AT Day 56

Miles Today: 25.4

AT Mile: 1020.1

(Clarion Inn, Harper’s Ferry)

Two days ago I realized that I’m going to get into Harpers Ferry well before Boots arrives. It was three weeks ago when we arranged to reconnect up here, and at the time I just loosely projected my miles up trail, thinking that it would be impossible for her to make the drive up. But to my surprise, she found the time off work, and we put it on the calendar.

This is to say that I wasn’t perfectly accurate with where I was going to be on the 8th, but I just gave it a “shot in the dark” and told Boots that I’ll be around Harper’s. If I’d looked at the maps a bit closer I would have realized that I’d be farther north by this weekend, but after she said she could make it happen, I went ahead and booked the hotel in Harpers and just accepted that I need to slow my miles a bit between now and then, lest I end up north of Harper’s when she arrives.

When I realized that I’m still ahead of schedule, in spite of my attempts to slow my progress, I texted Boots, basically asking if there’s any way that she’d be able to make it to Harper’s before Friday. She said no.

Then, this morning I woke up to a text asking “If I do make it to Harper’s tonight, where would we stay?” She’d managed to get the day off work and was headed north a day early.

All this to explain, I’ve been dragging ass these past two weeks, so as not to get to Harper’s too early. Then this morning I got the message that she’ll be arriving a day early, and all the sudden I needed to get toot-scooting-and-boogying.

It was about 30 miles to get to Harpers, on a late start, but there was a road where I was able to get a hitch into town, 7 miles back from the entrance to Harpers. So I ended up not having to do that 30+ mile day (thank god), but still made it to the hotel before Boots, so that I had time to clean up, get checked in, and settled into the room.

She’ll be here in an hour or two.

It’s a 9 hour drive north for her.

—

Between that morning text and this journal, there were a lot of hills and a lot of sweat!

Today was the Appalachian Trail “Roller Coaster.”

I remember hearing about the AT Roller Coaster all the way back in 2019 when I was hiking the CDT. The guy I was hiking some of Colorado with, a guy named “Hemlock”, told me about this section of AT trail that is just up and down and up and down and up and down, for 15 miles. It was the first time I heard of “PUD” (Pointless UPS and Downs).

Well, there’s been talk for the last week about this upcoming “Roller Coaster” but it wasn’t until talking to a hiker last night that it came to my attention that *today is the day*!

Before getting to the start of the Roller Coaster, I noticed a marking in the sand where it looked as if someone had scratched their name in the dirt with a hiking pole.

I was reading it for a moment, trying to figure out what it said, then realized that it said “Bees!”

I remembered someone yesterday telling me that he saw some other hikers at the beginning of the Roller Coaster and they “had just been mauled by bees.”

“Excuse me?” I asked. “They were *what*?” I was pretty sure that I’d heard him correctly, but I’d never heard the term “mauled” applied to anything smaller than… let’s say… a pit bull. I’d never heard of being “mauled by bees.”

It pissed me off right away. It was more of that fear mongering shit that gets under my skin way too easy. But I also tried to brush it off. Apparently not well enough though, as my attention was on trying to get through that little stretch of trail without being stung, and I didn’t even notice the sign on a tree that said I was beginning the official start of the Roller Coaster. I only saw the sign after 15 miles, the sign on the other side, welcoming NOBO hikers to the end, and welcoming SOBO hikers to the beginning.

I may have been more freaked out about the bees after being stung two days ago. It was my first bee sting of the trail, and I still don’t know if that’s what it was. But I’m pretty sure–a bee or a wasp or something.

Didn’t get stung today though. It was still early in the day. The air was still cool. The bees seemed to still be dormant.

—

So I got through the “bee mauling area” without taking any bee stings, but I did not get the Roller Coaster as smoothly.

It did a number on me!

The temps were hot yesterday, but today there were intollerable. I knew that the heat out here was going to be different than the heat of Arizona. I understood the concept of humidity. But I also understood that I wasn’t going to know what I was getting into until I was in it. I’ve said that same thing about the AT as a whole. I needed to get out here before I could understand it.

