6/9 Big Birds

9.1 today, 1218.1 miles N, 955.9 miles left
Eckville Shelter

Overnight we got strong winds as I went to sleep. I thought a bad storm was brewing but I was wrong. We spent the time while drifting off watching the outline of the trees bend and sway against the glow of the sky. High winds always worry me but no big branches seemed to fall.
The day started with a 800' climb up the ridge-line. In a open rocky stretch we came across a snake. I was ahead but Dana spotted him first. She shouted to me and I jumped back. It was definitely non poisonous. We think it was a Black King snake. It took a quick sniff with it's tongue and then turned around and disappeared into the cracks in the rock.
Our first stop of the day was at Pulpit Rock which provides a great view of the valley below. We hiked a little farther to The Pinnacle which had even better views. Were as the Pulpit was a clearing in the ridge-line The Pinnacle is a protrusion from the ridge-line of maybe 50-100 yards that gives an expansive overhanging view. We decided to lunch here and did not regret a choice at all. We sat on top of a rock in the shade of a tree and while we ate we started to notice the large birds circling around the ridge there. At times I counted 15 large vultures, probably 6 foot wingspan. They circled the ridge taking advantage of the thermals and wind to fly hundreds of feet up above the ridge and then circling and drifting down until there were almost flying through trees. Dana spotted some of them had red heads so she thinks those are turkey vultures and the others with black heads are black vultures. We spent at least and hour relaxing and enjoying the birds and view before moving on.
From the Pinnacle the earlier rocks mercifully turned to old woods roads mostly and we made great time to the shelter.
Tonight's shelter is like the 501 shelter in that it has a caretaker house and the luxuries that come with it. We we got there we met Caps and I was pleasantly surprised to see McGyver's backpack. He was in the solar shower and we had a reunion a few minutes later. Dana and I bummed some liquid dish soap off Caps and took showers that left us lemony fresh. After we arrived Fidel and Blowout arrived to complete the crew for the night.
At dinner Dana and I made ramen based spaghetti and Mac and Cheese. Fidel was stocked to the gills though and we ate well from his food. His mom sends his super yummy food in his care packages but it is stuff that is largely found in bottles and cans and so too heavy to carry far. He shared some mock duck, salsa, chips, sake, and more with us. Thank you Fidel's mom! It was yummy.
The rest of the people stayed in the bunk house and Dana and I pitched our tent across the road in a soft grassy field. There are countless birds all round this field signing to us.

6/8 The Big Climb

6.1 hiked today, 1209 miles N, 965 miles left
Windsor Furnace Shelter

The day started with a lazy morning. Dana is still living in CST standard time so I woke up about before her and went downstairs to pig out on the continental breakfast. It was OK although it lacked fresh fruit. Dana joined me an hour later for breakfast. After that we cleaned up, packed up, and headed out. We carefully darted across the busy highway to get to the Cabelas in front of the hotel. There we browsed a little more. It had been an hour since I last ate so I got the munches and we checked out the cafeteria upstairs. I avoided their impressive collection of big game burgers and got a salad and slice of disappointing pizza. Cabelas will give thru-hikers a ride to the trail if they have enough people available and this what we did to get to Port Clinton.
The shuttle dropped us off at about 12:45. The clerk at the post office takes her lunch break from 12:30 to 2:00 so we had some time to kill. I had passed through the rail-yard on the way into town yesterday. We went back to look at the displays of massive hunks of coal from around PA and the restored train cars they had parked there. On a door frame a short distance away we found a massive luna moth, about 2.5" in size, that was pastel green. I took some pics as it was amazing to look at. We went back to the downtown and poked through a old fashioned candy and nut shop and bough some fudge and small candies. Dana got a great peanut butter fudge and mine was an OK Orangecile. When the post office opened I mailed the excess gear we did not need on to Wind Gap and we headed off.
I retraced .8 miles of the trail from yesterday and showed Dana how to identify poison ivy along the way. Then we started the climb. Dana has been working out so she did a lot better than many of the people starting on Springer Mountain. Still a 1000' climb is a shock for someone living in flat Chicago and so we took it slow and easy. Also the 90º temps made things even worse with both of us soaked in sweat.
After we got to the top of the ridge line we speed up making it to camp in a pleasantly amount of time before sunset. Thus far on this thru-hike I have yet have a shelter site to myself but tonight Dana and I were pleasantly surprised to have the place to ourselves.
We had a little trouble with dinner as I put the stove on a wobbly spot accidentally causing a pot to tip and none of my food was labeled but finally we sat down to a hot meal.
After that the night has been mostly uneventful. Dana's eyes and ears are great at spotting all sorts of wild life around the campsite I would have normally missed.

