Week Thirteen – Rocksylvania, it’s Insania!

Hey everyone, Victory here! I confirmed this week that Pennsylvania does, in fact, live up to its AT trail name of “Rocksylvania.” Here’s what’s been going on this week:

Day 85, Monday June 12: I woke up in the spacious second floor loft of the Peter’s Mountain Shelter to the sound of our shelter-mates stirring and packing up. I checked the time, and it was only 5:45am…why was everyone being so loud?! I resigned myself to being permanently awake and lowered myself carefully down the sturdy ladder to head to the privy. By the time I returned to the shelter the entire structure was awake except for Sunshine, who stayed resolutely horizontal until after Meadow and I left. We got a slightly early start to the day’s hike, and were on the Trail before 7:30am. We hiked for several miles until stopping for second breakfast around 9:30am, where we saw a wild rose. I photographed it and finished my breakfast bars, not knowing that it would be the last and only photo that I took that day. About fifteen minutes after our first break, the skies let loose and three weeks of rain were dropped on us in a single day. It started relatively lightly, a cool but not cold (thank goodness) rain that barely wet us through. We decided not to put our raincoats on since we were already a little sweaty from hiking, and they wouldn’t do us any good of it rained all day…which it did. Short after it starting raining, it became a light bit steady rain, and after about an hour or so we were soaked through. My glasses were fogged up completely and repeatedly flecked with raindrops, which made it difficult to see in the dim grey light. We continued our slog forward, carefully stepping over the rocky trail in full awareness that the wet conditions made the trail even more slick. After a few hours the rain let up slightly and we decided to take a break for lunch. We ate our bars while joking about how wet we were, laughing at anything and everything: the large toad we found in the fire pit as it jumped away (I chased it off the trail so it wouldn’t get stepped on), the fact that a woman who passed us looked like a porta potty (she was wearing a large, dark teal boxy poncho with a white hood…), and the fact that we were cold (so funny…). We decided that the short-term goal was to ‘Make it Out of PA with No Injuries’, and that the Long-Term Goal was to ‘Make it to Katahdin with No Injuries.’ I added that if Plan A fails, Plan B is to ‘Make it to Katahdin *With* Injuries.’ After about twenty minutes of sitting there we dragged ourselves to our feet and kept walking, just in time for the rain to pick back up again. It rained all afternoon, only picking up more and more as time wore on. We splashed through ankle-deep puddles as we slogged along, rainwater running down my face in unbroken rivulets. I kept my eyes focused on the two feet of trail in front of me so I wouldn’t trip or fall, and whenever I found myself wondering whether my gear was staying dry in my pack I pushed the worry out of my mind–there was nothing I could do about it right now anyway! Time seemed to stand still as we slogged on in the persistent deluge; for an eternity it seemed that the only thoughts I had were mental remarks about the differences in puddles on the trail. “Wow that was a deep one!” Or “Yikes, this one was a lot colder than the last four thousand pit together.” We alternated between focused bouts of silent trudging forward, and laughing about how ridiculously miserable the conditions were. This went on for hours until we finally reached the shelter we were aiming for; we got there early by 3:45pm after an eighteen mile day, coming in hot due to the lack of breaks we took in the downpour. We found the shelter was already full of people, which was a first for us! As we stood just outside the shelter, I started shivering just as the rain began to let up temporarily. We took advantage of the brief respite and set up our tent, quickly throwing it together and covering it with the rain fly to keep the inside as dry as possible. Our home for the evening set up, we changed into our dry clothes (thank goodness we didn’t bother to put on our raincoats that morning!) and climbed into the tent. I balled up my soaking socks, shirt, and shorts and threw them in the tent vestibule to be dealt with the next morning. We realized we were starving since we had barely stopped to eat all day, so we each had a huge fruit and peanut butter wrap and a protein bar. It was only just after 4pm, so we both decided to take a nap. I laid my head down on my food bag inside the dry tent and slept for over an hour, which was glorious. I woke up around 6:30 and realized we still needed to cook dinner. We heated up our water in the tent vestibule since it was still pouring out, committing another cardinal sin of backpacking. You shouldn’t ever use a camp stove inside a tent due to the risk of fire, and also because burning the fuel produces carbon monoxide and you could suffocate…burning or suffocating to death seemed like a nice change from our day of being soaked, so we risked it anyway and were eating hot food in a jiffy. As soon as a break in the rain appeared, I jumped out of the tent to hang our bear rope. The perfect weight rock and branch appeared immediately and I only needed two throws, so it seemed as of the universe was taking pity on me after the deluge. We brushed our teeth, hoisted the food bags into the air, and climbed back into the tent for a long night’s sleep amidst more rain.

