First blood

Campsite in the morning

​T+5 (Mar. 23, 2020)

Woke up around 4AM to the unmistakable sounds of ice pellets hitting my tent. It wasn't coming down hard, but not a good sign considering it wasn't supposed to start until 9-ish. I forced myself back to sleep until about 6AM, then went about making myself breakfast in bed. Once completed, I packed what I could while still in bed and only got out of bed when it was time to pack the sleeping gear itself. Doing things this way definitely took longer, but it was much more appealing than braving the sub-0 temps and ice pellets!

​Got everything packed and onto the trail around 8:45AM. By that time the precipitation had subsided. The destination of this section is either Port Clinton or Hamburg. My preference is for Port Clinton. There is a hotel there that is hiker friendly and has all the necessary amenities on-site: restaurant, laundry, plus the requisite warm, dry bed, and shower. I'm planning on doing my first 0 (day I don't hike any miles on the trail) there. I need a more extensive resupply and there's some equipment that I'm not satisfied with, so I'm planning on seeing if I can upgrade at the World's Largest Cabela's in Hamburg. Will be calling Tues. to see if either the hotel or Cabela’s are open.

Anyway, from Palmerton (mile 1260.2) to Port Clinton (mile 1220.0) is 40.2 miles. I knocked out 3.3 miles getting to camp yesterday, but that's still a shade under 37 miles to go and I'd like to arrive on Wednesday evening. Doable, but much higher mileage than previously. I say doable because much of the trip I'll be on the top of a ridge and there isn't too many ups and downs to deal with. Only the weather...

To start today's hike the trail was moderately rocky with some small ups and downs, but I was making good time. About 2 miles in everything changed: I ran into a shit storm...literally. Wintry mix! First came more ice pellets, then rain, some freezing rain, and even larger raindrop sized hail. To make matters worse, I hadn't achieved my goal of passing the technically challenging portions of the day's hike. The first being Bake Oven knob, a 120' climb up a boulder field to the top. A mile and a half after that is Bear Rocks a really annoying - but flat - rock scramble. Then a half mile further is knife's Edge where, as the name implies, you hike along the rocky peak of the ridge.

Given the weather and terrain I took things as slowly as possible, but several points were quite exposed which prompted haste. It was at one of those points where I made a misstep sending my foot into the Abyss. I landed on my shin and did a bit of minor damage to it (bruise and abrasion - picture at end of post). Nothing serious, just annoying. While traversing Bear Rocks I actually ate it and landed on an unforgiving rock splayed out like road-kill. Luckily the rock was quite flat (which is why I slipped), so there was no physical damage - just that to my ego. The scariest was losing my footing on knife's Edge! I didn't fall, just twisted my ankle (not bad) and shredded the right leg of my rain pants.

Speaking of rain pants, let's take an aside to talk about them. I have the Frogg Fogg's rain gear. They come as a combo with standard S/M/L/XL sizing, I got the M, and the jacket fits nicely. The pants however...don't even come close to fitting! I tried them on in my apartment over my jeans and they seemed fine, but I never took them for a spin in the wild. Boy do I regret that!

When I don't have the added bulk of jeans and a leather belt those bad boys are 3 1/2" too big around the waist. To make matters worse they seem to be proportioned for your average NBA player as the legs are 4+" too long. So, I have to play Urkel (sorry for the dated reference Millennials, you'll have to use the Google) and hike the damned things up to my armpits in order to not step on the legs. Of course while hiking they slide down, so constant adjustment is required. I'll be firing those things into the sun ASAP!

After knife's Edge there's one more climb up a relatively easy boulder field to the top of an unnamed summit, just shy of PA-309. Not bad hiking up, but on the way down I witnessed some of the worst vandalism I've ever seen on any trail. A group of kids (come on, we all KNOW it was kids) spray painted everything in sight: rocks, trees, signs...everything. Plus they used axes to cut down 3 or 4 good sized trees - all healthy, living trees - one of which fell right across the trail. This destruction went on for over a half mile, probably closer to a full mile. I can't imagine how much spray paint those asshats had to lug into the woods to make that mess! What I can imagine is taking my anger out on their hides!

​After PA-309, the jackasses’ destruction ended and for the rest of the way to camp the AT largely follows a series of vehicle (logging? jeep?) paths. So it was rather quick going from there on out. Due to the weather, I wanted to stay at a shelter and the next one up is Allentown Hiking Club Shelter (mile 1242.4). Just as I was nearing that destination I got excited to be out of the rain...and got hasty. I didn't notice my pants falling down, so when I stepped on a rock I got no traction - only pant leg. Totally wiped out again! Again, only bruised my ego, so no harm no foul.

Once at the campsite I hastily unpacked everything an dumped / squeezed the water out of my pack. Then I got out of the rain jacket and wet base layer and T-shirt and into my light jacket and puffy coat. Next, I used my tent to cover up most of the shelter opening and hung what I could to "dry". I haven't checked yet, but I wouldn't be surprised if I have frozen socks and gloves to look forward to this morning!

All in all it was a really eventful day, with a few casualties: RIP rain pants, RIP skin on my left shin, RIP my dignity. Ok, who am I kidding? I never had that last one!

Total mileage for the day: 14.5 (started at mile 1256.9, ended at 1242.4). I realized after my last entry that I haven't, to date, been giving total miles traveled. Since I started at mile 1296 and am at 1242.4, the total mileage is 53.8 thus far.