Appalachian Trail - Day 074 - Clarks Valley Road to Green Point

Day: 074

Date: Friday, 07 July 2023

Start:  Clarks Valley Road (AT Mile 1167.3)

Finish:  Green Point (AT Mile 1183.5) but staying at Pine Grove.

Daily Kilometres:  26.5

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

Total Kilometres:  1990.4

Weather:  Partly sunny, very warm and very humid, with some rain later in the day.

Accommodation:  Motel

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Pop tarts 

  Lunch:  Trail mix 

  Dinner:  Cheeseburgers and fries, ice-creams

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

Highlight:  None really.

Lowlight:  Dave was struggling during the morning, though we covered the usual distance.  He felt very tired with a low-grade headache and was finding the hiking hard work.  Maybe it was the continuing heat and humidity and/or cumulative fatigue from the last six days hiking but, whatever the reason, we decided at our lunch break to find a way off the trail in the afternoon for an unscheduled day off tomorrow.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We woke at 5:30am and were hiking by 6:30am after a warm and humid night.  More heat and humidity was forecast for the day with the chance of thunderstorms and heavy rain showers in the afternoon.

We started by crossing the valley floor and Clark Creek along which we could see a number of hikers camped, though apparently it is prohibited there.  Then there was a steady climb up onto the long ridge of Stony Mountain.  It wasn't that steep, but it was warm, despite the hour.  The trail was rocky for long sections, as was the case all day, jmeaning you had to constantly watch your foot placement, but it wasn't bad enough to significantly slow us down.

It was the same story once we reached the crest of the ridge and followed it to the north-east, but Dave was finding it hard work.  There were no views with the trail staying in the green tunnel - sometimes forest and other times rhododendron and mountain laurel groves.  We did see quite a few thru-hikers, all moving faster than us, but probably walking shorter hours since we have seen some of them before.

Our breakfast break at 9:00am didn't do much to revive Dave's spirits and the next six miles seemed to pass very slowly for him.  Originally, we had thought we would hike every day for the next week to reach the end of Pennsylvania without a day off but, with Dave feeling exhausted after six days of heat and humidity and a steady mileage, we rethought our plans at our lunch break and decided to see whether we could organise a day off tomorrow.

Without phone coverage, we couldn't explore our options for another hour or so until we reached the top of our next ridge, Second Mountain, having had to first cross an old beaver dam that had turned Stony Creek into a swamp replete with many croaking frogs.

From the ridge we booked a motel by a freeway interchange at Pine Grove which we could reach via PA Route 443, a couple of miles ahead.  Uber seemed to be available, if necessary.  However, when we reached the road we decided to try hitch-hiking for a while before trying Uber and within minutes a pickup truck which had already passed us returned and the driver offered us a lift to our motel.  There was only room for one of us in the cab, so Julie rode in the tray with our packs.  The driver, an electrician returning home from work, was a really nice guy who was very interested in our hike and peppered Dave with questions all the way to our motel.  Hopefully we have encouraged him to hike some (or all) of the trail himself.  He seemed keen.

It began to rain before we reached the motel but, fortunately for Julie in the tray, not too much.  We reached the motel at 3:30pm and checked in for two nights.  Later we bought dinner from the adjacent McDonalds and are looking forward to an early night.

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.

Appalachian Trail - Day 072 - Middlesex to Duncannon

Day: 072

Date: Wednesday, 05 July 2023

Start:  Middlesex (AT Mile 1132.2)

Finish:  Duncannon (AT Mile 1149.5)

:  29.1 (Ascent 2372', Descent 2484')

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

Total Kilometres:  1933.9

Weather:  Sunny and very warm and humid.

Accommodation:  Hotel

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Cereal, toast & jam, waffles.  Later, ice-cream as well.

  Lunch:  Ham & cheese sandwiches 

  Dinner:  Gourmet pizza & fries/Doyle burger & fries, apple pie & rice pudding.