6/7 A happy reunion

.8 hiked today, 1207.7 miles N, 970.3 miles left

Today was mostly spent getting ready to hike with Dana. Kata-Pilllar and I went out and grabbed breakfast at a nearby resturant and then I started. First I made a pass at the postoffice where I found two boxes I was exspecting were missing. Unfortunately one had my food for the next five days so I had to replace that. Next I hiked to the road leading to Hamburg where I hitched a ride for the 2 miles into town. Once I town I set off to get as much done as I could and I did very well. The laundry, grocery, and pizza place were all next to each other so in an hour and half I managed to eat, shop for 5 days of food, and wash my clothes. Next I looked for a dentist as I have been worried about a gum problem I have developed. That took about an hour and half too since all the dentists in town seem to take the same lunch break. Finally I got lucky took a no show's appointment. I have been getting treatment for grinding my teeth and the dentist took a peek and told me it was anothe!
r symptom of the grinding. He said it would likely not get worse in the next 3 months so I will take care of it when I get off the trail. Then I headed over to the hotel where I was to meet Dana. I was really excited as we hadn't seen each other in nearly 3 months and I had scenes of cheesey movies (the run, embrace, etc) in my mind. What really happened was rather less romantic or exciting. Dana had already checked in and I got on the elevator to go to our floor. She caught me just before the doors closed. So good so far. The problem was the other older couple in the elevator. They already were showing signs of distress from my, err, aroma. As a result we had a rather muted reunion. We went up to the room where Dana was also rather focused on my hygiene. I can not understand as I had a shower only 5 days ago. ;)
I needed a little more gear so we headed out together to the massive Cabela's across the highway. There was a store like no other I have seen. It was gigantic with a small mountain in the center on which were posed at least 100 previously live animals. The people who had posed them had done a tremendous job making one almost swear that the animals were still alive. We browsed for a long while. Something I had never realized I had a need for was a cough silencer presumably to keep hunters from spooking prey. We headed back to the hotel and them went out for a romantic dinner at Taco Bell. We are both excited to hit the trail tomorrow though I hope the rocky repution of PA doesn't annoy Dana too much.

6/6 Rocky suckatude

23.7 hiked today, 1202.9 miles N, 971.1 miles left
Pavillion in Port Clinton, PA

Today I woke up to a chilly morning though still probably in the 50s. That isn't a complaint though since it is meant a cool day. After that anything positive about the hike stopped. My goal was 23 miles to make to Port Clinton tonight so that I could spend all of tomorrow getting ready for Dana's visit. The trail turned out to be the worst stretch of trail I have hiked yet! Over the 23 miles, perhaps 3-4 of them weren't uneven, sharp, shifty, hard, irregular, cold, treacherous, slippery, and/or rough. I could go on and on about the horrors of the rocks in the 501 to Port Clinton stretch but I will summarize as such; although I mentally was suffering from a serious case of TouretteKs syndrome but I only let the thoughts escape my lips once in the form of a one word sentence that rhymes with duck and could be heard 1/2 miles away.
One good part was a beautiful ferned woods. I love ferns. They are my favorite color, they tend to be in the shade, are wonderous to watch unroll from a sprout to full size, and have soft leaves. I stopped to take in this great and more importantly calming scene. After a litle while I decided a picture would be nice and took a shot and then crouched and got another shot from a different angle. I turned off my camera and got up and that spooked something I hadn't noticed. From less than 10 feet away a dog like animal about the size of a spaniel, light tan/white fur, pointed ears, a running gait that wasn't particularly fast but rather deer like (from legs, back legs, repeat), jumped out of the ferns and ran 50 feet away. Then it just walked on feeling untreatened by me. I am not sure what it was but I would guess a coyote. Very cool but unfortunatly caught me with my camera off.
The end of the day I made it to town by about the 6. The last section of trail headed down hill was astonishingly steep with me really having to dig in with my poles to keep from sliding down the packed dirt slope. The first thing I saw in town was the rail yard which had a display of massive boulders of coal as big as 5 feet tall and 10 across. Easy one was from a different mine in the state. I hit the Port Clinton Hotel bar and bough a salad and cheesy garlic bread for a snack and then walked towards the town pavillion where hikers are allowed to spend the night. A van pulled along side and I saw Anonymous. The driver offered me ride to the local newly opened outfitter (of which he was the proprietor) and I accepted. There I got fuel for Dana and I, replaced my lost iodine bottle, and picked up a map for Dana to use on the upcoming segment. Then a ride back to the pavillion. Anonymous has been wanting to replace his canister stove with an alcohol one for a while since it !
is getting hard to reliably find canisters. On the ride back we stopped to buy a couple cans of pop and at the pavillion we drank them and I made him a alcohol stove with them. The stove turned out great and also I helped him patch his ThermaRest with a patch kit he had bought at the outfitters.
I got to the pavillion after dark so I can't see who all the sleeping hikers are. For some reason no one took a mattress so I set up there. I think it is because there is a little leaf litter on top of it and it looks grungy but it is dry, smells fine, and I put a ground cloth on top. I am sure I will sleep well here.
One last thought is that I have seen no deer yet in PA. I hear PA is a real big hunting state so I suspect that is the cause.

