morvasaaty/AppalachianTrail-LD-Hikers-Blogs-and-Weather-20-years huggingface dataset:
Date: 2011-06-02
From: Wind Gap Parking Lot

To: Day 21
Miles today: 15.7

We finally caught a break today, the day wasn't quite as 'real' as the last few have been. It was excellent hiking weather today too: cool and windy all day, no bugs, no rain, no worries. The whole 16 miles was covered with ankle-breaking rocks but that is to be expected by now here in Rocksylvania. Our high spirits might have something to do with the fact that we made it to the Delaware Water Gap today and are done with Rocksylvania for good! So the Presbyterian Church of the Mountain operates a free hiker hostel right in town with an indoor (air conditioned) bunk room, hiker lounge, toilet and shower. They also have a secret hiker feed every Thursday during thru-hiking season, and we happened to show up a half hour before said hiker feed started. We had decided to go ahead and get a hotel room for the night and forgo the free hostel because we plan on partying a little bit harder than the Presbyterians might allow, but we couldn't pass up a free home-cooked meal. And what a meal this was, by far the best meal I've had since stopping by Key West Sandwich on my way out of Panama City (I've thought a lot about that Cuban sandwich.) The nice old churchgoers prepared a buffet-style arrangement on their raised patio and made a point to sit with us and offer pleasant conversation for the whole meal. I should have guessed that the church hostel would be the nicest friendliest hostel yet. So after dinner we said our goodbyes and made our way to the PO to get our mail drops, then stopped by the liquor store for some 6-packs, and checked into the cheap hotel. Now I'm full, I'm clean, I've done my best to wash my clothes in the bathtub, I'm lying in bed still sore, but content. Toe Jam's birthday starts at midnight so I plan on being good and drunk by then. Tim-Jesus-Christ-Mother-Fucking-Tebow is on the Daily Show tonight. Belle is raging it at Wakarusa. All is right with the world.
Date: 2011-06-03
From: DWG Hotel

To: Day 22
Miles today: 5.2

After a much needed night of rest and recuperation, we continued to chill out for most of the day. Didn't leave the hotel until 2:00, then we spent a lot of time at a diner and then an outfitter. You see, due to unforeseen circumstances primarily relating to him being a bitch, Toe Jam is hopping off-trail today. obviously he doesn't want to leave after just 275 short miles, but he's leaving for Egypt soon to teach English and go to grad school so he's got to go home to "get his affairs in order." I'm not sure when I'll see the filthy bastard again, but something tells me that our paths will cross again soon enough. So we finished up in town and all walked across the bridge over the Deleware River together, officially finishing Rocksylvania. We took a round of photos, said our goodbyes, and Kyle and I continued on into New Jersey while Omar went back to the Church of the Mountain. It's funny, Kyle and I were actually pretty silent and solemn after we had left Omar. We're just gonna have to take time to adjust to this new 2-person dynamic. Without Toe Jam here to wake us up at 7:30 each morning, yell at us all day long for being slow, and prevent us from falling asleep each time we stop for a break, we might find it difficult to maintain our typical pace. Belgian Chocolate and I only did a short 5 miles to climb back up onto the ridge and stopped at the first campground we came across. We set up camp right on top of a windy ridge, facing the sunset. Then struggled a bit to cook a delicious dinner in the wind. I put my food bag in a fancy bear box for the first time because the bears are apparently really bad here in the DWG National Park. Then I enjoyed a fat bowl of bubble hash and now I'm watching the final moments of the sunset from my blackbird. I love life right now : )
Date: 2011-06-04
From: backpacker campground