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

Highlight:  After we had been hiking for about 30 minutes this morning, having eaten our fill at the motel's continental breakfast (certainly quantity over quality), and as we passed a small farm gate store, we saw a young Mennonite boy (~10yo) coming flying up the driveway from his farmhouse on his bike and throw open the doors of the store and rush to stand behind the counter.  How could we resist?  Even though it was only 7:15am and we had just had breakfast, we bought and ate some of the homemade ice-cream (made by his sister) on the picnic table outside in the early morning sunshine. Later, his father drove up from the farm to deliver more fresh produce to the store accompanied by two other brothers, all dressed the same.  

Lowlight:  Not just a lowlight for today, but especially bad today, are the little gnats which fly right in front of your sweaty eyes as you walk along in the heat and humidity just waiting for their opportunity to land in your eye.  About the only way to get rid of them is to close your eye and slap yourself across the eye in the hope that you will crush the offending gnat(s).  Of course others immediately take its place.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We woke in time to arrive at the motel's continental breakfast at 6:00am when it opened.  It wasn't a particularly enticing spread, but we ate and drank our fill anyway, before returning to our room and then leaving to start hiking at 6:45am.

Initially, we had to walk along the very busy road (it was near a freeway interchange and there were vast trucking/transport yards) for 0.5 miles back to the trail but, once there, we were soon traversing rural countryside again though we could still hear the traffic noise.

After 30 minutes we emerged on to a road and passed a farm gate store where we decided to have a second breakfast (see above).  We really didn't want to lose another half hour, but the opportunity was too good to miss.

On resuming our hike, the trail paralleled the road through the farm country before following a creek downstream until we reached a point where the trail began to climb up to a ridge.  It was hot sweaty work, rewarded with a break near the top seated on a bench created from slabs of stone by the trail maintainers with a commanding view.

After a descent, we crossed another rural valley before a long climb up onto the Cove Mountain ridge.  We stopped at a viewpoint there and met three volunteer trail maintainers from the Maryland Appalachian Club whose clearing work we had observed on our way up and had a chat.

We had our lunch break in the woods atop the ridge shortly afterwards and then walked our last stretch of the day on a now very rocky trail (Pennsylvania is famous for its rocky Appalachian Trail).  We stopped at the Hawk Rock overlook which had a fine view over Duncannon and the Susquehanna River as well as to the west and southwest.  Then it was a long and steep descent to Duncannon where we followed the trail through town, picking up some cold drinks on the way, to our accommodation at the historic Doyle Hotel.

After checking in and showers, Julie went out in search of supplies for the next five days while Dave visited the nearby laundromat to do our laundry.  Later we had a nice dinner at the hotel.  We didn't see any thru-hikers on the trail today, but there were several at the bar.  This is the same hotel where Dave stayed when hiking the trail in 1986, though it has been renovated.

Appalachian Trail - Day 071 - Peach Glen to Middlesex

Day: 071

Date: Tuesday, 04 July 2023

Start:  Peach Glen (AT Mile 1109.5)

Finish:  Middlesex (AT Mile 1132.2)

Daily Kilometres:  38.9 (Ascent 2667', Descent 3465')

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

Total Kilometres:  1904.8

Weather:  Very warm and humid and mostly sunny.

Accommodation:  Motel

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Pop tarts

  Lunch:  Turkey & cheese sandwich, ice-creams.

  Dinner:  Bacon cheeseburger & fries, ice-creams.

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

Highlight:  The afternoon's walking, though it was very warm and humid, was enjoyable as we traversed the Cumberland Valley across and alongside fields and past farms and crops.

Lowlight:  Dave learned this morning that a long-time American friend - an adventurer, mountain climber and talented runner - who had hiked with him for a week on the Appalachian Trail way back in 1986 as well as sharing other adventures, passed away yesterday.  He epitomized living life to the full, and gave Dave much to think about as he hiked this afternoon.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We were hiking by 6:10am on a beautiful sunlit morning after some torrential rain overnight.  Our hiking friend, Rob, was being picked up and taken back to his car from the Green Mountain Store at 9:00am so that was our first objective.

