Mason-Dixon

I left the Harper's Ferry area on Tuesday morning, May 17th. Maryland is a restrictive state for Appalachian Trail hikers. It is prohibited to camp anywhere except in state designated campsites. The theory is that concentrating campers in designated areas reduces the impact to wilderness overall. There may be some truth to that, but having spent the last 14 years hiking and camping in wide open Wyoming it seemed severely restrictive.

To my great surprise, Maryland got it right with the Annapolis Rocks backpacker campsite. After passing the Dahlgren backpacker campsite earlier in the day I expected a bunch of tents on a small patch of ground near a busy road. Annapolis Rocks (cliffs overlooking the Cumberland Valley) had more than 60 sites, but they were broadly spread out in a large, densely wooded area. It was hard to tell that other backpackers were nearby. It was several miles from the nearest road and featured a caretaker who lived in a large tent for the duration of the camping season. Well done Maryland.

One highlight of the Maryland section of the trail was Gathland State Park, which hosts the War Correspondents Memorial. Built in 1896, it is dedicated to journalists who have died in combat. It's a stunning stone memorial.

Unchanged for over a century, the arch had four names added in 2003 (according to Wikipedia):
David Bloom, Michael Kelly, Elizabeth Neuffer, and Daniel Pearl.

Another highlight, for me, was the Edward Garvey shelter, about 10 miles north of Harper's Ferry. It's a very nice shelter, named after the man who wrote the book that originally inspired me back in the 1970's to want to hike the entire trail.

I met a 19 year old guy from Virginia at the Edward Garvey shelter who had just started hiking to Mt. Katahdin from Harper's Ferry. He weighed about 300 pounds and he was hiking the trail so he could meet Army or Marine Corps weight standards for entrance. His father was giving him a little tough love, telling him that if he didn't succeed he was out of the house. No pressure.  He was a nice, determined kid who really wanted to join the military. I walked with him for a while and I hope he succeeds. If he stays on the trail he will.

Maryland hosts only 41 miles of the Appalachian Trail, so by the next evening I was at the Mason-Dixon line, which marked the Pennsylvania border.

I passed through Pen-Mar Park just before the border. It is a beautiful park overlooking Waynesboro, Pennsylvania in the valley below. From 1877 to 1943 it was an amusement park, served by a trolly line from Waynesboro. 

I remembered Pen-Mar Park from when I was stationed at Fort Ritchie from 1983-1986. Fort Ritchie was only a mile away and I was tempted to camp at the border and hike over to it the next day to see what had become of it since it had been deactivated in 1998. It had been a beautiful little post, a gem. It was more like an Army country club than a military base. It had several lakes, a 9 hole golf course, a bowling alley, tennis courts, nice officer and NCO clubs, etc. We worked at an "undisclosed location" and after being bused back to the barracks each day we would grab our golf clubs (in the warmer months) and go play 9 holes. The 5th tee was about 30 feet from our barracks.

While I was tempted to see what had become of Fort Ritchie, I read that it had been having a very problematic transition to civilian life. Buildings were abandoned and falling apart, weeds were taking over, the golf course was closed, etc. I preferred to keep the country club memories, so I did not pay it a visit.

I'm 65 miles into Pennsylvania now. After five days on the trail and being soaked by rain on day five I bailed out to a motel in Carlisle, PA to take a "zero" day. It rained all day today again, but it should clear up a little before I hit the trail again tomorrow.

My feet needed the rest. I've had a nagging blister ever since I replaced my shoes a few hundred miles ago. The shoes felt fine at first, but over time they have found my weaknesses. Most blisters are short-term and eventually turn into protective calluses. I have one on the outside of my right heel that keeps getting bigger and more painful though. Piercing it with a sterile needle does nothing; very little liquid leaks out and the piercing quickly seals. It's a blister that refuses to become a callus. I recalled something from a book written by an Appalachian Trail thru hiker on how to deal with these stubborn blister-calluses. I put some thread on a needle and poked it through. I then left the thread in place. The thread supposedly wicks away the liquid being stored inside the blister/callus. It's been 24 hours now and it appears to be working. A few days on the trail will tell; hopefully it will become fully callused and I will then be fully inoculated against whatever pain these shoes can cause.

