Category: Long Distance Trails

We got to sleep in some this morning, not officially getting up and getting ready until after 9am. It felt so nice to sleep in! I went through the Burger King drive thru for a biscuit and then we took the car back to the rental place. We went in and attempted to bribe the man into agreeing to take us to the trailhead in the morning, instead of today. He said he couldn’t do that without us currently using the rental, but that if wanted we could have the rental another day, then when we return in the morning we could be driven to the trailhead free of charge. Well, ok then.

We kept the car. We drove down to the little downtown section and found a coffee shop/bakery to go in. Afterwards, we walked around a little bit before heading to the grocery store to grab some stuff for today and in the morning. We were back at the hotel and getting into the jacuzzi before 11:30am.

It was fantastic. We relaxed, floated, swam in the pool a bit, then got back in the jacuzzi. Today was just what my body needed. A real recovery day. Stretching and soaking. Soaking and swimming. I could have stayed in there all day. Except, we did have some stuff to do. We did a load of laundry so our stuff we swam in would be clean and dry.. along with the clothes I hiked in yesterday-especially those socks. Yikes.

We laid around the room and then sat outside awhile. We walked to Walmart across the street so I could get a new sponge. Then came back and decided we might as well have an early dinner.. so we drove over to the Mexican restaurant downtown. It was cute, but the food was bland. Don’t get me wrong, I ate all of my enchiladas regardless, like it was definitely doable, for sure, but not somewhere I’d want to back to. I would say I wouldn’t write home about it, but here I am writing to you about it now. Ha.

We got to the hotel and started packing and organizing our stuff to make tomorrow morning easier. We took turns showering. I got some Irish Spring soap because my Aunt Faye showed me a thing on Facebook saying it helped keep flies away. I’ll try anything to make that happen! So, we bathed with a new bar of that, and I cut some off to take with me on the trail. I’m planning to rub it behind my ears to attempt to keep those boogers away!

Now we’re laying in our beds, chillin. And sort of getting hungry again and debating on putting forth the effort to go get something else or not. LOL. Also, I’ve forgotten to take pictures, mainly because I’m so happy Andrea is here that I don’t like turning my attention to my phone, so I’ve just not picked it up much. It’s actually pretty nice, you know, to just enjoy the moment.

Anyway, I may fall asleep before we decide on getting more food. We’ll see what happens. Wish us luck tomorrow, it’s going to be a doozy Im sure.

Start: interstate 93 (AT mi 1820). Stop: Garfield Pond (AT mi 1829.4). Today’s miles: 9.4 miles Total AT mileage: 804.7 miles

Well, today was.. interesting. We got up at 7am and started getting ready. We packed, ate, and left for the rental car place by 8:05. The guy that promised us the ride wasn’t there this morning, but he had left instructions for the other 2 there. Once they checked in the boat, an older gentleman drove us to our starting spot. He made me a little nervous, with his wheezing breathing and questionable looking health. He drove us safely though, so what more could we want?
He thought we were nuts, but he was kind enough to drop us off along the exit ramp for the trailhead.. aka, basically on the interstate, by 8:35am. I got out of hiking that side mile to the trailhead and I am again now, simply because I have to start where I last stopped. Problem solved!

We got out and headed down the embankment to the trail. I was showing Andrea the white blazes and how to know you’re on the right one, bla bla. We passed a river and then some trails all came together (assuming one of those was the one to take you to the parking lot), when they separated back out, we were hiking up.

And that’s what we did for most of the morning. Up, up, up. The trail was kind in my opinion though. The rocks created safer steps than I had the last day that I hiked. And the trail around the rocks was soft but not muddy. The humidity was terrible though. It claimed to have been at 77% today. lol. I believe it. That was something Andrea wasn’t used to, that pretty Reno heat is nice and dry. We were dripping sweat by 9. Somehow, though, no bugs were swarming. Maybe the Irish spring soap does help.

Just before the top of our climb, we came to Liberty Springs Campsite. I said a quick “hey” to SnapShot as he came and went, he had left his trekking poles and ran back for them. Towelie was there eating and getting water. So, we got water and chatted with him for a bit, resting our legs for the rest of the climb.

It was overcast still when we made it to the top of the first climb, which wasn’t quite the top of Liberty Mountain, but as close as the AT comes to it. We couldn’t see anything but white skies. We took our time and didn’t rush. Andrea has to break in her hiking legs, and I was worried about her getting an injury early on if she pushed too hard. Plus, this is a hell of a day for day 1 in a backpack when you haven’t been backpacking like this in a few years. Those muscles need some time.. lol.

We made it to Little Haystack Mountain and then Mount Lincoln. It started getting technical here, hand over hand and climbing rocks instead of hiking them. Luckily, we did get some views for a short time up there. We found a little camp spot to sit down and eat lunch. We weren’t finished, but getting semi close to being finished when the sky decided to drop buckets of sideways water onto us. It flat out poured! We quickly jumped up and packed our food back in, put on our rain covers and started hiking-all before I finished chewing the last bite of my food. This was definitely not the relaxing, refueling lunch I envisioned for us.

