I was ready to rock and roll
Dear Pennsylvania,
It's been quite a journey through your land, but it fortunately ends tomorrow. I've met someone new, her name is New Jersey. She welcomes weary hikers who manage to escape your wrath. I've also taken the liberty of booking you a one way ticket to hell.
With no love,
Kirby
I hope that gives you an insight into what I think about PA. Today was no different.
Two hikers decided to roll into the shelter around 10:45PM last night, make a whole bunch of noise, and once they knew I was awake due to their ruckus they asked me to move over so he could sleep in the shelter. Cookie and I repaid the favor by accidentally making lot of noise at 5:15AM.
The theme for today was rocks, it was a rock convention today though. PA pulled out all the stops in her last hurrah. There were car sized boulders to scramble over and there were baseball sized rocks that twist your ankle every direction.
At Hahn's Lookout I got my first good view of NJ. It felt nice knowing that NJ was soo close.
I should mention that spring is in full bloom in the forests of Appalachia. The trees are thick in green, and the floweres are in the midss of blom. The flies are buzzing around, and gypsy moths have become the official species of the AT on a sunny day.
There were many spots along the trail where it seems the local maintainers purposefully tilted on their sharpest angle to anger already disgruntled hikers.
Then the trail came to a boulder rock scramble known as Wolf Rcks. Don't worry, there are no views to distract you. Believe it or not, this was the second most enjoyable part of the day. Instead of twisting my ankles every possible way, I enjoyed hopping from boulder to boulder.
I rolled into Kirkridge Shelter at 11:25AM for lunch. I also bumped into Cookie and Thud here.
After lunch I was fired up and ready to go, so I kicked it into high gear. I knew from here that in 6.4 miles I would be symbolically done wth PA. Most of this walk was spent walking n old dirt road, which made for easy walking.
At the summit of Mount Minsi, I realized I was close to DWG when I looked over the cliff and could just barely see the river below.
There were parts of this descnt that I ran over to alleviate the pain on my knees, I was also feeling pretty good. I was ready to rock and roll.
I rolled into town around 2:30PM and proceeded to grab a bunk at the local church hostel. I was forced to resupply in a convenience store seeing as there's no grocery store in town.
After lounging around the hostel a bit I split a pizza with Cookie. No signs of food posioning yet.
After calling my Grandma, I decided it was time to call it a night, my body needs a good night sleep.
Tomorrow I shall enter NJ and march to the Mohican Outdoor Center, where I shall stay the night.
Good night, and good luck.
Kirby
Ga>ME 2008.
