I won’t be able to rejoin them for hiking unfortunately (only partying, wooo!).  I have been biking most mornings since being home and my knee has felt better.  So as more of a test, I tried out some running today.  I did about 2 miles barefoot, and satisfied with how my knee felt I threw on my shoes and hit the trails.  I only made it a mile before the knee pain came back, but I am icing it as I type.  It’s at least a good start, though not encouraging for getting back on the trail soon.  I’ve been making sure to do a lot of stretching and use my foam muscle roller which helps to loosen up the area around the IT band which is the source of the pain.

I’ve got another month or so before they will be into Massachusetts, so with enough icing, stretching, and testing my knee out, I will hopefully be confident enough that it can handle hiking again.  The trail is only 2 hours from my house so it’s an easy location at which to meet them.

Before you jump out of your seat – this doesn’t mean my trip is over!  Unfortunately, the minor and infrequent pain became major and occurring every step so I had to stop 16 miles north of Waynesboro, VA.  We managed to flag down a ride and the woman, Pam, kindly drove me to the hospital so I could find out what was wrong with my knee.  Resting my knee and getting back on the trail in Virginia is really impractical.  If I ended up getting hurt again I’d be by myself and would have a hell of a time getting back to a town.

So I am at home in MA relaxing and riding my bike a bit each day to stay in shape.  I am not even thinking about what I am going to do next – finishing the trail seems much less probable, so that most likely won’t be my goal.  It never really was about the trail for me – I’ve met a fantastic group of people in my 866 miles and 62 days on the trail.

But thank you for following my blog – the comments definitely cheered me up as I went along.  I am glad I could share some of the experience with y’all!  And if I do get back on to do MA, VT, NH, and ME you’ll be the first to know.

Many people have asked me if I am still enjoying the trail – luckily I did not have access to a computer at the end of that 25 mile day!  I was downright miserable (don’t worry Mom!  It was only one bad day amidst an awesome week).

I don’t know if you’re familiar with the ache of feet after a lot of walking – well that eventually goes away and your feet become something akin to unconscious.  You know you’ll pay for it in the morning, but you just can’t really feel what’s going on down there.

It got to the point where I was deliriously singing a song about the shelter and why it wasn’t right in front of me on the trail.  The song had no rhythm, nor melody, and consisted mostly of me shouting “shelter” at the forest.  Undoubtedly my lowest point on the trail so far.

But the next day was glorious.  A 14 mile day is close to day off for us – we didn’t start hiking until 10:45, took a gratuitous 2 hour lunch, then another 30 minute break by Cripple Creek singing the Band’s song of the same name, and finally waited at a road crossing while Bart-less and Gandalf road-walked to find some beer.  We rolled in at 7pm all smiles to a beautiful shelter nestled in a valley by a creek.

So as horrible as the bad days get, the good ones are guaranteed to rebound you.  Backyard Boogie said to me “don’t ever quit the trail on a bad day.”

A wise man indeed.

Muffin Mittens, Butch, Sundance, Tugger, Red Ranger, Campchair, Compass, Bartless, Beans, Cakon, Hoots, Spaz McGee, Roadrunner, Grandma, Fat Old Dad, Trail Bug, Cedar Tree, Cowboy, Olaf/Hermann, Lucky, Rooster, Almost There, Chief Whitebrow, Frisbee

I’ll let y’all make up the back-stories to these names ’cause I got to go!

We’ve been getting weirder and weirder the more time we spend in the woods.  To the point where we are adopting false identities when talking to day hikers and tourists.  The identities come from regional stereotypes: Boston, Pittsburgh, Texas, and the Ocean.  We’ve got names of Chadwick McKennedy, Bobby Gritkowski, Colt Burns, and Blackbeard.  Chadwick is heir to McKennedy’s Clam Chowdah, Bobby G. works in a blue-collar grit mill, Colt Burns is a ranch hand from Del Rio, and Blackbeard is the famous pirate.  It’s probably only funny to us, but we’ve been signing the trail registers as these folks for the last 4 weeks.  Usually I am wicked tired and looking for a bubblah and some chowdah, but occasionally talk of the blizzard of ’72.

