Day 32: The Beermile challenge

My appetite has ramped up considerably. Shortly after a pancake breakfast at the RPH, I had a pint of ice cream, a calzone and a 20 oz soda and an energy drink at a deli.

Then came the beer mile challenge. This means we packed 12 beers [9 pounds] in each of our packs and hiked 12 miles, finishing a beer every mile.














[Me, Early Bear, Col. Mustard, Mississippi and Lil Dipper, July 11.]














[Halfway through!]

There were rhyming toasts, some jokes and a lot of singalongs. At the end, we made it to the Telephone Volunteers shelter just moments before a storm hit and in time to make dinner. More ramen!

Crossing the Hudson

[The Appalachian Trail crosses the Hudson River in New York via the Bear Mountain Bridge, July 9, 2009.]

Day 30: Trail Magic all day!

I hiked a whopping 6.4 miles from Ft. Montgomery, NY to the Graymoor monestary on July 9. The night before ended at a motel in Ft. Montgomery, where I shared a room with Z, the Romanian, and Early Bear and Lil Dipper also split a room. I had met all of them at a pub in town after descending Bear Mountain.

At Graymoor, Samwise and the Babes in Boots group [the twins plus Half Moon and Sunbeam and Squeegie] did some trail magic, along with Samwise's mom.

Samwise left the trail in Duncannon. He has rejoined it as of today, July 13, in Kent, Conn.

They made a cake:














The day was one long hiker picnic, with hot dogs, Yeunglings, channe massala [Indian vegetarian dish since Samwise is vegan] and a bulgar wheat dish, cherries, yadda yadda yadda. Chance and I triumphed over Early Bear and Lil Dipper in Euchre, the game of Ohio.

Next morning, the landscaper came by on his lawnmower at about 8 a.m.














[The pavilion at Graymoor monestary in New York, July 10. Chance in foreground, Half Moon in background.]

I see you, NYC

[The NYC skyline from the hike up to Bear Mountain, NY, July 9.]

Day 28: Hardest hike so far

Any day that starts with me being malnourished and dehydrated and includes four mountain climbs, two thunderstorms and an episode called the "lemon squeezer" is bound to be bad.

I'll have art on the day as soon as I get fotos from a fellow hiker via email.

By consensus opinion, the 14.3 mile stretch of trail from Wildcat shelter to Fingerboard shelter, in the beginning of New York, is probably the hardest hike since Harper's Ferry. Experienced hikers struggled to get above a 1.5 mph pace. I was finding it difficult to catch my breath and my legs burning with each step up.

At night I slept in the Fingerboard shelter, which is an old stone structure on a windswept and grassy ridgetop. Early Bear and Lil Dipper were there, as well as two hikers I didn't know, and Z showed up at some point in the night.

I also finally learned how to tie a bear bag thanks to Early Bear.

Ramen noodles never tasted so good.

Day 27: Breaking my distance record

After zeroing for two days at "the Mayor's house," I got back on the trail after breakfast on July 6, and by about 11 p.m. I had broken my distance record, hiking 29 miles [24.7 was previously the farthest I'd gone].

Breakfast was always the same: two sausage patties, a plain omelette, a fried potato pancake and two pieces of toast, with orange juice and coffee. I hiked out at 7:30 a.m. and about 11 miles down the trail, I tore through three scoops of ice cream at a farmer's market and fell asleep on the patio.

I moved to a more comfortable set of wicker furniture down the way when I woke up, and there I took in a mockingbird's performance. A group of hikers who had slept outside the mayor's house in tents the night before showed up and two hours disappeared.

I hiked out at 2:30 p.m. and the first climb took me to the top of the ridge I'd been looking at from the market porch and fearing. At 5, I reached the Wawayanda shelter, the last shelter in Jersey, which is 17 miles from the mayor's house. There were no tent sites and no people, and I felt wired, so I hiked a further 12 miles just for the satisfaction of getting Jersey behind me.

At about the state line I got out my nalgenes and dumped some orange drink into one of them and swirled it around. When I tasted it, I coughed uncontrollably. The other bottle was also contaminated with what must have been chemical residue from the inside of the hose from the mayor's house. I dumped them both out. A few miles on I sat down exhausted, verging on dehydration. I eventually got water from a stream.

It was about 11 p.m. when I got to Wildcat shelter in New York. I found the privy, then the bear box, but never the shelter, despite my headlamp and wandering. So I stashed my food and stuff in the box and crawled inside my tent feeling full of drive.

One Month!

July 10 marked my one month anniversary of hiking the Appalachian Trail. Thanks to everyone who has participated in the hike;I love getting your input.

As it happens, the anniversary turned out to be a good one. I spent it at the RPH shelter in New York, where a big group of trail volunteers were camping and grilling pork chops, burgers and chicken. I even got a game of hearts in with Chance, Mississippi and Bon Bon, a girl from Washington state who started in Georgia on April 17. Early Bear, the hiker I'd shared a shelter with on Day 1, was there as well.














[The cooking at RPH, July 10. The shelter is 33 miles from the end of the New York portion of the trail.]

In my first month, I hiked about 406 miles through West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York and got to within 761 miles of Katahdin, ME. It has been the experience of a lifetime and I'm looking forward to 200 percent more, and then 300 percent more when I do the bottom half of the trail.

Days 24 and 25: Hospitality

I am able to update this blog today because I'm at the home of Dick Ludwick, former mayor of the village of Unionville, NY. It's not in my guidebook, but it's widely known on the trail that Dick hosts hikers free of charge.

He has done so since 2007, mainly in honor of his late wife. He works with two other men, Butch and Bill, who help do the chores and cook the dinners and breakfasts. None of them have ever hiked the trail, but they admire people who do.

His house even has a couple of trees in the yard with white blazes on them to guide hikers to the door. At the deli in town they wear the T-shirt that advertises his house as "The Outhouse" for hikers, and they tell hikers how to get here. That's how I got here.

When I did get here, the place was filling up rapidly, and hikers kept arriving until we matched the record of 26 hikers for one night. It was almost a reunion of Palmerton.

Every night, he gives hikers a brief speech about the house rules, why he hosts and then plays two inspirational films: One about "Britain's Got Talent" winner Paul Potts and another about two men who did the trail to celebrate their 60th birthdays.

[After the hiking film, Leif e pumped his fist and shouted, "Yea! Let's go hike!"]














[Dick Ludwick, former mayor of Unionville, inspires hikers in his living room to finish the trail, July 3. "We want to be part of that victory," he said.]

The free laundry, internets and shower could not have come at a better time. My pack has been smelling frighteningly bad of late, and I've been looking more and more raggety.

We passed the evening watching "Rambo: First Blood."