Day 86, Tuesday June 13: I woke up in the tent before 6am, but wasn’t able to fall back asleep. To my great surprise and joy, the sun was shining! I hobbled to the privy, and when I returned to our little tent farm I saw that our tent neighbors were also already stirring. Frostbite, Smoke, OG Baggins, and new friends Frosty and Drive Through were taking stock of their gear and shaking out water from shoes, ponchos, and other things that were normally preferred to be dry. I lowered our food bags and packed up my stuff as well saving my freezing cold and still-soaked hiking clothes for last. I had decided to wear the same clothes again so that they would dry fast, but was not looking forward to putting any of it on! After we had done literally everything else, including eat breakfast, pack up the soaking wet tent, and filtered all the water we needed, I couldn’t procrastinate any longer. I wrung all the extra water it of my freezing shorts and t-shirt from the previous day, and then on they went. My shoes and socks were even worse, and everyone else at the campsite was laughing with me (and at me) as I put the dripping socks and shoes back on my resistant feet. Frosty fistbumped me after my shoes were on, laughing and saying that she was dreading putting her own shoes on too. This major hurdle done, we said goodbye and left the campsite. After only a mile or so, we came to a part of the trail that had been flooded by a beaver dam that the rodents had build back in 2018. There was a dry-trail bypass but we decided to stay on the main trail and at least check it out; if it were dangerous to cross we would turn back to the bypass. We didn’t find anything dangerous about the crossing even with the rains from the previous day. What we did find was a gorgeous beaver dam wetland, complete with singing spring peepers and bullfrogs, plenty of songbirds, and a few species of wetland sedges and other plants I haven’t seen in a few years. Our feet were already soaked, so we slogged right through the wetland and were able to proverbially immerse ourselves in it. We were only in the wetland for about fifteen minutes, but it stood out as a highlight of the trail so far for me!

After exiting the far side of the wetland, my shoes squishing out water with every step, we hiked a few sunny miles through forest and an open meadow. We stopped to look at something moving on the narrow path through the meadow…it was a dung beetle. An actual dung beetle, pushing its little ball of dung along the trail with its back legs. I didn’t realize we had dung beetles in Pennsylvania, but the shock quickly faded to amusement as we watched it for several minutes. Amazing!

After a beautiful wetland and a poop bug I wasn’t sure how the day could get any better…and then we saw a sign for Trail Magic. A section hiker named Jinx had left a cooler of sodas and Gatorade at a road crossing to let us know that there was Trail Magic at the next road crossing in a mile. We raced with Smoke, Frostbite, and OG Baggins to meet with Jinx, who offered each of us a root beer float (YUM!), along with some fresh watermelon, homemade brownies, and other snacks. Jinx is a section hiker and has completed over 900 miles on the AT so far, and boy was she organized. We all enjoyed chatting with her for a while before heading up the trail.