The rain quit shortly afterwards, but it made the trail a slip n slide. Andrea got to experience the difficulties of climbing rocks and roots when they’re soaked. It’s not easy. And it killed our pace. We reached the summit of Mount Lafayette, and even with the mist and fog blowing through and the wind attempting to blow us off the mountain all together, I found it beautiful. The rocks there reminded me of the John Muir Trail at points.

Occasionally, the wind would blow all the clouds off so we could sneak peak a view. We hiked on a ridge for several miles, and if the clouds weren’t there I could only imagine how breathtaking it would have been. I’m jealous of those who have gotten to witness it first hand.

Coming down Lafayette was rough. Slippery and muddy. We both fell a decent amount of times, most just little slides to the butt.. but Andrea took a couple nasty ones that looked pretty painful. We were aiming to get to a shelter to camp for the night, but decided to stealth camp at this pond instead. It was just short of a mile from the shelter, and it sounded like it was going to be crowded there. Plus, I don’t think either one of us wanted to do another incline and descent to get there, and it was already getting close to 5pm. So why not just set up shop?

The pond is pretty murky, but we found a spring that feeds into the pond to get our water from and wash off. We set our tents up way back a good ways so we hopefully won’t be spotted from trail. We ate dinner, Andrea is now a fan of the ramen bomb (ramen noodles with mashed potatoes mixed in). We’re both pretty whipped from today and in bed already (it’s 7:15).

I’m hoping the terrain for tomorrow is nicer to us than today was. Although I thought today was tons better than the Kinsmans. Now we’ll have to start tomorrow with a climb, but it shouldn’t be too bad. Here’s to hoping anyway. Goodnight y’all.

Start: Garfield Pond (AT mi 1829.4). Stop: Ethan Pond Shelter (AT mi 1844.8). Today’s miles: 15.4 miles. Total AT mileage: 820.1 miles

We got up and started getting ready at 6:30 and made it out of camp at 7:20. We immediately had the climb we skipped last night by camping by the pond. Luckily, the clouds held off for us to get some decent views on top of Mount Garfield, but not for long. The rain came minutes after being on top, and stayed off and on all day. I feel so bad that the weather is so awful while Andrea is here. It’s one thing for me to deal with the misery of it.. knowing I’ll have good hiking days coming, but it’s got to be worse on her knowing she took this as her vacation, and it’s been pouring on her everyday.

The descent was steep and it seemed to take us forever to get to the shelter we originally intended for last night. After that traverse, we were both happy we stopped early. That would have probably done us in yesterday. We briefly stopped in at the Galehead Hut to refill water bottles and I used their bathroom. I tried getting Andrea to get something to eat from there, but she wasn’t having it.

We then took on the 1300+ foot elevation gain of South Twin Mountain. What a beast. Although I’ll still say it was better than the Kinsmans. The way down required us to climb down the rocks of a waterfall. Seriously. It was slippery and terrifying to say the least. The ridge line went across 2 other peaks once we were up there, but there were deep descents and steep inclines, just not as long as the original to get up there. Roughly six miles in, we passed a trail to a shelter. I gave Andrea the option to stop there for the day instead of continuing.

This terrain is far from kind when it’s this soggy and wet. She said she wanted to keep going, and I feared it was because she didn’t want to feel like she was holding me back.. but she insisted she wasn’t ready to stop yet. So, we pushed on the 9+ miles to the next shelter. I’m now thinking that was a mistake. We both ended up in pretty rough shape by the end of the day.

We finished crossing the ridge and then had a long steep descent to Zealand Hut. Just before reaching the hut, I took a hard fall on a wall off rock and about slid into the rushing water that later creates Zealand Falls. Where I fell wasn’t deep or steep, so it’s not like if I went into the water I would have slid down the mountain in it… but it still hurt like hell. It’s surely going to bruise.

I filled my water at the hut and then 0.2 miles later we were on the flattest, most well maintained trail I’ve seen in over a month. That was so appreciated. We passed a boulder field and had some views there. We walked by a river to the left and ended up spotting Snapshot and Spotts in a nice stealth site. I was jealous.

The rest of the trail to the shelter was boggy, rocky, and messy. At 6:30pm, we finally got to the shelter, only to find that it was full. We were hoping to sleep in the shelter to avoid packing wet tents tomorrow, especially since there are no shelters for a few days now. Lovely. Exhausted, we set up our tents on a tent platform that has 2 other people on it already. My tent does not like being set up on wood. Also, this morning I realized my sleeping pad has a hole in it. But it’s in a spot I should be able to patch, when I’m not slap exhausted and have more daylight to play with it.

I got us water at the pond and washed off. We changed clothes and made dinner. We talked to some people at the campsite who must be doing a guided hike or something, because they were fascinated by thru hikers. We cleaned up, put our bags in the bear box, and retired to our tents that are currently getting rained on.

It’s just after 9pm and these people are being so loud. Part of me wants to be that person to yell out a good, “can y’all shut the efffffffff up, please?” But so far I’ve managed to bite my tongue. Now that I’ve got this typed up, my ear plugs are going in and I’m going to try my best to sleep.. all the while praying this tent doesn’t fall down in the middle of the night.. and that I stay dry. Pretty big prayers. Also, I haven’t had service for 2 days, so that’s fun. Here’s to being behind on posting these journals, lol.

Thanks for being patient with me! Sweet dreams, y’all.