Feet take a beating on the trail. I thought about not including the details of how much of a beating they take, but felt that full disclosure was in order.

I expected Pennsylvania to be nothing but rocks. Trail lore says that PA has the rockiest footpath of any section of the trail, but it hasn't been much rocker than elsewhere yet. I'm not even a third of the way through though, so I'm sure the rocks are coming.

Oh, besides having very interesting old iron forges dating back to the 18th century at Pine Grove Furnace State Park and Boiling Springs, PA, southern PA has at least three AT halfway point markers. That's because the trail keeps getting longer due to land use agreements and rerouting. It's currently about 2,189 miles long and a "2016" halfway marker is the arbiter, for now.

Harper's Ferry

When I got on the trail after Luray I only had about 25 miles of Shenandoah National Park to walk. I finally came across a bear within that final section of the park, a yearling of about 150 pounds. It was eating something along the side of the trail, saw me, and scampered off into the woods. Later that day I spotted a very large coyote trotting in the woods parallel to the trail. It didn't see me so I howled like a coyote to get its attention. It froze, ears perked, looking my way. I howled again, but it lost interest and continued on. Although I had seen an abundance of wildlife in Shenandoah National Park I hadn't seen any wild turkeys. I'd be willing to bet that those coyotes have something to do with that.

Not long after leaving the park I found myself at Manassas Gap, with the small town of Linden, VA less than a mile away. My guidebook said great things about The Apple House restaurant and store, less than a mile away. I was hungry and it was nearing dinner time, so I so I started walking down a country road into town. A local farmer, Jerome, stopped and offered me a ride, which I gladly accepted. He ran a small organic farm and sold his things in the local area. He said that the cold spring had ruined his cherry crop, but he was well-diversified, even raising hogs. His hogs were locally slaughtered and cured, and some of them ended up at the Apple House, which was famous for its cured hams. All of the staff there sported t-shirts stating "We have the finest butts."

After a delicious dinner, the weather turned even worse on the trail. It had been raining, but the the temperature started dropping quickly. I hoped that the drop didn't damage Jerome's tomato crop, which he was also worried about. I walked into the evening, looking for a good camping spot. I saw some snowflakes by the time I stopped and was glad I had kept all of my cold weather gear.

The next day was cold, wet and windy, and by the time I had passed through most of the "Rollercoaster," a series of steep ascents and descents, I was ready to get off the trail. Fortunately, the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club ran the Bear's Den, a great hostel housed in a stone mansion.

For $30 you got a clean bunk, shower, laundry, a large pizza, and a pint of Häagen Dazs. I snagged the last pint of chocolate and had a restful night. I also met some interesting fellow hikers; there were about 15 of us staying that night.

I was excited to make it to Harper's Ferry the next morning (Monday the 16th of May) since it was considered the "psychological" halfway point and was home to the headquarters of the Appalachian Trail Conservancy (ATC). I was the first one on the trail that morning, heading out the door just after 6:00, following a pancake breakfast with several other early risers. A very nice elderly lady who volunteered at the hostel made us pancakes and coffee. The Bear's Den really was a great respite.

The back side of the Bear's Den.

The trail to Harper's Ferry was not overly strenuous, so I arrived there by 3:00 PM after crossing a bridge with a magnificent view of the Shenandoah River, just before it flowed into the Potomac River. 

I made my way to the ATC Visitor's Center where I chatted with some other thru hikers. The staff took my photo and a printed copy went in albums they maintain. I entered the requested information (start date, today's date, where from, etc.) and started flipping back over the prior week's entries. It was readily apparent that I was travelling faster than 95% of thru hikers, maybe too fast. I weighed myself and my pack using a scale they had for that purpose and discovered that I have lost over 25 pounds since beginning in Georgia. I hardly have any body fat left. I haven't been in the 140's since Army basic training 34 years ago.