We reached there at 8:00am after an easy descent through pleasant forest but, sadly, though not unexpectedly, the store was closed until 10:00am because of American Independence Day.  Despite the early hour, we were both keen get some cold drinks from the vending machine outside the store but, also sadly, we didn't have the right change to buy even one drink!

We said our goodbyes to Rob who, after being shuttled back to his car, had a long drive back to Connecticut.  We had enjoyed his company for the past three days and he may be able to join us again later on the trail.

After leaving Rob, the trail climbed back up onto a ridge with rocks becoming more numerous in the mostly open forest.  Later in the morning, on the aptly named Rocky Ridge, it became very rocky with the trail, seemingly gratuitously, winding its way over boulders and through narrow rock passageways that provided no views and could have been bypassed.  It was slow going and tiring.

We took a morning break around 9:30am after about eight miles and about one third of the way to our objective for the day, a motel in Middlesex.  After the break, we had about another six miles of hills and rocky trail before we emerged into the pastureland of the Cumberland Valley and much easier walking.

Another two miles brought us into the pretty little town of Boiling Springs where many people were out enjoying their Independence Day holiday.  We passed the swimming pool which was teeming with children and followed a lakeshore path into the centre of town where we found a park bench in the shade.  Dave dried out our very wet tent flysheet while Julie walked to a nearby convenience store and bought us some lunch and very welcome cold drinks which enjoyed on the bench watching the world go by.

After lunch we continued our journey across the valley on a beautiful afternoon (see above) and eventually reached US 11, where we left the trail and walked about 0.5 miles along the road to the motel we had booked, arriving at 5:40pm.  Camping is very limited along the trail in the Cumberland Valley, so the motel was a convenient and welcome choice after a very humid and warm day.

We quickly showered and washing out our hiking clothes, then bought some dinner and supplies for tomorrow from a nearby highway service center.

It had been a long but interesting day, capped off by the motel management letting off fireworks outside our room as we are about to go to bed.

Appalachian Trail - Day 070 - Big Pine Flat Ridge to Peach Glen

Day: 070

Date: Monday, 03 July 2023

Start:  Big Pine Flat Ridge (AT Mile 1091.1)

Finish:  Peach Glen (AT Mile 1109.5)

Daily Kilometres:  29.9 (Ascent 1903', Descent 2605')

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

Total Kilometres:  1865.9

Weather:  Warm, mostly overcast and very humid.

Accommodation:  Tent

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Pop tarts

  Lunch:  Trail mix

  Dinner:  Hiker burger & fries/Bacon & Cheeseburger & fries, ice-cream 

Aches:  Dave - thigh still a little sore from yesterday's fall; Julie - cuts and abrasions on her left knee and shin after a fall today.

Highlight:  Passing the halfway mark, 1099 miles, this morning.

Lowlight:  None really.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We were on our way by 6:30am on a warm and humid morning. During the night there has been a very intense thunderstorm so things were still a little damp including our tent fly.

For most of the day we were following low ridges on a mixed bag of trail ranging from.very rocky and technical to easy paved paths through State Parks.  There were some sections of very open forest and we encountered our first (and very docile) rattlesnake.

In the late morning we passed the halfway mark of our journey from Springer Mt to Mt Katahdin and a mile later the 1100 mile mark at this, the end of our 10th week.  It feels good to know we have less distance to go than we have already done.

In the early afternoon we reached Pine Grove Furnace State Park where there is a store famous with thru-hikers for the "half gallon challenge" to see how fast they can eat a half gallon (~ 2 litres) of ice-cream.  The record for this year is 4:48 apparently.  They also have a reputation for good hamburgers so we started with those and then Julie and Dave decided to share the half gallon of ice-cream without going for a time.  Since Dave ended up eating the majority of the ice-cream, he wondered whether he should have gone for the record on his own!

After eating so much we virtually waddled back on to the trail which initially passed through the picturesque State Park and then climbed gradually back up on to a wooded ridge where we found a campsite beside the trail at around 5:00pm.  There was a forecast for severe thunderstorms in the late afternoon, and we did get some rain and could hear distant thunder, but seemed to avoid the worst.  Nevertheless, we put our tents up quickly just in case and then had a relaxed and peaceful evening in the woods.