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6/5 Ordinary Day

17.4 hiked today, 1179.2 miles N, 994.8 miles left
501 Shelter

Today turned out to be an easy day minus my general drowsiness. I think I could have curled up and napped at about any point but I wanted to get a little ahead so I could relax before I meet up with Dana on Thursday.
Early in the day I passed a water quality project to clean up the results of the mines. It was remarkably simple with a pipe taking water from upstream and bubbling it up through chipped limestone. The water leaching from the tailings is too acidic for most river life, especially fish people like to catch. The limestone disolves into the water lowering its ph. The effect is dramatic. Just up stream the water shows very little signs of life and inside the pool of water of the treatment system I saw a frog presumably happily swimming around. Shortly after that site I came across a well preserved graveyard that I assume was for the residents of the town that lay in this gap in the 1800's. What was neat were all the gravestones I could read were of people born in England who had died in the 1850's.
The trail from there on was unremarkable. There were ocasional outlooks which were much better than others of recent days. The rain seems to have really cleared the haze out of the air.
William Penn Shelter was kind of neat. It is somewhat impractical but dramatic in that everything about it makes one feel small. The shelter is about 15-20 feet tall but the first floor is over 10 tall. The steps leading up to the shelter are oversized and the picnic table even seemed to have taller legs. Though the shelter was very nice I couldn't help thinking that the same amount of wood could have housed twice as many people. I hung out there with Caps and Anonymous who cooked extra dinners they had packed before I push ahead to the 501 shelter.
The 501 shelter is named for the highway it is right next to. I almost skipped over it due to the road noise but I decided to check the register. When I hiked down the shelter's side trail I found a large building with a enormous skylight and bunks. Given it had 4 walls the noise was not bad inside so I decided to stay after all. It is deluxe having a shower, treated water, and if one had a cell phone pizza delivery.
In closing I wanted to mention the wildlife I have seen. First there was the tick on my knee. Never use Off bug repellent wipes. I used it on my knee and still had to pull out a tick. Next I saw a long slug in the trail. What I love about these and snails is the way their eyes are on stalks. If they get scared they had suck them in so they are flush with the surface of their body and then they stick them back out slowly looking to see if the danger has passed. Very cute. Finally I saw a box turtle with red eyes crossing the trail.

6/4 Bang head here

17.5 hiked today, 1161.8 miles N, 1012.2 miles left
Rausch Gap Shelter

Last night I slept poorly. I kept waking up and at 4:30 AM when I answered nature's call I just couldn't get back to sleep. Finally I read my book for an hour before taking a hours nap. It is shame too because today would have been the perfect day to sleep in. The rain that started last night continued right through to the morning. With the exception of Martini and Rossi everyone waited out the rain and finally it stopped around 9:30 AM and I got out on the trail at 10AM.
For the first part of the day I hiked with Caps. We did well going the same pace for a long while. As a result I was following close behind him deep in conversation. When you hike behind someone you have no abilty to scan the trail ahead. As a result one tends to focus on the behavior of the other person and look down at the ground below their feet for one's next footstep. That was the situation I was in when suddenly Caps, without changing pace, ducked. I started to look up but before I could I heard the sound of my head going full force into a thick tree trunk that had fallen across the trail. I hit it hard and it was a complete surprise to me. Caps heard the bang and I dropped to my knees with the combined pain of my head and general disorientation. The hit didn't break any skin but a hour later I had a 1.5" bump and some light scratches. The inital headache lasted all day. I hope it goes away tomorrow.
About a half and hour after the tree and I's firm embrace we came to a short rocky stretch. That is where we found the rattlers, four of them, trying to sun themselves in the overcast. I got lots of good pictures as Caps and Anonymous wanted to stick around for a while and be macho. They poked at the snakes and took more daring pictures. After about 45 minutes of that we go moving again. The rest of the day was not nearly as exciting as the morning though it was more comfortable. The day started hot and muggy but in the afternoon the temps cooled way off leading to very comfortable hiking.
I ended up hiking with Kata-pilllar for the afternoon/early evening. he was having a bad time of it as his shoes were rubbing a spot on his ankle raw. I was not in a hurry so I hiked with him for a while. Along the way during a late lunch we came across a campsite with some fresh potatoes hanging in a bag from a tree. I grabbed a couple to spice up dinner.
Finally it was closing in on night fall so I hiked ahead so I could set up before it got dark. Rausch Gap is an area that used to be popular for coal mining and the trail passed by much evidence of this. There were massive piles of tailing from the past mining and some small creeks run orange from the minerals that leach out. The local rocks I know can be rich in iron and I suspect the water running through the finely ground rock is is leaching it out a much higher rates than would happen with bigger pieces. These tailings did make some of the best trail surface. For about a mile the surface of the AT resembles a jogging path, firm and smooth.
I made my regular dinner and then boiled the potates I found earlier. I was full from the dinner though so I am saving them for breakfast.
There has been a flower we all have seen on the ground from time to time that seems to fall from a tree. However the flowers occur so high up in the tree I haven't been able to identify the tree in question. Well Caps just graduated with his degree in biology and solved the mystery. It is a tulip tree. The bud is orange green and white, and inch or two across, and is very durable compared to other flowers.
Tonight exactly same crew of people is spending the night as the shelter spacing here is rather bad. We had choice of a 17.5 mile day or the next shelter would have made 30.8 miles. We all chose to take the more sane choice but there turned out to be numerous campsites along the way and I am sure up ahead as well so we really had more options than we knew.
I have spotted the neighborhood mouse, I hope he is friendly. :)