Well, my cheerful friend… I feel that I can now say that I know what it’s like to hike in the humidity and heat of the Eastern US. Not pretending that today was the worst that I’m going to see this summer, but today absolutely was the worst humidity I’ve ever hiked through!

I was fucking soaked today.

Pardon the profanity, but I don’t know how to express the difficulty of today without it. Maybe someday I’ll be a better writer and have more words at my disposal to describe misery. Until then however, I’ll have to stick with this: It was fucking hot and humid today, and I was fucking soaked!

I started the day hiking in my sun hoodie. But dear lord, that didn’t make it far. Within an hour of hiking I did something that I *never* do, but I tried it today–hiking without a shirt on. I feel like such a douche like that on trail… but it was just unbearable. I was so wet that I was dripping sweat with every other step. But after awhile without a shirt, I decided that I needed to wear at least something, so I put on my town shirt–the short sleeve green shirt.

It was soaked through in less than 10 minutes.

For the next 15 miles, the trail went up and down nearly the equivalent of the Grand Canyon, except in intervals of about 1-2 miles at a time. Up. Then back down. Then up. Then back down again. Then up… you get the picture…

In the heat, it was rough.

I knew there were going to be hard parts on the AT, but this was one of the roughest moments I’ve experienced on trail. Norovirus sucked. That bacterial infection from day 10 sucked too. But dude… the heat and humidity today… I don’t know how to put words to it.

Three times today, amidst the heat and the humidity, I had a bug fly directly into my eyeball. Not sure why a bug decides to do a B-Line at my eye like that, but it quite sucks to be so sweaty that you’re basically looking like you just stepped out of the shower, then have a bug kamakazi it’s way into your eye, so you have to pick little mashed-up bug pieces out of your eyeball for five minutes…

All this to say, the trail sucked today!

I crossed the AT 1000 mile marker today, but barely had the will to take a picture of it. I was miserable.

Sweat was pouring off my face, I’d wipe it with a towel, and before I could get a picture, it was beaded up on my face again.

The heat was just miserable.

And I know that there’s a lot more of it to come this summer…

On of the problems I have with the heat is foliculitis. It’s a skin condition that I’ve had as far back as I can remember. Most of the time it’s literally a non-issue, but if my legs sweat and don’t have ventilation (like with shorts), it causes them to break out very badly. It’s a lot of the reason that I wear short-shorts on trail. They mostly don’t collect sweat, and they keep me from having breakouts on my legs. But today’s heat and humidity was enough that even my little running shorts were drenched before 10am, and were rubbing against my quads, starting to lead to chafing.

The only way I could make things so the shorts weren’t bothering me was to take the side seam of my running shorts, roll them in, and tuck them into the leg holes of my briefs. In other words, I made my short-shorts into *even shorter* short shorts. Basically they just covered my ass and diddly-bits, leaving my full upper legs exposed to the open air and ventilation.

It helped, but it also looked like I was hiking in a Speedo. The few times I saw other hikers I pulled the tucked part out of my briefs so they fell to their normal length.

Even with that however, I can already tell that my thighs are starting to break out from the accumulation of sweat through today… and although I’ll spare you the wonderful details of this next bit… I have entered The-Land-of-Ass-Chafing. It’s never been an issue on any of the 8,000+ miles I’ve hiked before this. But now that it’s too humid for sweat to evaporate, everything is soaking wet and just rubs and burns in ways that it doesn’t when I’m dry.

Dude… today sucked.

Good thing I had something to look forward to.

—

About have way through the day, right as it was HOT, I got a text from Plinko who had gotten out of camp before me this morning. He said that he’d stopped at the road side restaurant up trail and that it had AC and cold beers. So I made the .3 mile detour to join him and get out of the heat.

Sitting there and enjoying a burger and NA beer, I looked at my maps more clearly since I was out of the heat. That’s where I saw that I could get a ride to hotel in Harpers from 7 miles before town, thus giving me time to get in before Boots arrives tonight at 10pm.