We still had almost thirteen miles to hike before reaching the next shelter. The rest of the day passed relatively slowly, with a few rocky ascents and rock fields to cross. We crossed a large foot bridge over a wide, murky river. We saw many more spotted newts, and I was able to photograph one that had a tiny bead of water on its back. We took several breaks to eat, and one longer break to take our shoes and socks off to let everything breathe for a while. We had heard that the 501 Shelter where we stayed can actually receive pizza deliveries due to its proximity to the road, and Frostbite and Smoke asked us if we wanted to split an order. Smoke placed the order when he got there well ahead of us, and by the time we reached the shelter after a 17.5-mile day of hiking there was already an extra large pizza waiting for us. Meadow and I split the entire pizza, and we as a whole shelter sang happy birthday one day early for Meadow! This shelter also had a caretaker’s house next door, with a young couple staying there to watch over the shelter. More importantly, they had a Flemish Giant rabbit that was ENORMOUS, and although Gerald wouldn’t let me close enough to pet him he was certainly fun to watch as he romped around the yard. After filling our water bottles and charging our phones a bit at the caretaker’s porch, we visited with our shelter mates for a while. We all showed off our neat wildlife videos, and I thought my dung beetle video was going to be the most exciting until OG Baggins showed his video of two giant black rat snakes mating. As per usual, the shelter went quiet around 8:45pm as everyone went to sleep.

Day 87, Wednesday June 14: I woke up in the cozy, enclosed shelter to the hustle and bustle of everyone getting ready to leave very early: around 5:45am. I continued sleeping as long as I could, but ended up getting up around 6:30am to head to the porta-privy. The actual porta-potty was just cleaned out yesterday and was therefore much nicer than pretty much all of the normal AT privies. It was already starting to rain lightly, which didn’t bode well for the day. We got packed up and were ready to leave just before 8am, and it was fully raining. I joked around that we could just take a Zero and stay in the shelter all day, but Meadow didn’t go for it. The rain was much, much colder than Monday’s rain, so we decided to put our raincoats on for warmth even if they didn’t keep us dry for long. We hiked in the rain for about two hours until we reached another (huge) mikestone…Mile 1,200! This milestone seemed almost more significant than reaching the halfway point, because now we were in the triple digits of remaining miles: less than 999 to go! Despite the cold rain we stopped at the stone “monument” and celebrated with photos and, of course, a snack.

The rain continued on, and so did we. We hiked through forests of blooming mountain laurel, waist-high ferns, and as always lots of ROCKS. We took our time picking our way carefully over the rocks, which were even more treacherous because they were very wet. At one point, another hiker was coming SOBO (southbound) with a giant poncho enveloping his entire body and his enormous pack, and he stopped to let us pass. As we got close to him, he looked around at the rocks and then up at the still-raining sky, and called out to us laughing. “I didn’t see this part in the brochure!” I laughed and called back, “You’re right, I want my money back!” We wished each other well as we passed and went our separate ways. After a few more hours of hiking the rain began to slow and eventually stopped altogether, although the clouds stayed low and threatening. We were supposed to meet my mom (hi, mom!) at a road crossing to pick up a resupply and a few other surprises, and we seemed to be taking forever to get there! Eventually we finally got to the road crossing, and as we got closer, the surprise was finally revealed: we had a huge crew there to surprise Meadow for her birthday! Her parents, some friends from back home, and a few other dear folks from “my side of the family” had all traveled to meet at the little AT parking lot for a Trail Magic Birthday Party. There was delicious pizza, Oakmont Bakery cheesecake, a cake from La Gourmandine, fresh fruit, and plenty of other snacks that we were able to share with a few other Thru-Hikers as well. Keeping the surprise for several weeks was hard, but seeing Meadow so shocked and happy was totally worth it! We had a fantastic time visiting with everyone who was able to come out; thank you all so much for being a part of the fun!! After an amazing afternoon it was finally time for us to tear ourselves away, and we said our goodbyes. We crossed the road and waved one last time before charging back into the woods to hike another 8 miles under a blue sky. We passed through another proscribed burn area, with the trees standing tall and the ocean of blueberry bushes reduced to 6-inch seedlings once more. We ended up missing the marked the taste we were aiming for, so we stopped at the next clandestine tent site we came to with aching feet and very high spirits. We completed our camp chores relatively quickly, and went to bed early partially due to the lack of cell service.

