer and splitting a package of hot dogs with him.
The cabin was maintained by Nancy, a woman from Maine who teaches physics at Gould Academy in Bethel. (This is the same school that the first two Afghan Scholars attended. Check out the project by two Colby grads: http://www.afghanscholars.org/) Nancy woke us up from our bunks (with mattresses!) early the next morning with the announcement that pancakes were cooked! I think Peter may have gotten the wrong impression of what trail shelters are like after being spoiled at Upper Goose Pond Cabin.
We hiked out of there and stopped partway up the one major climb for the day to have a beer and snack break (in the interest of lightening our packs of course). Peter and I discussed such high-brow topics as politics, religion, philosophy, and literature all day and pretty much solved all the world’s problems. (I’ll let Peter fill you in on the details.)
We stopped for a break at a beaver pond.
I think we may have been interrupting another couple that was there though.
We also stopped at the house of the “cookie lady,” but she wasn’t home, so we refilled our water bottles, but didn’t manage any free cookies.
After a good day of hiking, I think Peter was sufficiently tired. He should have been after 18 miles!
At the shelter, Peter and I enjoyed one last treat he packed in for me: a large can of Dinty Moore beef stew!
Thanks for joining me Peter! You earned your trail name Sherpa 😉
After my day with Peter, I hiked through Dalton and Cheshire en route to my goal of North Adams. I then summited the highest peak in MA, Mt. Greylock.
Finally, after a steep downhill from Mt. Greylock, I made it into North Adams on Sunday evening. I was surprised to easily catch a hitch from a nice math teacher driving a convertible! He dropped me off at the hotel where I saw Drop and Gold Bond for the first time in months.
We spent that night and all of the next day eating and relaxing in North Adams. I am thrilled to be back with them, and Antsy and Cliffhanger are meeting up with us here in North Adams today (June 12), which will be the first time we’ve all hiked together in a long time! Hopefully the Swiss catch up soon too!
At last I am caught up with my blogging! It’s just a big hike uphill out of North Adams today and then we’ll be in Vermont by this afternoon!
But this was the most memorable (mostly because I misread the last line and only when I published it on my blog did I realize it encourages, not prohibits, happy noises). I was actually telling people on the trail that a sign discouraged happiness because it might lead to a bear attack. It’s actually rather disappointing to see that the sign made sense all along.
The best part about CT was my reunion with Alien and Swiss Miss, the couple from Switzerland that I hadn’t seen since the day I left the trail for my broomball tournament. On June 4, I hiked the ~12 miles into Kent, CT, and met them at the library, where there was a joyous, yet hushed reunion. We quickly moved outside so we could exchange stories at full volume and chatted over lunch next door at The Villager.
We then stopped at a small grocery store to resupply and I caused a funny scene. I was in conversation with a nice older local lady. Just as Swiss Miss was walking up to us, I heard the woman ask me, “So are there many chicks on the trail?” I gestured towards Swiss Miss and replied that there were very few, but that almost all of them were married like Swiss Miss or dating someone. At that point, it became obvious that I had confused both Swiss Miss and the local lady. It turns out that she’d asked me not about the women (“chick”) situation, but about the “ticks” on the trail!
I ended up doing some other errands on my own in Kent and meeting back up with the Swiss for dinner at a Chinese restaurant, where we were the only customers (not because of our smell). After dinner, the Swiss stayed in town for the night and I hiked back to the trail and stayed at a shelter 0.3 miles south of the road into Kent.
That next day was great! First, it was my Mom’s birthday (happy birthday Mam!). I managed to call home from my tent that night and the Swiss sang the Swiss-German birthday song to Mom over the phone.
Before that, I hiked alone for most of the morning but I kept running into day or section hikers. I enjoyed meeting a couple from Arizona, that was out visiting their adult son John in CT. I talked with them for maybe a half hour along the edge of a river. Here’s a shot of me and John taken by another hiker named Pete that looked like a pirate with a purple backpack.
I also met a woman walking three of the most obese dogs I’ve ever seen.
After a break for lunch at a shelter, I hiked on and came to a section that the CT trail club “strongly recommended” hikers detour around. I at least had to check out this impassable stream crossing, which turned out to be not very difficult.