I was also starting to get some ass chafing at that point in the day, so plotting a way to get off trail early also saved me a lot of pain which would have been 7 more miles of this today. Thank god this worked out, and I can hike those remaining 7 miles into Harpers with Boots tomorrow. We’ll just take a shuttle back down trail to where he picked me up today and finish up the last bit of Virginia together.

I would have stayed at the bar a bit longer, and soaked up a bit more of the AC, but right as I was starting to munch on my burger and absolute drunk stepped in and started making a scene. It was about 1 in the afternoon, but from what I could tell, he seemed to have started drinking at about 1 in the afternoon YESTERDAY.

As he stepped in he made a comment about worrying that if he sat too close to me that people might think we’re gay.

“Maybe I am gay.” I said in response, and it was clear that nobody had given him that before. This was one of the “good old boys,” for whom the word “gay” is an unacceptable insult. So to have someone taking that insult and saying “maybe I am gay” was something he’d never heard before. Didn’t know how to respond. The 25 beers that he had in his system by then didn’t seem to help his quick wit either.

Within 5 minutes Plinko and I both left back to the road walk and back to trail. Plinko made comment that the drunk had probably never experienced push back like that from someone at that bar. Seemed to be more the places where other drunks gather to slur their words and barely listen to the other party.

I told Plinko that I not only doubted anyone had ever given that guy any lip like I had, but that was probably too drunk to realize that I even was giving him lip.

I digress… bar culture just fucking sucks.

The only other true “bar” that I’ve been to on this trail was in Damascus; a guy told me he’d buy my meal for me there, so I joined him. But while I sat there drinking an NA beer and burger, someone at the bar used the “N” word twice within 5 minutes.

I haven’t spent a lot of time in my life at bars like that. The AT has taught me I’m not missing much.

—

I’m at the Clarion Inn now, waiting for Boots. She’ll get here a little before 10… an hour still.

It’ll be the first time we’ve seen one another since meeting beside a fire, on mushrooms, at Trail Days. The little bit of time we had there was nice, but I know we’re both looking forward to having more time this weekend in Harpers to get to know one another better, do some hiking, and be tourists.

She’s been single for some years not. Like a lot of women, got treated like shit by the boys she’d been dating for some time, and basically said “fuck this” and hasn’t been dating for a few years. Which is why it was so hard for me to knock down the walls she had up to try and get to know her there. Since Trail Days however, we’ve both been a lot more open towards one another, and as such, the time we’ll have here in Harpers will be much different than what we found in Damascus.

Since she’s driving so far and we may not be able to see one another for the remainder of the trail, I’m taking the rest of the week off to spend with her.

Tomorrow we’ll hike those 7 miles into Harpers, like I said, and then we’ve got the rest of the weekend to be tourists. There’s history stuff, river floating (maybe), and just relaxing off trail.

My dad told me to have fun and not get married. I’m planning to follow both pieces of advice.

Probably won’t write every day this weekend. Will probably just write after I’m back to trail.

Wormwood.

AT Day 55

Miles Today: 23.79

AT Mile: 996.0

(Rod Hollow Shelter [tent])

Part 1:

All I can do is laugh and ask the rhetorical question of “are you fucking kidding me?” Over and over again. Let’s be real now–thru hiking can suck sometimes. Digging cat holes, waking up at night and crawling out of a tent in the rain to piss, running out of food, getting your gear wet, carrying food and water weight, dealing with stings and bites and scrapes and ticks. There’s a lot of shit out here that isn’t fun…

But I feel like after letting go of so many of those things that make us human, this trail and my exeperience of walking it have turned into something different than they were at the beginning. For that matter, I am continuing to turn into something different than I was at Amacaloloa Falls. I like this thing that I’m becoming. After you get past all the rough stuff, of which there is a lot, thru hiking is such a beautiful thing. So much that it’s unbelievable. It’s magick!

Remember that lady hostel owner I wrote about a couple of days ago–the one who was full of self-help advice and 2-hour hitches to get 7 miles? Well, I also said that she had some good stuff in here speeches, and here’s one of them: I asked her, if she could go back to when she was about to turn 40 years old and give herself a piece of advice, what would it be.