I had a talk this morning with several other thru hikers who also felt they were going too fast and should slow it down a little. I'm going to make a slight effort to do that.

The Harper's Ferry area is beautiful. I particularly liked a three mile section of the trail that ran along the old C&O Canal tow path after crossing the Potomac River into Maryland. The old stone locks are still there.

Blue heron.

1000 Miles

Hit 1000 miles today; nearly to West Virginia!

Dogs

I'm in Luray, VA for the day - mile 941; it's about two thirds of the way through Shenandoah National Park. The park is very different from the trail so far. Besides being slightly less grueling, the trail through the park never strays far from Skyline Drive. That means that the campgrounds, camp stores, and restaurants that cater to the huge summer tourist influx are readily available to backpackers. They are never more than a mile from the trail and they just opened for the season about 10 days ago. Good timing.

The deer in Shenandoah National Park are extremely abundant and docile, probably because hunting is prohibited there. They just glance at you when you pass by and then go back to whatever they were doing. The morning after I camped there I heard some breaking sticks while lying in my sleeping bag early in the morning. I lifted up the tent fly and a deer was about 10 feet away from my tent, grazing. Humans don't worry them.

Unleashed dogs would probably worry the deer more, hence one of the reasons why the Park Service vehemently prohibits unleashed dogs. Hundreds of signs dotted around trail entrances and parking areas list six backcountry rules. The first one states that pets must be leashed at all times. Knowing the Park Service, this is more oriented toward protecting the "resource" (deer, etc.) than other park visitors, but that's a discussion for another place and time.

I've had had a few run-ins with unleashed dogs on the trail so far and was glad for this restriction, whatever its motivation. Early on, in Georgia I came face to face with an unleashed pit bull. Its owner quickly caught up and took control, and the dog was never aggressive, but an unleashed pit bull on a popular hiking trail? Not good. A while later, as I was walking into Buena Vista, VA, an extremely aggressive dog charged from a yard and closed on me, barking menacingly. It took me a full minute of unwanted submissiveness to calm the dog and let it realize that I wasn't a threat, its owner bleating uselessly from behind a wooden fence the entire time. When I finally got the dog to lick my hand I left and the owner apologized. I smiled and kept my cool.

A few days later, I came across a hiker who was pitching his tent. I greeted him, since I'd met him before. I was about 30 feet from him and his dog charged at me, getting right in my face and barking aggressively. Again, the dog ignored its owner's admonishments and only calmed down after I was forced to stop and prove that I was not a threat. This was getting old.

On my second day in Shenandoah National Park I rounded a bend and was immediately charged by three dogs, all with packs, all unleashed, with a toothy German Shepard leading the pack, again barking menacingly. I exhorted the owners (there were 5 or 6 of them) to control their dogs and only got the standard "Oh, they're friendly" response. I then instinctively resorted to First Sergeant mode (my Army days coming to the fore) and chewed them out for violating park rules. I was tired of having to confront unleashed dogs.

Later that afternoon, a pink haired girl and her large husky approached me near a campground. She had the husky on a leash, but it was a long one. The husky was very friendly, maybe too friendly. I tried to give a wide berth, but the husky extended it's leash and proceeded to sniff and slobber on my crotch as I passed by. It was rather awkward, and the embarrassed girl muttered "She's awful." Now I had dog slobber on my crotch as I headed to the campground store.

I've had about enough of dogs for a while, leashed or not.

Milestone

Today is Monday, May 9th. I'm going to head back out to the trail today after spending the night in Waynesboro, VA at a very nice Day's Inn. The price was good, the breakfast was good, no complaints. My only gripe was not with the motel, but with trying to get around as a pedestrian when just about everything in modern America is geared toward motorized transportation. The motel is in a newer area of town; restaurants and shopping centers abound. If you are on foot though, there are no sidewalks and none of the intersections are designed for pedestrian use. It seems that only densely populated cities and small towns that still revolve around an old core understand pedestrians.

