Day 34: Fort Montgomery

Start: Fingerboard Shelter (AT mi 1391.3). Stop: Bear Mountain Bridge Motel, Fort Montgomery, NY (AT mi 1406.1). Today’s miles: 14.8 miles Total AT mileage: 381.4 miles

I woke up to Numbers packing his stuff.. and I have to say, I had the BEST sleep I’ve had in over 2 weeks! Apparently all the hassle of blowing up the flat mattress was just a waste of my time, energy, and sleep. I should have been making a pallet and calling it a day! I did struggle to fall asleep at first because my feet were aching so much from yesterday’s awful ups and downs. At some point Derby rolled and Numbers made racket, so I got up and got my pack and propped my feet up on it.. THEN, then I drifted right off and slept until I was woken up, which was well after 6am. I’ll call it a success!

I started packing too, once Derby was up and moving. For some reason I still think my stuff makes more noise than other people’s stuff, so I never want to be the first one to cause the noise disturbance lol.. that may change. I ate breakfast and everyone was up and packing or already heading out (FarOut and HotSauce were one of the firsts up! They weren’t planning to zero so they wanted to knock out today’s hell as quick as they could to get their chores in town done). Lizard seemed to be still snoozing, so when I was headed out (last besides her), I went to let her know. She was already awake-just not up yet, and wouldn’t be far behind me.

It was smooth going for the first bit of the morning. I mean it was hot as hell already, but the terrain was nicer than it had been. Mostly smooth-ish trail with no scrambles. I passed Krash who was camped up on the hill and not out yet. A mile later, I got to a road crossing where Derby was sitting. He told me where to go to get fresh water down the hill. He carried on hiking, I hid my pack and poles behind a tree and trekked down to the campground to fill my water bottle. Yesterday’s creek crossings had a lot of tannin making the water look yellow. I wanted clean filtered water that didn’t require extra effort of actually doing the filtering. When I got down there, Finch and Smiles were there. We chatted a second and I left them, knowing I’d be seeing them again soon enough.

It was smotheringly hot. Like, you know the sky wants to bust because it is so absolutely humid that no one, even the sky, can stand it much longer. Smiles ended up passing me while I ate my lunch, and mentioned that he might get a ride from one of the upcoming road crossings and go to town, then come back tomorrow to do this next portion. Not me, I think. I don’t want to make this misery last 2 days when it can just be today (I do swear I love backpacking and want to be here.. you just have to realize you go through a lot of emotions at times. This thing is tough, physically of course, but mostly mentally.. your mentality can make or break you on this journey.).

When I got back up to my pack, I was a little mad I hiked down that hill and didn’t get any closer to my destination. Oh well, what’s done is done. I started hiking again and quickly came up on Krash, who passed me during my side venture. He was getting yellow water, and I was back to being happy I did venture down there after all. I walked and walked and went up and down several times. At some point pretty early/mid morning, Lizard passed me and I didn’t see her or anyone else (besides Krash) again until almost 6pm when I made it to the motel lol

The third huge climb of the day had me dragging. I’m talking probably one mile an hour drraaaaaaaaagging. Cussing every time I had to use my hands to hoist myself up over something. It was at the top of that third climb when the lightening and thunder started. I was hiking with Krash, who walks in a defeated “what in the hell am I doing here” kind of slow saunter.. which is hysterical and regardless of if he feels that way, just seeing his walk makes me feel like he’s commiserating with me.

We walked and talked and seemed to both know how ridiculous we are by being on a mountaintop during a thunderstorm, but I just couldn’t seem to move my feet any faster. Not to mention, it’s honestly more scary to think about being down the mountain some and getting hit by a falling tree. But whatever. We’re out there already, it’s best to just keep moving. So we did. I turned a corner and saw a gorgeous mountain with a huge firetower looking structure on top. And then it hits me. “SHIT! That’s where we’re going!” Down this mountain, across that valley and UP THAT MOUNTAIN and back down. Holy hell. I may die today.

Also of note, my phone was at a lovely 32% battery at this point (i started at 44% thanks to FarOut and HotSauce giving me a little juice so I could have enough battery for an Uber when I got to the bottom of that mountain..).
So, half way down that third mountain, the rain came. It was like watching a scary movie and hearing a wave of crazy birds coming or something.. I heard the rain way before it got to us. And I’m here to tell you, I literally teared a little, looked at the sky (through all 9 million trees) and said a “thank you” to the man upstairs, because that rain was just what I needed to cool off. It finally got to a point that I could move quicker than a toddler mid tantrum in a grocery store.