Day 88, Thursday June 18: I awoke around 6:30am to sunny blue skies and the sound of a gentle breeze. After being soaked for half a day the previous day, starting out with blue skies was an encouraging sight! We packed up camp and were on the trail by 8am, after eating a quick breakfast of protein bars. After a few quick miles we came to an overlook, where we took an early Second Breakfast break. There was an odd wooden totem pole by the overlook, and I appreciated the time and effort that someone clearly put into creating the useless thing and then carting it into the wilderness.

After a few more miles we stopped for another snack break on a rocky slope, seemingly extra hungry today. Our friends Smoke, Frostbite, and OG Baggins came barreling down the rocky trail. I joked that they must have overslept based on the fact that we were in front of them. Without stopping to chat, Frostbite said “yep, we did oversleep in the dark shelter we stayed in last night, and now we’re late to catch our shuttle into Port Clinton!” Oops! We said goodbye to them as they quicky disappeared down the hill, and then we followed slowly after them. We stopped to see the Port Clinton train station on our way into town. With our food bags full (or over-full!) from the previous day’s resupply, we were able to pass through without needing to longer in town. We crossed the Schuylkill River and went under Route 61 before returning to the forest and climbing back out of the river valley. We climbed slowly up to the Pulpit Rock overlook where we had a view of a great swath of Pennsylvania. A group of other Thru-Hikers were already there admiring the view, and they were talking about how completing the trail had become a slog for them. A young woman named Mimic said that she had to take a few zero days off the trail, just so that she could “get through the next eleven hundred miles.” Get through?! The four hikers agreed that the trail experience had lost its luster for them in Virginia, and they were just going to finish the trail as quickly as possible. Meadow and I looked at each other, aghast. We were still enjoying every moment on the trail, including the hard parts, and it seemed so wrong to be doing the Appalachian Trail almost against your will. Eleven hundred miles is a long way to walk if you hate every step! I wondered what it was about their experience, whether on the trail or off the trail, that led them to be disenchanted with it.

We hiked on for a other few miles, skipping the view at the Pinnacle because it was off a side trail and our feet were starting to hurt! We arrived at our final destination for the night, and found that there were already four tents set up there. We found an open space for our tent before hanging the bear rope and cooking dinner. We were able to get water from a very shallow nearby stream, although there was clearly a frog living in the only pool deep enough to collect water from. The water was a faint green color, but after I pushed it through our water filter it was mostly clear…Yummy! We finished our chores before crawling into the tent just before 9pm.

Day 89, Friday June 16: I woke up to overcast skies and chilly, humid air. I knew rain was in the forecast, but at least it wasn’t raining already! We packed up camp at the same time as the either campsite neighbors, and hit the trail by 8am. We had a short two-mile hike to the Eckville Shelter, mostly along a gravel road. This was the only photo I took on the morning before the rain started!