To: Day 23
Miles today: 11.4

As predicted, our first day without Toe Jam was slow as shit. I woke up at 10:00 Am and was immediately approached by the infamous Thor the Hiking Viking. He did a thru-hike last year and now he is one of the Ridge Runners for Southern New Jersey. He have me and BC each an amazing fire-cooked blueberry muffin and bummed me an all natural, taylor made, light blue, american spirit cigarette. The first real cigarette I've had in a while. I returned the favor by getting him really high on hash. We exchanged stories about music festivals, the Grateful Dead, and the String Cheese Incident for a while. It really made me miss summer tour and wonder how Belle is doing out there on her own. I've been doing live music pretty hard for the last couple of years and it's weird taking so much time off. I miss it more than just about anything I left back in the real world, other than my girlfriend of course. I really appreciate the Granola Funk camp not and realize how important they must be to the Rainbow Family's survival. We finally left camp around noon, and we took a break at every single view and overlook. Then we stopped at the unimpressive Mohican Outdoor center to use their toilet and their microwave. Back on the ridge, we stumbled into this guy named 'The Intimidator.' He is decked out in all BDU's, carries like 4 different types of handguns, and a big sharpened wooded spear he calls 'The Persuader.' He's an ex-Navy Seal and he's got the tattoos to prove it (Seal Team III) who is quite obviously suffering from PTSD. I went ahead and blazed a bowl of hash with him too, and he was very appreciative because he apparently hadn't smoked hash like that since he was overseas 20 years ago...We only did like 11 or 12 miles today but it was nice and leisurely, great views of parallel ridges and high-mountain lakes all day. NJ is substantially better than PA was. the rocks aren't as bad at all and even though the elevatin changes more, we generally stay up on the ridge line all day and avoid big climbs/descents. W00T fuckin W00T.9:33 PM
Date: 2011-06-05
From: campsite

To: Day 24
Miles today: 14.7

We finally picked up our pace today. Left camp relatively early and managed not to stop to smell the roses every chance we got. We met a super friendly old Ridge Runner named Baloo near the Brink Road Shelter who informed us that that the giant mosquito is, in fact, the state bird of New Jersey. he was cool enough but not as cool as the weed-smoking jam-band loving Thor the Hiking Viking that we met yesterday. We also ran in to Rock Monkey on the top of Rattlesnake Mountain, a girl whom we had met back at the Church of the Mountain hiker feed. Her fiance had just gotten off-trail due to an injury so she's out here on her own now, which is pretty admirable. The three of us decided to hide our packs at Culver's Gap and hitch into Branchville, NJ for lunch. We were trying to eat at Joe to Go's just for the experience because the place is run by this senile old man who is notoriously mean to thru-hikers, but the place was closed when we got there unfortunately. So we wound up at the tavern up the road where we had beers and lackluster cheeseburgers. Eventually we were joined my our old pal High Life and his buddy Doppler and left by Rock Monkey, who could tell that we were all in the mood to get drunk. After a couple more beers, BC and I left the tavern and night-hiked up to the Gren Anderson Shelter. It was pretty dark by the time that we got here so we just set up camp outside of the shelter so as not to wake anyone else up. I'm chillin in my blackbird now. Today is mine and Belle's 2-year-anniversary also. I sure love that girl, can't seem to get her out of my mins while I'm hiking. I hope she's doing okay, as okay as I am at the very least. I'm sure she is. She's currently in route from Wakarusa, our anniversary festival, to Bonnaroo, a fest that neither one of us has really even paid any attention to. Dun dun dun...
Date: 2011-06-06
From: Gren Anderson Shelter

To: Day 25
Miles today: 18.4

Real day today. We woke up pretty early. Not as early as Rock Monkey but earlier than The Samurai, who stumbled into the shelter wasted around 4:30 this morning. Yesterday was his birthday so he had hiked some crazy number of miles and then drank some crazy number of beers with High Life and Doppler once he got to Branchville. Early in the day, we were passed by a couple of super fast NoBo thru-hikers. They told us about this secret shelter for long-distance hikers only that was up the trail a ways... and it has a shower. So we decided to shoot for it. Unfortunately, the day was hot, the state birds were horrendous, and the treadway was rocky as shit all day long. It was eerily reminiscent of Rocksylvania. We made it though. 18 long miles. Luckily the Secret Shelter was worth the long hard walk: 4-walled shelter w/ a checkerboard floor, panoramic window, heater, electrical outlet, warm shower, excellent well water, and good company. We stayed overnight with High Life, No Falls, and the super fast couple. BC and I pretty much just sat there and listened to the hikers who are way more experienced than we are. I really love trail people.
Date: 2011-06-07
From: Murray's Secret Shelter

