Category: Long Distance Trails

Start: 501 Shelter (AT mi 1196.1). Stop: Sandy Spring (AT mi 1210.5) Today’s miles: 14.4 miles. Total AT mileage: 185.8 miles

I have to fight my grumpiness in the mornings when I stay in shelters.. because I’m naturally grumpy when I wake up, and more so when I can hear other people moving around and getting ready. It’s a blessing and a curse, like, I’m happy I hear them, otherwise I’d sleep til 10, but I also love sleeping, and would like to get some better sleep than I have been, for sure.

Either way, I was awake, packed, and walking by 7:30 this morning. We fully walked into Rocksylvania if we were ever confused about when the rocks “start.” The balls of my feet were super tender this morning. I was concerned for another blister, up around where the ball meets the toes, but the skin was so tough I thought maybe not.. until about 2.5 miles into hiking over 18 billion rocks. One step and I felt a rip and then pop. It was definitely a blister. It has definitely now popped under pressure. It definitely hurt like hell.

While I was limping along, babying that foot by trying to not put pressure towards my toes, I hit a weeble wobble rock and started to roll my ankle! Luckily I was able to bear my weight on my trekking poles and hop off of the foot all together. If not, I’m assuming I would have rolled it completely and hit the ground. My thru hike could have ended! It’s still sore now, but no worse than the throb of the blister, and it’s hardly even swollen with no bruising I can see. I’ll call it a near miss and a huge win.

I limped along slowly for the rest of the morning.. with the pain either slowly easing off or my brain finally ignoring it. We all ended up refilling water around mile 5, and then went on a hunt for the “swimming hole” the caretaker of the shelter we stayed at told us about. Lizard made it there first. She seems to get as excited about jumping in water as I do!

Once everyone got there (except NoFilter, we were all wondering where she got off to), Lizard and I went to the top of a hill where the big rope swing was. I helped pull the rope in and then recorded her swing in! It was awesome! I was too chicken to go off the rope, lack of upper body strength and all, so I walked back around to where this wall was creating the dam or pool. Another hiker jumped off the little swing by the wall, and then I cannon balled in from the wall! That water was SOOOO cold! Like teeth chattering cold! And while it was freezing, it was also numbing all my ailments. Win win.

Cholula and I recorded Derby jump in and then Randy off the long one. Lizard jumped back in, and then we all hung out and laughed and tried to dry out. It was an incredible morning. We stayed for probably an hour or hour and a half. After everyone else got moving again, Lizard and I ate our lunch while drying a bit more before starting back out. Crinkles, Randy, Derby, and NoFilter all got a hostel for the night, so they were getting picked up only 3 miles from where we were. Cholula didn’t want to undo her wrapped ankle, so she didn’t swim, Curmudgeon washed his shirt out so he was cooled off, but mostly dry.. they hiked on while we waited it out.

We all leapfrogged each other for the rest of the afternoon, and decided to camp down by the stream near the shelter we were aiming for. Lizard hasn’t shown up yet, so I assume she decided to stay either at or closer to the shelter, unless she just kept going.. the girl definitely has her trail legs!

We filtered our water here, and Curmy built us a fire to try to eliminate some of the bugs.. it helped tremendously! We ate dinner and then escaped to our tents because of the influx of bugs once the fire was out. Oh, but Cholula and I each were able to get our food bags on a tall branch we originally aimed at only as a joke.. after she nailed it on the second try, I gave my rope a go for my bag.. I took 4-5 tries, but eventually got it!

This trail life is getting equally easier and harder at the same time. Sometimes the terrain throws you for a loop, but then you come across a swimming hole that makes you so happy it overshadows all of the pain and irritation of the day. Pretty amazing how perspective works sometimes.

Start: Sandy Spring (AT mi 1210.5). Stop: Port Clinton/Shuttle to Rock ‘n Sole Hostel (AT mi 1220). Today’s miles: 9.5 miles. Total AT mileage: 195.3 miles

What a day, what a day.
I got up at 6:45 this morning and started packing up. For a first, I was too hot already to drink a cup of coffee, so instead I drank a ZipFizz and ate a cliff bar. It actually held me over quite well, so I may end up switching up my routine for this instead of breaking out the JetBoil to “cook” breakfast every morning. Another perk: I was on the trail by 7:40, so it helped speed up my morning process.. and it would have been faster still if I had actually filtered all my water yesterday instead of being lazy and going to bed, lol!