The Eckville Shelter had a spigot with running water which was greatly appreciated since we didn’t have to filter it. We filled up our two one-liter bottles, and I also filled our water bladder since we had heard that water would be hard to come by for the next two days. Sure enough, we checked the mapping app and found that every stream we would be crossing for the next day or two was still dry, even after the torrential downpours from earlier in the week. So we filled up our bottles and some extra, begrudging the extra weight in our packs. As we left the shelter and headed back into the woods, we came across another Thru-Hiker named Possum who was stopped on the trail, staring into the woods. As we approached we heard a raspy barking sound, and Possum said there was a “mad raccoon” just off the trail. Possum started barking back at the raccoon until it waddled off, visibly upset at being barked at. After hiking on with our new strange friend, he said that he thought we should have gotten to the shelter by now…As it turns out, he had also been planning on stopping for water at the Eckville Shelter, but he missed the turnoff point. I mentioned that the water situation was grim, and suggested that the distance to walk back to the shelter wasn’t that far. He said that he would just “sip” his water today and tomorrow, and that he wasn’t about to walk a half mile southbound for water…his loss! As we came to the first big climb we had, Meadow and I pulled ahead of him and we didn’t see him again for he rest of the day. At the top of the ridge after a brutally steep and seemingly long climb (but not Georgia long!), there was a 2.5-mile side trail that would have taken us to Hawk Mountain. I didn’t realize the AT passed so close to Hawk Mountain, but we would have to stop to visit another time! Shortly after passing this trail junction, the rain started. It became a steady, heavy, and very cold rain very quickly, and it continued for several hours. The sky grew so dark that it was actually difficult to see, and the rocky trail was even more treacherous now that it was wet. Before long we were soaked though, but kept pressing on. Our feet were hurting more than usual, and in particular my Achilles tendons began to protest every step. I took some Vitamin I (Ibuprofen) and kept going, far too cold and wet to consider taking a long break. Around 2pm the rain finally lessened, and the sun tentatively came out. The air remained chilly though, and still we pressed on. At one point I rolled my left ankle and it hurt way more than usual, causing my to throw my trekking poles and pack on the ground and fling myself on a rock seat to inspect the damage. I still had full range of motion and after a short while the pain faded, so it was “Back to the salt mines!” and I picked up my backpack. Just after 3pm, we reached a major road crossing at PA 309, and saw some familiar faces! My mom had met with her cousin Judy and they were waiting for us at the road. Exhausted, cold in wet clothes, and in serious foot and leg pain from the rocks, the promise of a diner meal was just too exciting to pass up, and fifteen minutes later we were seated at the Mason Jar Diner with a six-page menu. We put our socks and shoes on the roof of my mom’s car to be dried out and crisped up by the sun while we ate. Meadow and I split an order of blueberry pancakes in addition to our normal meals, and topped it off with some ice cream…yum! It was so wonderful to see Judy and my mom, and spending time at the diner really turned the day around for us! We were dropped off back at the trail just before 5pm, the sun still tentatively shining in between grey rain clouds.

We decided to hike a few more miles, which took us up and over the Knife’s Edge: a beautiful and scary rock scramble over the very top of a ridge. We were lucky that the rocks had dried in the few rainless hours of the afternoon, because the footing was treacherous enough when the rocks were dry. We made it across the Knife’s Edge unscathed, and hiked on past the Bear Rocks overlook before finding a place to set up camp. I was able to get the bear rope over a thirty-foot-high branch in three throws, which means I don’t have anything to complain about (how disappointing). After eating a small granola bar and brushing our teeth, the rain started again and we hurriedly finished our chores before diving into the tent for the night.

Day 90, Saturday June 17: The 5:30am alarm seed to go off early, and we began to pack up camp. We started the day with a very rocky section, and–what a shock!–the rocks continued for a while. We climbed a short ascent over a few miles to Bake Oven Knob, which is partially exposed large- and medium-sized slabs of rock that overlook a wide expanse of Pennsylvania farmland.The sun was trying its hardest to expel the clouds, but from our view on the Knob it appeared to be raining on the mountain next door.

The rocky trail continued for miles, which made our feet hurt faster and even more than normal. We eventually got to an area that appeared to have been strip mined in the past, with large open areas devoid of large trees. The trail was relatively flat in this area, but the rocks persisted. The sun slowly came out and shone through the open canopy. After the rains from earlier in the week, I appreciated the sun’s warmth even more. We had a few great vista views from the top of the mountain, and could see for miles.

After a few miles in the sun, we descended into the Lehigh River valley and crossed over the river via a large bridge. We dodged some high-speed traffic and scurried up a hill to an Appalachian Trail parking lot, where our friend Jerry was waiting to pick us up! We had hiked about 11 miles total for the day, ending at Lehigh Gap around mile 1260, but with the Pennsylvania rocks and the heat, we were so glad to have done a shorter day. We went to a local campground in Palmerton where we set up our tent right next to a frigid creek. We were able to grab showers and do a load of laundry, sort through our resupply, I occasionally iced my feet by wading in the icy creek, and we sat in actual chairs. The evening culminated in firing up the ole’ Coleman stove to blow up some Jiffy Pop popcorn, which I had never had before. Jerry had a tiny string of lights that I put up in Meadow’s and my tent, and we fell asleep to the sounds of the nearby creek and the traffic from I-476.