Just for fun, I walked along railroad tracks for about three miles while heading into Waynesboro yesterday. Google Maps showed that it was a much more direct route into town, and I didn't feel like hitchhiking or calling for a shuttle or taxi. Since it was Sunday, I figured there wouldn't be any trains running, and there weren't any.

Why is the title of this post Milestone? Because I'm finally through with the nonstop vertical roller coaster for a while. I'll be entering the southern boundary of Shenandoah National Park today and the terrain will be less extreme from here through Vermont.

The steep climbs and descents that characterized the first 860 miles of the trail become physically and mentally exhausting after a while. A few days ago I steadily climbed up to about 4,000 feet from about 2,000 feet. I then precipitously descended down to a river below 1000 feet, only to immediately climb back up to 4,000 feet. The next day was almost a repeat of that.

Surprisingly to some, the Appalachian Trail is considered, mile for mile, the most strenuous of the three great long distance trails in the U.S. Although it is shorter than both the Pacific Crest Trail and the Continental Divide Trail, it exceeds both of them in total elevation gain/loss. Now you know why I'm so thrilled to begin a section of the trail where these gains and losses aren't so stark. It will become strenuous again once I reach New Hampshire and Maine, but I'll be so close to the end that it won't take a psychological toll. I should be in absolute peak physical condition then also.

I had an interesting experience yesterday while walking down to Rockfish Gap, the trailhead near here. It was a sunny afternoon and lots of local day hikers were out on the trail. I saw one guy coming toward me who appeared to be around 30 years old. He was tall, well-tanned and muscular, wearing shorts and an open vest. He had a strange gait to his walk and as he got closer I noticed that he had some large feathers tied to his hair and something in his mouth. As he passed by me I noticed that he was carrying a baby blanket and that the thing in his mouth was a pacifier. He said "Hi Sir" in his best baby voice as he walked on by without even taking the pacifier out of his mouth. I soon caught up with another thru hiker and we were both incredulous, not really believing what we had just seen.

Well, it's time to catch a ride back to the trail.

Old Orchards

I left Pearisburg, VA on Tuesday morning, April 26th. After about a mile I discovered how Pearisburg got its name. On a hill above the New River, which runs by the town, there is an old cemetery, complete with a tall flagpole and an American flag. There was no vehicle access to the cemetery, so people must walk up to maintain it. I noticed an impressive grave, partially surrounded by a brick wall. Thanks to the Daughters of the American Revolution, a bronze plaque explained that this was the grave of George Pearis, a Revolutionary War captain who was from this area.

After crossing the sizable New River on a long bridge, the trail meandered past a stream before heading uphill.

A sign by the stream warned not to drink from it. A short distance later the trail skirted a large landfill operation. That explained the sign. In general, the smaller the stream and the higher the elevation, the cleaner the water. Ideally, you only want to draw water above all roads and habitations. It's usually, but not always, possible to do that on the trail. I was thankful for the sign.

The trail quickly moved to higher elevations, as it always does after passing through a town, and ran along the West Virginia border for much of the day. I came across an old apple orchard on a hilltop, with thousands of stones placed in neat piles when the orchard was cleared of stones generations ago.  A few apple trees remained, not having succumbed to the native trees yet. They were all fully bloomed with white blossoms, and the din of busy bees could be heard.

The border marker between Virginia and West Virginia.

The next day, after a very steep climb, I came upon another abandoned hilltop apple orchard. This one was much larger than the first, extending for more than a quarter mile. Dozens - perhaps a hundred - neat piles of stones periodically dotted the old grove. Each pile was between 3 to 5 feet high. The remaining trees were also in full bloom and I considered myself fortunate to be passing through during the brief period when they flower.