To: Day 26
Miles today: 13.5

BC and I had a lazy but productive morning this morning. We took a nice long shower and used the opportunity to wash our socks off the best we could. We had a visit from Rock Monkey, Bolt, and Coast, who had all heard about the good water here and stopped in for breakfast. We finally got around to leaving somewhere around 9:30, thinking that we were in store for a relatively easy 13-mile hike. We were wrong. It was 90+ degrees all day and we were hiking uphill all morning thanks to Pochuck Mountain. The mosquitoes are the size of hummingbirds and they are everywhere. It's like something out of a Alfred Hitchcock/Hunter S. Thompson nightmare. Oh well. The shower I took this morning is enough to keep my spirits up for now. After doing 13 miles that felt like 20, we had to walk 2.5 miles off trail down this dangerous highway to get to Vernon, NJ. I don't have a mail drop here but I had to come into town to use the internet (to figure out my frightening money situation.) We took Rock Monkey's advice and checked out the St. Thomas Episcopal Church Hostel. Good advice Rock Monkey because this is bay far the nicest place I've stayed in, Allenberry included. These church hostels are just plain amazing. Here's the list of amenities: AIR CONDITIONING, basic cable, internet, showers, laundry room, full restaurant-grade kitchen, 3 refrigerators with free food, mattresses, tons of first air and hygiene supplies, and plenty of privacy. I'm here with BC, Rock Monkey, High Life, and The Samurai. We have a bunch of beer and wine. Total Recall, The Princess Bride, and The Fox and the Hound are in our movie queue. It's gonna be an awesome night. Much needed after the few days we just had.
Date: 2011-06-08
From: St. Thomas Hostel

To: Day 27
Miles today: 0.0

Guess What? We decided to take a 0 at the church. Big surprise huh? The amenities here are just too good to pass up for another day. And, according to the news, we are in the middle of a record-breaking heat wave here in New Jersey. I'll continue to hang out in my air-conditioned paradise instead of going mountain climbing in the 99 degree heat, thanks. Rock Monkey and High Life took off though which is good because they didn't party nearly as hard as the rest of us last night and didn't seem too happy about us being loud and belligerent until the wee hours of the morning, High Life especially... Plus we decided to go straight to the liquor store after breakfast to buy more booze. This will be the second night in a row that we will get drunk in the basement of an Episcopal church. Doppler, a German guy named Mammoth, and a couple other NoBo's showed up today too. It's gonna be a party. I could get used to hiking like this, even though we are officially the slowest hikers ever... It's okay though, I'm having fun that that is what it's all about (for now. I probably won;t start doing real miles until Kyle hops off-trail in early July.) I decided today that I'm going to go ahead and try to volunteer at Camp Bisco as well. It'll give me a chance to see my lady, see my band, and get some hard-partying out of my system before I start hiking for real. Taking a break from music festivals was a foolish idea to begin with. And I really miss my girlfriend...People really can have wildly different experiences out here: hike quickly or hike slowly, live cheaply or lavishly, be solitary or social, make it to the end or not. It'll take me a little while yet to find my niche... but at least I know that I'm in the right place.
Date: 2011-06-09
From: St. Thomas Hostel

To: Day 28
Miles today: 5.0

So we managed to get out of the church... at 5:00 PM. Rather hungover (poor Samurai woke up on the bathroom floor and had lost his pants,) we decided to wait until after the heat of the day to even try to hike. Then a huge lightning storm blew in and me, BC, and Samurai decided it was a good time to leave, against the advice of the other hikers. We wound up stranded for an hour at the Burger King a few blocks away while rain and hail rained hell outside. This was not a problem however because it gave us an opportunity to buy squirt guns and pack in like an extra 10,000 calories. Then we hiked out during a lull in the rain. The rain picked shortly thereafter and we wound up taking refuge at a bar on the outside of town called the Vernon Inn. We spent like an hour and a half at the bar hobnobbing with the local riffraff and then hiked out with a healthy buzz. As soon as we got back to the trail head we were met with 900 foot, slippery, rocky, muddy climb. Our approach was improperly timed as well because the sun went down as soon as we got to the base of the climb. The three of us learned an important lesson today. Hiking drunk is fine. Hiking at night is fine. But hiking drunk at night is a major no-no. After what seemed like an eternity, we made the 5 miles to the Wawayanda Shelter. There we found two hikers fast asleep, so we woke them up and forced them to collect their shit and make room for us. All in a day's work. In other news, it looks like nothing but rain for the next several days. So... there's that. At least it will put an end to this awful heat wave.
Date: 2011-06-10
From: Wawayanda Shelter