This is what she said: “Everything is going to work out exactly the way that it’s supposed to be. It might not always be the way you *want* it to be, but it’ll turn out the way that it’s meant to be. You just have to let it happen.”

Further reinforcement of that “serendipity” idea that’s made up so much of this hike.

Yesterday I met another hiker who is finishing his Triple Crown on the AT this year. It’s weird, because I met my first other one the night before, then I met him yesterday morning, after going 53 days without seeing anyone in my same situation. I’d been hearing talk up trial of at least one other hiker who would finish their Triple in Maine, but had yet to find one.

This second hiker’s name is Plinko, and he seems like a good dude. I saw him at trail days and noticed he looked like he had a lot of miles under foot, but we never talked until yesterday when we were both waiting for the grill to open. I got a tall boy NA, and he laughed about it before stepping in and getting one for himself.

It shouldn’t be a surprise that I connect with Plinko way better than I have with other hikers I’ve met on trail so far. We both have a lot of shared miles at this point, and in spite of not meeting one another until yesterday, we’ve had a lot of shared common experiences on the AT as well. Somewhat of a wonder that we didn’t run into one another until now. I started my hike on April 11; he started on April 13.

One of the other Triple Crown hikers mentioned that they started with another Triple Crown finisher, but that person only made it about 200 miles in before, in his words, “They left the trail and said ‘fuck this shit.’ Didn’t like the green tunnel and the climbs and all that stuff.”

Funny–I relate to that hiker. I obviously didn’t leave the trail because of it, but I felt those things early on as well. I remember sitting in my tent with Norovirus in Hot Springs and thinking that I didn’t like the AT, that maybe I wasn’t going to learn to like the AT. There were a lot of times where I was lonely and wet and simply not enjoying it.

I don’t feel that way now, but I can see how someone could hike the PCT and the CDT, and then come out here and hate everything about the Appalachian Trail. This trail isn’t like those other trails. I understood that to be true when I was pushing out those 30 mile days in the first month of my hike, but I didn’t realize how I was missing things. Still, I don’t regret anything about that month (except maybe catching Noro?), but I am hiking very different now.

I did the math this morning to see what kind of miles I need to do to get to Harpers Ferry by 6pm on Friday to meet Boots, and it’s 17.3. There wouldn’t have been any way for me to slow my miles like that in the first month. Now it even seems challenging, but here I am, making it happen.

I looked up trail on the maps and saw that there was this BBQ roadside store just off the trail at mile 7 today, so that’s where I set my sights, and that’s where I’m sitting now, with my belly full of BBQ and a half dozen donuts that I split with Plinko (we met on trail again this morning about a mile before the road crossing to this restaurant).

It’s a bit hot and humid outside, so neither of us are feeling bad about posing up in the AC here where we can much calories and recharge electronics.

That said, we’ve been here for about an hour, and I suspect that in the next 30 mins we’ll probably head back to trail.

There’s another one of these trailside restaurants 25 miles up trail from here–just short of Harpers Ferry. I’ll of course have to make a pitstop in there tomrorow afternoon. Good lord, I’m not going to be able to fit into these trail shorts by the time I get to Harpers, at this rate.

I’ve also decided that if I get to Hapers on Thursday or early on Friday that I’m just going to push a few more AT miles north of town and either hitch back to meet Boots at 6pm or have her meet me up trail and bring me back to town. Either way could work. Either is a good option.

Alright. Back to trail here shortly.

Will write more tonight.

—

Part 2:

It has passed the point of being “warm” now. We’re into the month of June, and it is *hot*! I knew that the heat out here was going to be different than the heat of the desert southwest, but also that I wouldn’t understand exactly what it’s like to hike in this kind of heat and humidity until I get out here and into it. Today seems to have been the first of what will undoubtedly be a lot of hot days I’ll see this summer.

It was so nice to dip off trail and into AC from 11 to 1:00 today with Plinko. We lingered there at the table, sipping Diet Pepsi and recharging battery banks than the time it took us to finish the gratuitous meals that we each ordered. The place was also known for their powdered apple donouts. You know we got a half dozen, and although Plinko promised to eat three, I ended up with four. Not sure how the math worked out on that, but my belly was happy about the transaction.

