Miles today: 18.1
Total miles: 814.7
I wasn’t looking forward to the hike today because the elevation profile in my guide book showed tons of tiny up and downs. I hate those. I would so much rather have a couple big mountains to climb than hill after tiny hill. They just wear me out. On top of that, the weather was just a tad uncomfortably hot to hike in. Some days are just harder than others to find motivation and this was one of those days. I struggled up the many hills that in actuality weren’t that bad, but were made worse by my poor outlook. On the bright side, I didn’t miss a part where the trail turned, which I later found out Blondie, Delta, AND Timeless had all missed and ended up walking 2+ miles out of their way.
Blondie kept waiting for me every few miles and we’d take a break together. He simply cruises along seemingly effortlessly as I was dying, gasping for air, up the little hills. My day was made much better, however, when midafternoon I came across every hiker’s dream: trail magic! A wonderful trail angel had left a cooler full of fruit, granola bars, apple sauce, ramen, batteries–everything imagineable–by the trail at a road crossing. I was SO happy. I haven’t had trail magic of this sort–where a cooler or food is just left there–since Vermont before I got off trail for my knees. I kind of expected we wouldn’t get any more because all the Northbounders have passed already. But New York surprised me and some wonderful trail angel DOES care about southbounders. My day got way better as Blondie and I sat there pigging out (even though it was RIGHT after we’d taken a lunch break).
As we sat, we debated whether to continute to our planned shelter for the night, which would be a 19 mile day or to call these trail angels I’d heard about, which would shorten our day to maybe 15, a somewhat significant difference. We debated back and forth and then decided to at least call and see if the trail angels were even still hosting hikers. I called and John answered and was so friendly. He said they definitely will host us and to Blondie and my delight they’d pick us up at a road crossing further down the trail so we’d still be able to get in 18 miles today! That was settled-we’d stay with them. We had 6.6 miles to go to the road crossing where John would pick us up. I was still struggling with the frustrating ups and downs and heat, but I put in my headphones, blasted music and put my head down and was at the road crossing in a couple hours.
I was glad to have that day behind me. John came and picked us up and took me and Blondie to his house. We met his wife Susan, their two dogs Emily and Abigail, and their chickens. I took a hot shower with the most amazing water pressure I’ve felt in a long time, grateful for my first shower since MA. We got to do laundry too. And, on top of all that, they cooked us dinner. On the menu was mexican, complete with margaritas. We were in heaven. John and Susan were so kind and laidback, and just made us feel so comfortable. We even had ice cream for dessert. We sat around relaxing and reading past our bedtimes and I slept so well on a real bed.