To: Day 29
Miles today: 12.1

Funny morning this morning. I woke up early and went outside to pee, and noticed 5 more tents and a hammock set up outside of the shelter. It turned out to be 5 recent high school grads from Maine who call themselves the Magic Tree House Fantastic Kill Squad and this super chill ex-Army Ranger named Breeze. One of the Kill Squad happened to have his parents meeting him there at the Shelter that morning so we all stuck around and yogied a bunch of food from their picnic baskets. After bagels and bowls with the Kill Squad, me, BC, Samurai, and Breeze hiked together at a good pace all the way to the Lakeside, NJ because we all needed to re-supply. We ate lunch together and then split up in to two groups and took turns getting our mail drops and buying an obscene amount of booze. We rendezvoused at nice little local bar where the owner bought us a round and chatted with us a bit about the AT. Then, between the four of us, we packed: 4 Yuengling tall-boys, 4 heady tall-boys, 4 25oz Molson XXX's, a six-pack of Pork Slap, a 12-pack of Narragansett, and a bottle of Jim Beam over the Eastern Pinnacles and up Cat Rocks all the way to the Wildcat Shelter, which was a 9 mile hike. I'm not kidding. We met the MTFKS and a couple other new faces there and threw an epic hiker party. We had booze, the high school kids had just gotten a bunch of weed from their parents, one of them had a backpacking guitar and played music all night, some weekend warriors were out there for a birthday party so we made nice with a bunch of little kids. It was great. The night ended with Samurai serenading us all to sleep with some traditional Irish and Scottish lullabies.
Date: 2011-06-11
From: Wildcat Shelter

To: Day 30
Miles today: 14.3

We were all sleeping soundly last night after a night of heavy drinking. Then come 3:30 in the morning a freak rainstorm blew in. I'm talking torrential, flash-flood style rain. Of course, none of us had set up our rain fly's because the sky was clear all day yesterday and we were really wasted by the end of the night. So all of us got soaked. I was lucky enough to wake up and drunkenly drape my rain fly over my hammock in time to keep from getting too wet. Poor Breeze, however, slept right through the storm and woke up around sunrise sloshing around in about 2.5 inches of water that has accumulated in his tent. I got up pretty early and spent the early morning hours huddled in the shelter with Breeze, Samurai, and Baby Feet for warmth. We polished off the rest of the booze from last night, smoked way too much weed and hash, and chain-smoked cigs until the rest of the crew was awake. At some point a pair of hikers showed up who had already hiked 10 miles this morning. They ate brunch and left before we could even finish packing. Then a group of 30+ Asian day-hikers showed up expecting to have lunch in the shelter. They took one look all of us half-naked, half-starved, soaking-wet, hung-over, thru-hikers and decided to take their lunch break elsewhere. Lol.    We finally got ourselves motivated enough to leave the shelter somewhere around 2:00 in the afternoon still managed to do a solid uphill 15-mile day, complete with technical climbs, rock scrambles, rain, and something called the Lemon Squeezer. The Lemon Squeezer is pretty much a long narrow rock crevice that you have to scramble up; it required that I take off my 50 lb pack, throw it up to the top of the rock, bash my head on the side of the rock wall, and spider-walk up the crevice. Needless to say, it was a pretty grueling day today. BC and Sam are great company though and hiking with them definitely makes the time go by faster. We got to the Fingerboard Shelter after nightfall, as is tradition, and squeezed into the already-crowded shelter. The shelter was rather impressive in that it was completely constructed out of stone, not wood, and it even incorporated a built-in interior fireplace. The only problem is that it was built on a big exposed rock face so there is literally no camping around the shelter,hammock or otherwise. Sometime around 9:00 Teen Bean and Green Mile, the two hikers we had met at Wildcat earlier in the day, showed up exhausted. They had just done a 25, compared to our 15, so we were obliged to make room for them and ended up packing ourselves into the shelter like sardines. It is a wet and surprisingly cold night tonight but it's pretty bearable now that I'm surrounded by warm, albeit stinky, bodies. We're aiming for Bear Mountain tomorrow. Which is good because I need a short day after what I went through today for sure.
Date: 2011-06-12
From: Fingerboard Shelter

