Appalachian Trail - Day 073 - Duncannon to Clarks Valley Road

Day: 067

Date: Thursday, 06 July 2023

Start:  Duncannon (AT Mile 1149.5)

Finish:  Clarks Valley Road (AT Mile 1167.3)

Daily Kilometres:  30.0 (Ascent 2667', Descent 2313')

GPX Track:  Click here for Julie’s Strava & Photos

Total Kilometres:  1963.9

Weather:  Hot sunny and humid with a rain shower late afternoon.

Accommodation:  Tent

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Breakfast hash, toast & jam/Omelette, hash browns, toast & jam.

  Lunch:  All American sub

  Dinner:  Rehydrated meals 

Aches:  Dave - a few niggles; Julie - nothing to report.

Highlight:  Unusually, the late afternoon rain shower was very welcome on a hot and humid day.  We got a bit wet, but it cooled us down.

Lowlight:  Heat and humidity made it a very sweaty day for hiking.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We had a lazy start to the day, getting up later than usual then having breakfast at diner across the road from the hotel.  Dave then had some last minute admin requiring attention so it was 9:00am before we began the long walk out of Duncannon on what was already a very warm day.

Knowing that water was going to be hard to get for most of the day, we bought plenty of drinks to take with us, then a few more on the way out of town which we drank before beginning the big climb away from the impressive Susquehanna River.  The extra fluids added to the heavy weight of our packs already loaded with 4-5 days of food, and we were not looking forward to the climb to the Peter's Mountain ridge.

Then, when we got to the ridgetop, we found that the trail followed the narrow rocky/bouldery spine of the ridge for a mile which took the best part of an hour.  It looked like being a long day.  Fortunately, the trail became a little easier after that, though still very rocky, and we took our lunch break a little before noon in a nice clearing in the ridgetop forest having only done about five miles.

After lunch we continued on, saturated with sweat, even though the ridge was relatively flat, and were very happy to find a "trail angel" dispensing cold drinks and snacks to some very grateful thru-hikers at a road crossing.  We inhaled a couple of cans of drink and chatted for a while before continuing on, knowing we still had nine miles to go before reaching a spring where we hoped to camp.

The rest of the afternoon was spent following the ridge on slow trail in energy-sapping heat, relieved somewhat by a late afternoon rain shower.

Finally, the ridge ended and we descended until we reached the spring and our planned campsite at 7:00pm.  We both enjoyed a bit of a wash in the cold spring water before eating dinner and retiring to our very warm tent.