I then caught up to the Swiss who had followed the recommendation and taken the detour way out of the way. We hiked together the rest of the day until the shelter and I really enjoyed their company and conversation. Ideally, I’d like to hike with them through Maine and summit Katahdin together.
The next day followed the same pattern. I walked alone in the morning (I’m a later sleeper than most hikers) and then finished hiking with Swiss Miss and Alien. One motivation to pick up my pace and catch up to others was a potentially rabid dog I saw in the woods. I noticed something running towards me from far ahead, and I assumed it was simply an unleashed dog running up the trail ahead of its owner. As it ran closer, however, it became clear that it was not on a path, its owners were not around, and it looked mangy and was dripping foamy drool from its mouth. Unfortunately, I’d already drawn attention to myself by calling to it in a friendly voice, which caused it to stop close to me and bark ferociously. After seeing the foaming mouth, I quickly made my exit and checked often to ensure I was not being followed.
There was also a nice walk past some cool houses and a dam with waterfalls.
I loved that this house had one wall entirely made of stone and another made up of mostly windows.
Here’s a shot of Swiss Miss and Alien on an overlook.
On June 7 my little brother turned 21! That morning I hiked a short distance uphill to the highest point in CT, where I met Chef Boyardee, a Canadian translator who hiked the AT for three months last year.
After a slippery, rocky downhill section, I said goodbye to CT, crossed a wide stream that many hikers complained needs a bridge, and entered Massachusetts!
On Wednesday May 30, I crossed from New Jersey into New York, which proved to be my favorite state do far.
The section started with some boulder hopping along a ridge line with great views.
At one point there was a ladder set up against a rock face that otherwise would have been hard to climb.
About an hour (3 miles) into New York, I came up behind a section hiker that had just started that morning. I asked him how far he was walking and was initially confused to hear him respond that he was walking to Duncannon, PA. My expression must have given away my thoughts, because he quickly asked for confirmation that he was walking south as he had planned. I responded that unfortunately he must have gotten turned around because he was in fact walking north! He told me that he’d started at the NJ/NY border earlier that morning, so he had walked a full day and netted three miles in the wrong direction.
A few miles later on my first day in NY I stopped at an ice cream shop and first met another thru-hiker named Socrates (who came out to the AT to think). We sat near a mother who was married in Kennebunkport, near where I grew up in Maine, with two young children who were very smart and talkative. The seven year old boy named all fourteen states that the AT passes through simply from memory of the states along the east coast! Apparently he has been using an app on the iPhone to study the states and their capitals, which he rattled off to me with ease.
That night I stayed at a shelter with Socrates, Daypack, and a section hiker named Working On It.
The next day was pretty eventful on and off the trail. Most important, my cousin Josh and his wife Jenna had their first son, Brody! I didn’t actually hear about this until the next day, but Brody’s birthday was May 31, and he’s a healthy, beautiful baby. Congrats Josh and Jenna!
That same day I hiked with Working On It for several miles and shared my dream of starting a treehouse bed and breakfast business. A graduate of a prestigious business school, he had a useful perspective on the benefit of an MBA to an aspiring entrepreneur, so I enjoyed picking his brain. I also learned indirectly from Working On It that the Steripen I had been given by One Step over a month before had not been working the entire time I’d had it. In essence, I’d been “treating” my water with 90 seconds of blinking visible light rather than UV light as I had thought. Ironically, I only learned this when I showed Working On It how to use his Steripen and realized that his glowed unlike mine! I am now back to using AquaMira.
The section that day contained a beautiful lake and a forest with little underbrush on rolling hills so the views were great! I also passed through a narrow ravine called the Lemon Squeezer. I had to take my pack off and hold it above my head to fig through.
Right after that is a difficult (but very short) climb up a large boulder that apparently deserved an alternate easy route around it.
I also saw a long black snake north of that section.
Later that day, Socrates stopped for a late dinner 4.3 miles before the shelter. We then hiked those last miles from 7 to 9 pm and saw 19 deer in those two hours!