The clearing of these orchards must have taken many thousands of hours of labor. With the lush valleys below, I wondered why previous generations would have put so much effort into developing difficult to access hilltop apple orchards. Then it dawned on me; for a sizable portion of US history, from the colonial era to the late 19th century, apples were a cash crop. They were occasionally eaten of course, but their real value was in their fermented juice. Apple jack, or hard cider, was by far the most popular adult beverage of the day, not supplanted by beer for quite some time. Now I understood why people would have put so much effort into these orchards; it was good old American free enterprise at work.

On Wednesday, I was walking up a long, steep hill in the early evening to the top of Brush Mountain, where I camped. Thousands of fat, healthy centipedes, averaging about two to three inches long, were everywhere on the trail. Perhaps it was mating season. I did my best to avoid stepping on them, not always successfully.

I mentioned before about seeing animals eyes at night when looking at them with my headlamp in "spotlight" mode, which I use when walking the trail at night. I've seen many more pairs of eyes since then, including one animal that was spooked by me and climbed 15 feet up the nearest tree. It was too dark to see what it was, maybe a raccoon or opossum. Speaking of opossums, I was talking to the proprietor of a gas station/convenience store I stopped into last week and he informed me that opossums love to eat blood-engorged tics. I like opossums for that alone.

There are spiders everywhere on the trail, on the ground and suspended in air from their webs. When hiking at night their eyes glisten a bright green when you shine a headlamp on them. They look like two tiny, glistening emeralds. You can't walk more than 20 feet at night it seems without encountering a pair of spider eyes. It's really pretty cool. I've met some other hikers who do some night hiking and are fascinated by what you can see at night. Others want nothing to do with it.

I've been encountering many more deer on the trail than before, both during the day and at night. I also came across a painted turtle, a few snakes, and some bright orange salamanders.

On Thursday I was following the trail down from a rocky ridge. Sometimes I become complacent about making sure I am following the white blazes, since the trail is so well-worn in most places that your eyes just follow the path. On the way down from the ridge the trail became incredibly steep and rocky, almost dangerous. I slipped and fell at least once before realizing that I hadn't seen a white blaze in a while. I checked Google Maps and discovered that I was about a quarter mile off trail. I vectored back, making a mental note to be more observant of the white blazes. They are there for a reason.

I walked past McAfee Knob early in the morning on Friday. It's an iconic point on the trail where people get their pictures taken standing on a jutting rock high above an expansive valley with their best Lewis & Clark poses. It was foggy and drizzly when another hiker and I were there, so no view was to be had. However, a few hours and a few miles down the trail were the spectacular Tinker Cliffs, where the trail meanders along the age of a cliff for half a mile. Sometimes it ran too close for my comfort. The fog had lifted by then and I took a few pictures.

Tinker Cliffs.

Late in the afternoon on Friday I approached the town of Daleville, VA, my next stop. It had been a 95 mile walk from Pearisburg and I was more than ready for a rest. Within a quarter mile of the trail head I came across three guys who offered some "trail magic." They were all hikers, but were taking a day off. One of them was from the area, so they had a cooler full of beer and chocolate cookies for their fellow hikers. Besides the local guy (trail name "Four More Years"), they were an electrical engineer from the Czech Republic (trail name "Checkmate"), and a guy from Nova Scotia (trail name "Nova"). We chatted for a while when a guy from Shropshire County, England showed up. He was surprised that I not only knew where Shropshire was, but spent a week there on a family vacation. Small world.

I'm at mile 727, almost a third of the way done. My trail-runners were shot, so I hit the local outfitter today (Saturday) and bought a new pair. They were very comfortable on the walk back to the motel, so I'm optimistic. Shoes, as you can imagine, are the most important gear items in my inventory.

I'm most of the way through Virginia now, and I must say that it is a beautiful state. I'm looking forward to Shenandoah National Park, where the trail begins to level out a little, but I have about 150 more miles of steep climbs and descents before then.