To: Day 31
Miles today: 12.6

Amazing day today. Where do I begin? The two latecomers from last night, Teen Bean and Green Mile, are also planning on picking up a mail drop from the P.O. in Bear Mountain, and they were pretty exhausted from their 25 yesterday, so they decided to join us on our short day today. And Samurai really doesn't have a schedule to speak of so he stuck with us too. The P.O. is only open from 8:00 - 10:00 AM today so our plan was to camp on top of Bear Mountain where you can see the NYC skyline and then hit the P.O. first thing in the morning. This was until me met a couple out on a day-hike with their little baby and our plans changed immediately. Brad and Cari are their names and our conversation with them went something like this:Brad/Cari "Hey. Are you guys all thru-hikers?"Us "Yes we are. All of us."Brad/Cari "Wow that's amazing. Is there anything I can do for you or anything that you need? I live just up the road here."Us "Thanks anyway. But we've been living in the woods for so long that we really wouldn't know where to begin."Brad/Cari "Well, how does a hot shower, a home-cooked meal, and a warm bed to sleep in sound?"Us >dumbfounded silence< followed by a resounding "YES!!!"So Brad literally picked up all 5 us, he even let us hike up to the top of Bear Mt. while he ran and grabbed his car so we wouldn't have to skip and trail-miles. He threw us all in his SUV and drove us to his amazing house off the highway in the woods where he in in the process of building a veritable palace for himself and his young family. Brad let us all take showers and do laundry while Cari prepared 12 lbs of steak with a reduced mushroom glaze on top, fruit salad, huge sweet potatoes, fresh veggies, ice cream, and beer. Sorry Church of the Mountain, this is the best meal I've eaten in recent or distant memory. Now we're all posted up in our respective beds/air mattresses watching the NBA finals on Brads huge flatscreen TV. This is unbelievable, too good to be true even. We pretty much met the nicest couple that ever existed... and we met them in New York of all places! I will be singing their praises for many many moond to come. Thank you so much Brad, Cari, lovely little Linnea, and family dog Lilly!
Date: 2011-06-14
From: Canopus Lake

To: Day 33
Miles today: 14.9

Another pretty good day today. No crazy trail magic today, but a solid standard day. BC, Sam, and I drank a few tall-boys last night so we were moving pretty slowly. It really helped to have Tean and Green to keep us moving with their occasional disapproving glances. The day itself was pretty uneventful: lots of climbing, decent weather, nice and cool. NY is a pretty tough state as far as the trail is concerned, but with you come across a near-by town or deli like every other day it's pretty easy to resupply and eat well. Speaking of eating well, we ate at another deli today... I even packed out some liverwurst, but no alcohol this time. If a had knows NY was going to be like this, I wouldn't have packed any food at all.We got to the Morgan Stewart Shelter pretty late, raged the privy pretty hard, and went right to bed. Breeze is here chillin' like always, as are Inchworm ans Sprocket. Another solid 18 miles today, trying to bam' out a 20 tomorrow.
Date: 2011-06-15
From: Morgan Stewart Shelter

To: Day 34
Miles today: 20.6

We managed to leave a bit earlier today, but not much. Teen Bean is getting annoyed that it takes us stoners so long to break camp in the morning. I wouldn't be surprised if she just leaves us in the dust soon. She probably would have my now if she was more comfortable hiking alone. I don't think Sam really wants to keep up with her either, he has a much more leisurely pace in mind. We did a quick and easy 11 miles until we reached this hiker-friendly garden center. There was supposed to be a hot dog stand there but, instead, it was just Inchworm and Sprocket on a power trip. Luckily, the owner of the garden center gave us a ride down the road to another deli. God I love New York. This is the 3rd day in a row that I've had a fresh deli sandwich and a quart of milk. We walked back to the garden center and then climbed back up on the ridge and did 10 miles to the Ten Mile River Shelter. Sam stayed behind though to dry off his gear and hit on passers by. When we got there Chaco Taco and Margalow, a couple we've been leap-frogging for a while, were setting up behind the shelter. Pleasant company. The front of the shelter opens in to a big grassy field that served as the stage for a spectacular lightning bug fireworks display all night. Tonight is my first full moon on the AT as well. And I have two 24oz 10% abv lagers to drink. What a great night.