The hitch both there and back were both pleasantly easy. Plinko and I, both having hiked the CDT before this trial, know what it’s like to be at a hard hitch that can take an entire day. In total we probably spent 7 minutes with our thumbs out.

When we got back to trail however, it was hot hot hot.

Enough that this evening, after I set camp, I walked back to the creek, collected water, and used my “shower head” that I made for the trail. It’s basically just a screw-on cap that disperses the gravity feed bag like a shower head for about 70 seconds.

It was cold, but the cold was also nice, and I felt much better after doing it. I knew that I would. The hiker who was there at the shelter, by where I was showering, commented that he has just become used to the wet stickiness of hiking in this weather. I told him, “fuck that.” I don’t like being wet and sticky on trail if I can avoid it!

—

Saw my first copper head today.

A few days ago I was hiking and thought I saw a really big black snake in the trail. It turned out to be just an electric cable. But when I saw this one today, it looked much different than any snakes I’ve seen on trail so far. At first I thought it might have been a rattle snake, but then saw with no rattle, but a diamond-shaped head, it was a copper head.

I scooted it off the trail with my hiking pole, and we both went on our way.

—

Tonight was the first night that I’ve seen fire flys since I was a little kid, on vacation to visit my grandparents in Louisiana. It had to have been more than 30 years ago!

They were starting to pop off while I was showering by the hostel. Someone had asked if I’ve seen them, a few days back, and I said no. But tonight they’re all over around the shelter and where I’ve set my tent.

—

Only saw two other hikers today, except when I got to the shelter. There are probably another 5-7 here; hard to tell because many of them are already in tent by the time I got here at 8:30. Hikers sleep early on the AT.

But both of the hikers I saw today made comments about the pushup thing. The section hiker I saw last night at the shelter where I had dinner asked about it when I passed him this morning. Said, “where you doing pushups there, after you had dinner last night?” Plinko was standing there too as the three of us chatted at the road crossing. I told him the ten pushups, per mile, per day thing and that I had yet to lose any weight on trail. Plinko remarked that was testimate to the efficacy. I also said that I try to eat protein, but that pushups seem to be making the difference.

It’s about 30 miles to Harpers Ferry from here. I could push that in one day if I wanted, but I’d like to get in around noon on Friday (2 days from today). So I’ll likely push another super casual day tomorrow, and have only a few miles for Friday. There’s another trailside restaurant tomorrow, but I don’t know if I’ll stop there or not. Who are we kidding? Of course I will.

Wormwood.

AT Day 54

Miles Today: 28.92

AT Mile: 973.1

(Bear Hollow Creek [tent])

For some reason I had a hard time staying asleep last night. Kept tossing and turning after I woke up to pee, sometime around 1am.

When the birds started chirping I put in ear plugs (which prove to be incredibly effective) and I took my beanie hat, and rolled it down over my eyes like a sleep mask. I’ve used this set up a lot of mornings on trail and it always seems to yeild results. Another hour or two of sleep by blocking out the sun and the birds from 4:30-6:30am.

It was only 7 miles to my last wayside stop of Shenandoah National Park, and it was only a minute’s walk off trail to get there. Unfortunately, the grill part of the wayside didn’t open until 11, and I arrived just before 10. But I wasn’t going to miss my last opportunity for a Blackberry Milkshake, and the store part of the wayside was open. So I killed time and waited.

And by “killed time and waited,” I mean I ate Lucky Charms cereal and drank Tall Boy NA beers. Ladies and gentlemen, we have reached a noteworthy point in our world’s history when we now have NA’s available as tall boys. God bless America. Or something…

By the time 11am rolled around there were several road bicyclists who had just rolled in, and one of them bought my milkshake for me. I felt like a sorority girl at a bar, getting drinks bought for her. It was flattering. But also weird, because I felt obligated to talk to the older gal who jumped in and ordered a second shake as I ordered mine–“Make that two,” she said. “They’re both on me.”