It isn’t all hiking for us.  We occasionally do things like knock down half fallen trees, dance to Van Morrison at 6am on the trail, and hike a half mile down the road and pack out a large 10 topping pizza onto the trail.  It’s been really fun hiking with them as a result.

The Lefties won’t last much longer.  Bart-less will be getting off in Harper’s Ferry to return to real life and med school.  And with all the people in New England I know who want to hike a section with me, it will be hard to meet the desires of everyone in the group in terms of miles and where they want to stay.  But as we’ve seen with the weather, a good thing must come to an end.  After 22 days of no rain, we’ve got 5 days straight rain ahead of us.

So it goes.

I am carrying a SPOT Tracker satellite messenger with me while I hike.  My sister has been compiling the GPS coordinates from my OK messages into a really cool map.  Unfortunately, none of the messages I sent in the Smokies worked – possibly from not wanting to be outside in the freezing cloud and sending them from in the shelter.  But the link is below so check it out!

Awesome Map of My Progress

I’m in Damascus, VA and will be in Virginia for another 540 miles!

The shelters typically sleep around 8-10, but sometimes up to 24 or as few as 6.  Of course there is always someone who snores, and mice who crash into your head at night.  But if you clean out your pack and make sure you’ve not left a Snickers wrapper anywhere, they at least won’t chew through your rain gear to find it.

I’ve become quite accustomed to sleeping on a wooden floor.  Out of the 21 days I’ve been on the trail, I’ve only used my tent 4 nights, two of which were in heavy wet snow resulting in the roof collapsing at 3 AM – but hey, that’s what I get for bringing a two and a half season tent.

The shelters themselves are fairly uninspired structures – most are 3 walled with a sloped roof and slight overhang with the open wall facing opposite the direction of the wind or so the theory goes.  The really interesting part about them is what people leave behind.

First, there are the shelter legends.  These wet, sometimes tattered notebooks are records for hikers to write thoughts, complaints, whimsies or messages for people who they met earlier on the trail.  They range from tirades against snowy trails to almost philosophical observations of life on the trail.

Much less encouraged, but still dutifully performed, are the graffiti and engravings left by former hikers.  I had a message left by some folks who were doing a section hike and liked my moniker “Two Rings” and the various stories I was making up about its origin.  Of course I was a little shocked when I saw “Hi Nipple Rings” freshly carved into the next shelter.  But aside from funny messages, the carvings and graffiti are mostly written by would-be philosophers or potheads, or sometimes both.  Quotes from John Muir and Henry David Thoreau neighbor marijuana leaves and images of a scruffy male with a joint hanging from his lips.

It’s certainly an interesting mix of people who hike the trail.  And no where is this more evident than in what they’ve left behind: their records, graffiti, and sometimes, pair of pants.

Hiking in the snow has been difficult, and though the weather is finally starting to turn for the better, it’s going to be a while before the trail condititions shape up.  This means extra effort and calories spent trying to get from one place to the next.  So to a hungry hiker, there is nothing better than free food.

Every year, near Tray Mountain, two section hikers drive up with a grill along access roads in the Chattahoochee National Forest.  Rounding a bend, I could smell hamburgers in the middle of the woods and was so surprised that I could only answer “possibly” to the question “Do y’all want some cheeseburgers?”  He didn’t need to ask again if I wanted seconds and handed me another as soon as I had finished my first.  The accompanying Mountain Dew tasted like a fine wine and was delicious beyond any description. 

You couldn’t ask for a better definition of Trail Angels – people going out of their way to make the trip a little more enjoyable, pleasant, or memorable in some manner. It’s going to be a while before I get over being suspicious of people offering something free.  But relying on the hospitality of strangers is a necessity on the AT.  And when  it’s cheeseburgers in the middle of the woods after two exceptionally cold days of hiking through the snow it’s as close to heaven as you can get.