Cholula and Curmudgeon left a good 15-20 minutes before me, and stayed ahead of me all day. I knew they didn’t want to waste money on a hostel for tonight, because the only one available was a bit pricey, and curmudgeon’s birthday is coming up so they already had plans on getting a private room in the next town. I texted Lizard the second I got service to see if she wanted to get the hostel with me, and about yelled with happiness when she texted back yes! Hahaha it’s so funny how you get excited about the silliest of things. I knew I wanted to charge my anker battery pack, shower, and get some laundry done.. but I didn’t want to pay the shuttle fees alone, because it would have put me out over $100 for one night in a bunk bed, but since she wanted to, too, I’d have good company AND save some money!

Because of the excitement knowing I’d be showering and feeling clean soon, PLUS the excitement of getting into town today, getting a free shuttle to Cabela’s, AND Taco Bell.. I was on cloud nine trampling over those Pennsylvania rocks. I had not one care. I was slightly limping, and occasionally cursing when my foot would slide the wrong way on one rock to be stabbed by another.. but I was happy as hell!

The trail seemed to have more patches of “smooth straight aways” aka: 5-10 steps before a sole and soul crushing rock would pierce through the bottom of my shoe, and slightly less “every step is a rock hop.” It made for a quicker day for me than previous days, and I was able to get down to the outskirts of town (where Lizard, Cholula and Curmudgeon were all sitting at a picnic table) by 12:30 ish. With easier terrain I’d have been faster, but such is life. The Cabela’s free shuttle doesn’t come until after 1pm.. so it felt like I was right on time. And just before I made it to them, the trail has a very very steep downhill.. almost a bit of sliding involved (dear Lord thank you for not letting it rain lately, or that thing would have been plain awful). On my tap tap tap—- sliiiiideee— tap tap tap—- sliiiiiidee down, a snake also decided to slide downhill! It literally swept past my feet, rolling, ended up on its back, belly up in front of me-I’m full on terrified screaming, and trying to stop so I don’t slide into it- and then it pops over onto its belly and slithers over some. I managed a full stop and had enough time to work on some deep breathing while it was still too in the trail to move past it. I get my camera out and get some pictures as it’s finally going off trail-and just as quickly as he came barrel rolling out with me-he was gone completely from view! SOOO crazy!

We get to the hikers pavilion in town, where hikers can camp for free, to wait for the shuttle to Cabela’s. While we’re waiting, Curmy noticed 2 snakes on a rock in the stream. I take a picture of them.. they’re kind of far, so I couldn’t see colorings well.. but right as I turn on the video, one slides to the middle, one goes up to the same spot, and then one of them jumps off the rock into the water and starts swimming! I captured it all! (I’ll upload it to FB) While I was still in shock, horror, and slightly mesmerized, another, smaller looking snake came swimming fast as ever down stream too! Too quick to get a picture of him.. he reminded me of walking on those moving walkways in airports.. you feel like you’re zooming. Lol, I know, I’m weird.

Anyway, we got to Cabela’s, found some stuff we needed, and realized how much I must stink to the nicely dressed and cleanly washed folks in there shopping. I almost felt embarrassed, and then Lizard was like, “No, we’re hikers, we earned this.” Damn right we did. We’ve been working hard as hell. And my shower is coming soon!

After we shopped, we hung out at the picnic tables in front of Cabela’s like true hiker trash. Our phones were charging, and we door dashed Taco Bell to us so we wouldn’t have to walk to it. We smashed an ungodly amount of Taco Bell, so much so that as I’m typing this at 10:15pm (way past hiker midnight by the way), I’m still not hungry.

Craig, from Rock ‘n Sole hostel picked Lizard and I up from Cabela’s a few minutes after the shuttle took Curmy and Cholula back to the pavilion campsites. He even swung us by Walmart so we could quickly grab a few things we couldn’t get from Cabela’s. He’s an incredibly nice guy, and the hostel he runs with his wife is absolutely awesome. It’s on their property, has 6 bunks and a little kitchenette. His wife is going to make us breakfast in the morning, and I don’t care what it is-I know I’ll love it!

We showered, they’re doing our laundry, and we all hung out by a campfire for awhile and chatted.. Seth is another flip flopper we met here, and has fun to get to know a little bit-as much as you can in an evening anyway.
I’m all tucked in my nice comfy bed, and can barely hold my eyes open. Sweet dreams, y’all.