Even after we made it to the shelter, the deer were still ever present. I didn’t sleep well that night because two or three deer were grazing just feet from the shelter and they are surprisingly loud eaters as they rip grass out of the ground.
The next morning, June 1, I witnessed my first rattlesnake!
I then saw 9 deer, including a sleeping buck, on the way up Bear Mountain. The trail up and down that mountain was so well maintained that I felt like I was walking through a park.
At the top was Perkins Memorial Tower, which has been a destination spot for tourists in cars for decades.
At the bottom of the mountain, Socrates and I enjoyed a delicious meal of burgers, fries, and apple pie, which was discounted because a squirrel had somehow made its way into the dining area. Our receipt literally had 10% off for “squirrel.”
Our bellies full, we passed through the trail side zoo, which contained several animals that we hadn’t yet seen on the AT.
After the zoo, the trail took us across the Hudson River via the Bear Mountain Bridge.
I resupplied at the world’s best and busiest gas station, right next to the trail. They had six full-time employees and were open 24/7. I passed on the sandwiches (to order) from the deli and instead opted for hot NY style pizza.
Finally, I spent the night just up the trail with several hikers in a shelter at a monastery. The hiker I was most surprised to see was Working On It, the section hiker I’d met a couple nights before, who averaged about 20 miles for most of his week on the trail, nearly unheard of for someone just getting in the trail. I didn’t see any monks at or near the shelter, but I heard the church bells ringing some familiar tunes the next morning.
The next couple days brought some good views. I especially like Nuclear Lake.
I also saw the largest oak tree on the AT, Dover Oak, which boasts a circumference of more than 20 feet. (Sorry Jacob and Adam; no videos of this one.)
Finally, before my last full day in NY, I stopped at a garden center just off the trail that offered free showers. I was thankful for hot running water, but with no shampoo, soap, or towel, I don’t think I ended up much cleaner than I started. I had to dry off with a dirty shirt, and I put dirty clothes back on after. By the time I walked the few miles through the mud and rain to the shelter, I am sure nobody could have guessed that I had showered in a week.
All in all, NY was pretty beautiful and full of fun memories.
Thanks to Grampa and Aunt Barb’s gifts, I created some trail magic in Delaware Water Gap. I treated one thru-hiker to some pizza and two others to milkshakes. Of course I ate lots of pizza and milkshake myself.
My first day in New Jersey started by walking along a highway for a while until I crossed the Delaware River. Then I climbed uphill with my 39 pound (!) pack; after my resupply in Wind Gap, my bag was nearly 10 pounds heavier than when I left Springer!
I came to Sunfish Pond, where there were cool rock stacks at the spot I stopped for a snack. I watched a snake swim around a few feet away from me but I accidentally scared it away when I tried to get a video of it eating a frog. (It wasn’t actually eating the frog yet, but it looked ready to attack.)
Later in the day I came to another pond that was overflowing from the heavy rain the day before.
I had a wet night in my tent that night as more rain came in. Some of the guys I camped with were practicing skills they’d learned at “tracking school” where they learned how to survive in the wild from the author of “The Tracker.” (http://www.trackerschool.com/)
The next day was Memorial Day, so people were out in hordes. In addition to all the day hikers, I saw a turkey from this fire tower.
I also saw this deer as I was finishing my day and walking into the shelter.
I met a very interesting and funny couple there named La-Z and Detour. They had just finished taking their sponge baths outside the shelter when I arrived, so I thought my timing was perfect. They were celebrating their anniversary on the trail and were clearly the most perfect match for each other.
The next morning I entered High Point State Park and received a free Pepsi at the park headquarters from the Friends of High Point State Park. Thank you Friends of HPSP!
After my pitstop at the headquarters, I
summited the highest point in New Jersey.
I stopped for water at the “secret shelter,” a private cabin owned by Jim Murray, who lets hikers stay or rest there.
At the end of the day I passed through the Wallkill River National Wildlife Reserve, which was home to hundreds of birds.
My last day in New Jersey started with another boardwalk over swampland.
I then stopped at a farm near the trail for some fresh fruit and a muffin. It’s amazing how quickly I’m passing through the states now!
Slower Than That Bear, But Faster Than You 