Day 91, Sunday June 18: I awoke to the sounds of birdsong and the creek, both nearly drowned out by the traffic sounds from I-476. By the time we rolled out of the tent around 6:30am the sun was already high in the sky and Jerry was making coffee. We ate a breakfast of PBJs and sausage and egg sandwiches cooked in cast iron over the ole’ Coleman Stove, which really set the bar for breakfast sandwiches pretty high!

We took some time to pack up camp and get organized before heading for a drive-through of Jim Thorpe to oggle the town, and then we headed back to the AT where we left off the day before. The climb out of Palmerton began with a climb out of Lehigh Gap, which was by far the scariest rock scrambling required on the AT so far. In several places I threw my trekking poles onto a rock ledge above my head so I could use both hands to grip the slippery rocks and use all four limbs to climb. There were large steps up that required mountain-climbing holds (which of course I just made up on the spot) and steps down that were so tall that I just slid down a rock face and hoped my ankles didn’t snap when my feet hit the rocks below. The heavy backpack threw off my balance and made it seem even more likely that I would be pulled off a ledge and fall to my death, but (spoiler alert) eventually we made it to the top and the mountaineering was over.

Once we hit the top, we were treated to more rocky trail, but some expansive views of the surrounding mountains. Due to the steepness and difficulty of the terrain, it took us quite some time to cover the two miles out of Lehigh Gap. The sun was shining brutally and the temperature reached 80 degrees relatively early, and we hiked for a few miles along more exposed strip mines. We weren’t sure if we would come across any water sources during the day since most of them were being reported as dry, so we did our best to conserve our water.

We crossed large transmission line right of way, and saw the first ripe blueberries of the hike! They were slightly smaller than store-bought blueberries but a little sweeter, and in the right of way they were growing on very short, scrubby bushes with green or orange leaves. We ate just a few to save the rest for the bears, and they were delicious.

By the early afternoon we were both thirsty and tired, but we had resolved to hike until we found water. The next shelter would be a 16.1-mile day, and that was the only place that we could even potentially get water as the springs were not reported to be dry. We trudged along, hot and dehydrated, until we hit a parking lot along the trail with still four miles to go. To our extensive relief, a Trail Angel had placed a pile of gallon jugs of clean water for hikers. Amazing! We had seen “water caches” like this along the trail before, but this was the first time we desperately needed water. I drank almost a whole liter right there, and then we filled our bottles and our water bladder to carry with us. I didn’t even mind carrying the extra weight pounds since it meant that we had found WATER!

The last four miles of the day seems to pass slowly, but eventually we reached the shelter area just after 7:30pm. The shelter was empty, but since it was down off a side trail near a public parking lot we opted to tent closer to the Trail near a few other tents. It took us about an hour to hang the bear ropes (we both had to hang our ropes since our food bags were too heavy to hang on the same rope), put up the tent, and cook and eat dinner. When Meadow was hanging her bag the branch cracked and threatened to drop, so we picked a new branch and she threw the bear rope over again. It was hiker midnight (9pm) by the time we finally plopped ourselves in the tent, completely exhausted by the events of the day.

I remembered first thing in the morning that it was Father’s Day. Throughout the day I spent some time, more time than usual, thinking about my dad. I reminisced about my first backpacking trip in college when he and I hiked 33 miles in two days/nights, which was hard for both of us back then. He took me out for ice cream on the way home, and we both got mint chocolate chip. I thought about all the stories he used to tell about hiking with the boy scouts (he had to be rescued from floodwaters via helicopter once) and in Switzerland, and I thought about how he used to tell the stories rather than just what he said. I miss my dad so much, and I wish that the AT was something that I could share with him. But I also know that I wouldn’t be hiking the AT at all if it weren’t for him. I’m still trying hard to be grateful for the time that we all had with my dad, and I hope that I’m honoring his memory by doing something that he taught me how to do. I miss you, dad…Happy Father’s Day.