Start: Port Clinton (AT mi 1220). Stop: Windsor Furnace Shelter (AT mi 1225.9). Today’s miles: 5.9 miles Total AT mileage: 201.2 miles

Today just felt.. easy. Not necessarily the terrain or anything, just that the day had a chill, easy vibe. I woke up at the hostel all cozy and comfy. I was the last to wake up, but the other two were super quiet. Seth was mouselike in his packing and Lizard was still laying in her bed. When I went to the bathroom, it almost seemed like there was a relief that I was awake and everyone could move about freely and get ready for the day. I won’t lie, I was tempted to curl back up in my blanket.. but there was no point really.. my brain just always wants 5 more minutes of sleep lol

By 7:30 Craig sent a message saying coffee was ready, so the 3 of us walked over to their front porch where they set up a nice table for 4 for us. We met his wife, Jody, and she cooked us breakfast. It was delicious! And so charming in every way! We had fresh fruit, an egg, sausage, and cheese bagel, orange juice and coffee and water. Seth had toast with jam with his fruit. We were entertained by their 14 year old yellow lab, Sugar, who was quite the cute old gal.. even in her little coughing fits.. and their cat came out to greet us, too.. although Lizard and Seth took more to him than I did.

Craig took Seth to the trail first, and then came back for the two of us.. which was nice because we had no rush to get ready and could stretch and just relax. We had no where to be until 1230 when the post office in town opens, so we were taking it easy.

Craig dropped us off at the hiker pavilion, where Curmudgeon, Cholula, NoFilter, Crinkles, Derby, and Randy were. It was a great little morning reunion! While half the gang went to Cabela’s on the free shuttle, our little tramily went to the barber shop down the street to hang out. Sounds weird, yes, BUT this place was awesome to us! They gave us free coffee and cookies, let us love on their “mascot” dog, and literally hang out with them while they would randomly cut hair. We sat in chairs and talked and charged devices, read Chinese astrology things and had a fantastic time. What else was there to do while waiting on the post office to open?

When it got close to opening time, we moseyed over to a candy shop, and spent more than we should have on a sugar high. Leaving there, we walked down the main road to get to the post office and passed FarOut, HotSauce, Towely, and someone else I can’t remember.. we all caught each other up on the last couple days, told all about cabela’s and Taco Bell.. man i hope they catch us tomorrow, I really enjoy all these people!

Finally, we make it to the post office. The guy behind the counter hands me my one box, and I’m thinking there’s NO WAY my tent is in that little box. YALL! My new tent packs SOOOOO TINY! Just seeing it’s littleness in the box made my heart so happy I decided to make the switch! I sent my old tent home, a whole 4 pounds, and now I have this new one that comes in UNDER 2 pounds with the stakes and bag and everything! I’m amazed!

We repack our new things, Curmy and Cholula head on to the trail while Lizard and I finished rearranging, then we followed soon after. We followed the river for a half mile before going though an underpass. The beams had someone’s handwriting absolutely everywhere. Craig told us about this, that it was the homeless man’s writing, like his manifesto. He passed away last year, and from reading some of his writing, it was quite clear he suffered from mental health issues. His words were very dark and paranoid, it made me wonder if he was traumatized early in life and that’s what triggered the delusions and psychosis, or if that was there all along, part of his genetic make up that would have showed itself with or without trauma? Fascinating to think about, but also so very heartbreaking that someone lived under a bridge and was plagued by the awful thoughts and feelings he was writing about.

Anyway, after the bridge the trail went steeply up and then continued up some switchbacks. Lizard quickly left me in her dust while I huffed and puffed my way up. Once I made it to the top, I decided to put on my audiobook. The day was chilly, especially compared to the last week of flat out hot, and it kept threatening rain.. although none really came. The woods felt dark and almost mystical. I became so transfixed into my audiobook (The Starless Sea, a very mystical book itself), and because of how the weather felt and the way the scenery looked, the words playing in my ears seemed to transport me into another world all together. The miles flew by, in my head. Luckily it was only a 6 mile day to camp (because we got such a late start), because I glanced at my watch and realized I was hardly walking 1.6 miles per hour! This book had me totally sucked in!

Once I got to camp, the others were setting up and chatting.. I got to set up my new tent! It’s not 100% perfect tonight, but it’s pretty darn close! It feels HUGE and so spacious! I’m so happy I made the switch!
We all ate dinner around an awesome fire Curmudgeon built and we chatted about any and everything. It’s funny how I set out to do this “alone” and I’ve rarely been alone and never once actually felt that way. There is such a sense of community with fellow hikers, and this tramily I’m in is a pretty sweet one. We know we won’t stick together every day, per se, but we all agree it’s nice to come together at the end of the day. I’m definitely the slowest hiker in our little group.. but I kinda like showing up after everyone else. It’s hard to explain, but I feel like I don’t miss anything this way. If something happened ahead of me, I’ll come across it.. it’s like I feel safe knowing where everyone is.

Anyway, I’m off to sleep in my new tent 😉 let’s all hope I staked it out correctly and the whole thing doesn’t fall on my head at 4 am.. hahaha