As Krash and I started up the 4th mountain, Bear Mountain, I quickly realized this is a mountain top traversed by the day hiking community. It was so well groomed, and WIDE.. and to my complete disbelief: there was not one rock scramble to be had! AH! The big guy just blessed me twice because I was thoroughly stressed about the difficulty ahead. It was smooth, albeit still slow going to the top. We made it there and there were vending machines! Lots of benches and whatnot too, but it was mid downpour thunderstorm, so those didn’t suit my needs.. but the Poweraid in the vending machine held its weight in gold! I huddled under the awning and got my phone out-which was acting fritzy due to the water droplets on the screen (it’s in a waterproof case, but the water still wigs it out). I blew on my right hand until the phone agreed it was dry enough, took it off airplane mode, and got hit with all the texts. Everyone was at the motel/hotel already and easily got Uber’s from the bottom at the resort area the trail walks through. Cool. 20% battery, I can do this!

We talked to the couple I didn’t know from the other day, we leapfrogged a few times today, they are DuckTape and Lemon maybe? I was a bit distracted by my misery to pay all the way attention earlier in the day and felt it too rude to ask her what her name was again lol. They were at the vending machines with Krash and I, and she looked like the picture of despair. I must look the way she does now when they pass me on those uphills-giving those pleading looks that say, “please just make it stop now..” hahaha I feel your pain, girl.

Going downhill was also smooth and wide and even, except it had the big stone steps that were placed there-but they’re not all the same distance, so it’s a long drop between steps at times. Those steps felt like they quite literally caught my feet on fire. It got to a point that I had to walk down by putting both feet on each step and alternating which one went first.

When we got to the bottom, I found the overhang of the spa and promptly dropped my gear and laid on the ground. I propped by feet up on one of the big stone pillars holding up the building. I didn’t have one care, and if someone from the spa was going to come tell me to move, I was going to take my sweet time. I was spent!
I waited for my hands to dry and opened my phone back up. Uber: no cars available. Seriously? Ugh. I text the group to see where they were when they got picked up. I waited awhile and let Krash use my phone since his was all the way dead dead. He made a call and I was worried it would really kill my battery.. 11%.. eeek!

The couple passes, says they’re going to walk. I think they’re nuts, then realize I’m going to have to walk, too. Ha. Oh, me. I wait 10 minutes, get my life together and start walking. When I get to the pavilion not that far away, I try again: Your ride will arrive in 51 minutes. Jesus Christ, Uber!Krash says he’s staying at the pavilion, I say bye and start walking. I get to a roundabout with no luck with my hitch game-cars are flying by way too fast. I felt like I was playing chicken when running through the roundabout to get to the correct road.. and then a cop had a car pulled over-no hitching here now, either. I carry on.

I pass over a bridge and once the railing ends I stick my thumb out, turn and smile as people fly by at 45-60 mph. I laugh, thinking no way in hell is someone going to pull over in the rain and pick my dripping wet self up. But against all odds, less than 2 minutes later, a dude pulls over with his flashers on and let’s me in his front seat! He was so nice, a teacher, with dreams of doing the AT when he retires (he couldn’t have been older than me, with all the things I see being a nurse in an ICU, I wanted to tell him not to wait, tomorrow isn’t promised, but I held my tongue). It was a quick 3 minute drive and I was at the motel, profusely thanking him for his kindness.

Derby and Lizard were in their borrowed “laundry” clothes and fresh and clean from their showers. They told me how to go get my laundry clothes, which I quickly did and got into the shower. The rain did not help my rash. At all. Like it got tremendously worse and burns in the water from the shower. Yikes.

Derby, Lizard and I shared a 3 bed room. We had pizza, watched tv (with actual commercials, been a few years since I’ve had that “luxury”), and then promptly got in our beds for the night. Cholula and Curmy were somewhere at the same motel, I saw Curmy for a quick second as I got there, and Cholula was already in their room, clean and resting her feet. FarOut and HotSauce got a room at the other hotel in town, along with almost everyone else we know.. haha there weren’t many options and no one wanted to carry on in the rain. Nine days of hiking definitely qualifies us for a zero.

I think we earned it. I’m pretty excited about sleeping in tomorrow, and I know my feet are!