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6/3 Not bad at all

11.4 hiked today, 1144.3 miles N, 1029.7 miles left
Peters Mountain Shelter

I was up so late last night that I got a late start today. I packed up and headed out. I took an hour or so to write some email. I did this while sitting on a curb near the hotel when Curtis from Standing Bear Farm, the place I stayed just after the Smokies, passed by. We said hi, he didn't remember me but then again he sees a lot more hikers than I. His season was over as the big hiker rush had already passed through so he was going around with his wife and kids looking at other hostels to see what ideas he could get from them. He told me a long list of improvments he was planning so next year's crowd will have an even better time than the pretty darn good I had. After that I got a light breakfast before heading out.
One thing I needed to take care of was my mail but it was Sunday so I couldn't go to the post office to get stamps. I asked around at the local stores but none had any so I set off with the CDs of pictures for this blog still on my back thinking next chance I would have to get rid of them was Port Clinton. I was worried I might crack a disk from the beating my pack takes.
The trail walked through town for nearly three miles and along the way I noticed a uneasiness. The people were unquestionably nice and the homes were generally well kept but there was a feeling that the town was dying. On the shore of the river was an old steel mill which was shuttered which I think likely is the source of this. It was I think the fact that many of the stores were good but obviously people weren't putting much into apearances. Also there was a near total lack of big national brands as if they thought the local market wasn't good enough. In some ways this was good as the businesses all seemed locally owned and the people working them were very friendly. None of the pubesent clerks with their mind elsewhere making the minimum wage that seem to be fixture of any big box/fast food restaurant. In the end I liked Duncannon. I am just a little uneay and worried for it.
On the way out of town I noticed I was passing within .2 miles of a truck stop. Truck stops rock for thru hikers, they have food often in the form of buffets, showers, a lounge, phones, and all the other small nick nacks life on the go requires. When I got there they did have stamps, envelopes, a fedex box, and a USPS mailbox. The envelopes were only available as multiple packs and I needed something stiff sided so I got a cardboard box and some packing tape from the cashier and made my own box for the photos. With that done I could hit the trail worry free and started making miles. At 4PM it was supposed to rain so I was hoping to make it to shelter before then. However I had the combined problems of a full load of food and the need to haul 1 gallon of water the 7 miles from a spring to the shelter. The way the water was today was similar to yesterday. The first shelter I passed had a good water source and then the shelter where I was spending the night had one labeled as 8!
00' downhill. From what I gather it is not quite so bad as I read but the trail is unpleasantly steep. I decided to carry the water between shelters to save myself this unpleasantness. At Clarks Ferry Shelter where I filled up I was glad to be passing through. The catapillars I have been seeing around at first were cute but now have turned into a nuisance. The shelter had thousands of them crawling all over. As I left that shelter I noticed the bushes were covered in them. The mountain laurel seems especially hard hit. The bushes have flowers now but they are a nearly completely without leaves as the catapillars have eaten them all. I think these caterpillars are gypsy moth ones as I have been seeing a lot of signs about the forest service dropping insecticide to stop them from mating. They appear to be a real problem that could wipe out some plant species around here.
After that shelter I had to walk nearly 7 miles with a full load a food and water, not much fun. It, however, turned out not to be that bad. The storm front moving in did obscure some of the views but there were still a few lovely spots to stop for a minute. Also the trail I was expecting to be very rocky and that with the heavy pack would have be double ugly. It turned out to be only mildly rocky with a lot of flat. I made good time over it. The last pleasent surprise was the rain. It wasn't heavy and was quite refreshing after all the recent heat.
Tonight's shelter is a cavernous space with room for 20-30. Widowmaker, Caps, Kata-Pilller,Martini, Rossi are all here so it is a friendly and lively crowd. The rain has picked up and is really coming down now but everone is in for the night so the timimg has been good.

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