But I felt like the exchange of a somewhat awkward conversation was worth the $8 milkshake. And I did enjoy talking with her. Just didn’t know what we were jumping into until we were already in it. Another dude chatted me up while I was there waiting for the grill to open, and of all the things you could ask about the AT… he asks, “Have you found any good weed on the hike? I heard there’s a lot of weed.” He said it in a hush tone, as if there was some kind of secret in the air. But we’re in Virginia–a recreational legal state. So I don’t know why he was acting like it was a big deal.

I told him that, yes, a lot of hikers on this and most long distance trails smoke. But also that it’s incredibly difficult to find in Virginia, in spite of it being legal. I refrained from sharing with him my other drug related stories from the trail.

On that note, this is now 4 days without the use of psychedelics on trail. The reset has felt refreshing, day by day. I’m glad to have taken a break.

—

Later this afternoon I met another hiker whom I have not seen in over a month. He’s an older German dude, and we met on day 5, just north of the NOC. We hadn’t seen one another since day 9 though–when I was hitching into Gatlenburg for resupply and great-American-adventure. But we both remembered one another instantly.

One of the first things that he remarked, in his somewhat funny accent, was that he’s “surprised that you don’t have a harem of women with you by now.” I laughed, because I remember the day we met. I was on mushrooms (as I’d continue to be for the following 40+ days), and I was playfully energetic. I was still fresh to the trail too. We met one another at a hostel where he was stopped for lunch. I cracked an NA beer (this was back when I was still carrying them out of towns), then hit my pushups. He made a remark about remembering when he was young too, and I howled like a coyote or something. Told him that I had to get up trail, as I’d heard about a couple of cute hikers who were just ahead.

Apparently the encounter stuck with him as well, because all this time later, he still remembered it, and it was the first thing that he brought up–that he expected me to be with a harem of women by now. Hallariously inaccurate, but the image of it brightened my day.

Spec on the other hand…

Now if there is any hiker on trail who’s collected a “harem of women,” it’s that guy… I’ll leave the story for him to tell though.

I told Navigator a bit about the story from Trail Days, and that I’ll be seeing Boots again this Friday in Harpers Ferry. He was surprised to learn that I’d be chasing a girl who isn’t a hiker, but I corrected him. “Not a *thur* hiker,” I explained. “But she does hike.”

—

Can we take a moment to appreciate how much I’ve learned to hate whatever species of silk worms are dangling from the tree branches out here?! I don’t know if there was some kind of hatch this week, or what, but there were a couple of miles today where they were *everywhere!

They’re these little inch-worm caterpillars that produce a thin spider-web-like string that they repel down from the trees with. The result is hundreds of these little fucking worms, hanging from invisible threads from the tree branches, all through the trail. I’ve had them here and there on trail up to today, but there was a time today where I had to literally walk down trail swinging my hiking poles in front of me like I was sword fighting ghosts or something. I’m sure if anyone saw it they would have assumed that I was absolutely out of my mind. And to think–this is when I’m *not* on mushrooms!

They were so bad today that as I started flicking some of these worms off of me, I counted eight of them all at once. In total I must have collected 30 or 40 of them in those few miles!

God I was sick of them.

And on the topic of critters that I’m not too fond of, there’s something that stung me today. I don’t know what it was, but it was bad enough that I dropped my hiking pole immediately and swatted it off of me. It must have been a bee or something, because there’s a bit of swelling in my ankle now, and a very clear red dot where it stung me. Hurt like hell for a few minutes, but even a few hours late now it still hurts some. Such is life out here…

—

It’s come to my attention that I’m most definitely going to get into Harpers Ferry before Boots. She won’t be able to get there until Friday evening around 6:00, and as I’ve been reading maps today, it’s looking like I might get there as early as Thursday night. No real chance that she can get there any earlier, and I thought about hiking on, then hitching back the following day, but I think that just makes more difficulty than it’s worth. So my plan is to just chill in town until she gets there. I might even stay in the hostel Thursday night unless I can figure out how to slow my progress between here and there.

Getting tired as I write. That tends to be the case with these most nights.

Will write again tomorrow.

Wormwood.