Appalachian Trail - Day 069 - PA Route 16 to Big Pine Flat Ridge

Day: 069

Date: Sunday, 02 July 2023

Start:  PA Route 16 (AT Mile 1069.9) but staying at Greencastle

Finish:  Big Pine Flat Ridge (AT Mile 1091.1)

Daily Kilometres:  33.5 (Ascent 3599', Descent 2789')

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

Total Kilometres:  1836.0

Weather:  Warm, humid and partly sunny with one brief shower.

Accommodation:  Tent

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Bacon, egg & cheese bagels

  Lunch:  American subs 

  Dinner:  Rehydrated meals 

Aches:  Dave - had a fall on slippery rocks, landing on his thigh on the replaced hip side which is feeling a bit bruised/corked but hasn't lost any mobility; Julie - nothing to report.

Highlight:  None really.

Lowlight:  None really.

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

We met Rob (Dave's former work colleague and friend) at his car at the motel at 6:00am, and stopped in at the adjacent McDonalds to get some take-away breakfast before driving back to the trailhead where we stopped hiking on Friday.

By 6:50am, the three of us were hiking through peaceful woodland on a very still and humid morning.

For most of the day the trail followed a ridge northwards dipping down to gaps along the way and crossing quite a few roads.  We were conscious that we were close to civilisation most of the time and took our morning and afternoon breaks at popular state parks where we had access to picnic tables, water and toilets. Luxury!

The trail was mostly easy through pleasant woodland with little undergrowth, though it did climb up to a few rocky knolls which, with the exception of Chimney Rocks, seemed meaningless and had no views.

Around 6:30 we found a really nice campsite atop a ridge with the sun setting to the west and enjoyed a relaxed dinner before retiring after a good day with little of the forecast rain.

Appalachian Trail - Day 068 - Day off in Greencastle

Day: 068

Date: Saturday, 01 July 2023

Start:  PA Route 16 (AT Mile 1069.9) but staying at Greencastle.

Finish:  PA Route 16 (AT Mile 1069.9) but staying at Greencastle.

Daily Kilometres:  0

GPX Track:  Click here for Julie’s Strava & Photos from her jog/walk around Greencastle today.

Total Kilometres:  1802.5

Weather:  Overcast and very warm and humid.

Accommodation:  Motel

Nutrition:

  Breakfast:  Macca's big breakfast

  Lunch:  Mexicali subs

  Dinner:  Patty melt & fries/Chicken burger & fries, donuts

Aches:  Nothing to report 

Highlight:  Rob, a work colleague of Dave's from 20+ years ago, who is also a keen hiker, arrived at our motel today after driving down from Connecticut and will join us for a few days of hiking along the AT.  It was good to see him again and start catching up our respective news.

Lowlight:  We were surprised and saddened to get an email from our thru-hiking friend of the last five or six weeks, Tassie (from Tasmania), who is a day or two behind us on the trail, telling us that she is ending her hike for this year.  She seemed to be cruising and enjoying the experience, so it was a shock to hear she had quit, though we knew she had been hiking with an injury.  Thru-hiking is very tough, mentally and physically, and Dave has also felt close to the edge on a number of occasions.  It sometimes seems like a never-ending endurance race rather than an adventure.  We try to keep in mind the saying that "You never quit on your bad days"

Pictures: Click here

Map and Position: Click here for Google Map

Journal:

Apart from the arrival of Rob (see above), we had a fairly typical rest day.  A good breakfast was followed by Dave doing some admin with the TV on in the background, while Julie went for a sightseeing jog/walk.

Rob arrived just before lunch and we drove to a nearby Walmart where we had some lunch and did our resupply shopping.

We returned to our motel and had a quiet afternoon before meeting Rob again for an early dinner at an adjacent truck-stop restaurant and finalizing our plans for tomorrow.

An early night is planned.