Date: 2008-05-31
From: RPH Shelter NY

To: Telephone Pioneer Shelter NY
Miles today: 16.6
Weather: light rain

Day 104 ¢ Saturday May 31 ¢ Telephone Pioneer Shelter NY ¢ Miles Today: 16.6 Total Miles: 1432.2After the few sprinkles last night at 8:30, we didn't have any more precipitation until early this afternoon when we had just a few more light sprinkles. It was definitely more humid today. I¢m sure there is more rain to come our way soon. Time will tell.Today was one mighty weird day compared with where we thought we were versus our guidebook. We're supposedly camped .2 miles past Nuclear Lake at Telephone Pioneers Shelter, but it felt more like a couple miles past the lake. Obviously our guidebook has a typo! About 15 years ago, a medical radioactive processing plant contaminated Nuclear Lake. It has now been cleaned up and is safe for swimming according to government officials. We did not take time to go swimming as we were trying to get to the shelter before severe thunderstorms with hail arrived. We learned of the forecasted severe storms early this morning from some day hikers. We did not want to be out in it if possible, so we booked pretty hard. We hiked 9 miles to the first shelter by 10:00 a.m. We updated Trapper, who was there taking a food break, about the weather. We were all surprised that we had hiked 9 miles already. It was another 7.6 miles to the next shelter. We continued to book down the trail. The confusion set in after Nuclear Lake, when we could not find a sign for the shelter. We kept on booking figuring it had to be somewhere close. Just as we thought we were getting close to the shelter, we heard a ton of hammering and our hearts just fell as we were hoping for a nice relaxing afternoon nap.   Drats! Upon arriving to the hammering noise, we found a Boy Scout troop making a ramp across a swampy area. Great news on the construction effort. Now let us just hope that our shelter is far enough away from the noise to allow for a nap! At 1:30 we started to really think we had missed the junction for the shelter. The next shelter would have meant a 25-mile day, which we could do, but we were on ¢E¢ for water. Our minds were saying, "Where in the heck are we?" We were still boogying as fast as we could. About 20 minutes past the Boy Scout construction efforts, just when we thought we were dazed and totally confused, we saw the junction for the shelter! Actually we heard water first which was sweet because we could hike another 9 miles to the next shelter if need be for a 25 mile day but not without more water. Hearing the water was sweet, but seeing the shelter sign was icing on top of the cake! Ahhh, our hike for the day is over! We quickly freshened up in the creek, so as to not scare Trapper if he were to come by! We delayed setting up the tent since the storm was forecasted to be severe and with hail. We hung in the shelter from about 1:30 until 5:45. It never rained a drop! The skies were a bit gray but it didn't look like any horrible storm coming, at least not yet, so at 5:45 we decided to set up the tent and call it a night. Dinner had been served, food bag had been hung, laundry was hanging on the line drying and well, what else could we do but sleep!The sad news is that it looks like Trapper has moved on to the metro station into NYC, which is just 3 more miles up the trail, and we did not get a chance to say goodbye to him and exchange email addresses. The miles came quickly for everyone today and it appears that he was able to keep his original Saturday schedule of catching the train, which is wonderful news. When he hiked 8 miles on the wrong trail 2 days ago, he was sure that he would have to delay catching his train until Sunday, which wouldn't have gotten him home until 1:30 in the morning. Today would have been a mighty long day for him, his third nearly 20-mile day in a row, but I bet he's quite thrilled to be on his way back home. He had a rough section hike this time. He got lost for 8 miles one day, and on another day he fell 3 times on the rocks, each time slicing his hand. On top of all that he lost his dear, beloved walking stick, which he had used from Georgia all the way to here, on all of his section hikes over all these years. I think it was a sad day for him and a tiring day. He actually named the stick "Wilson" after he had lost it. This could not have been a fun section for him, but hopefully he takes away some memories of it and can eventually smile or laugh at the experience. There is one person with us tonight ¢ a guy who came in from the metro, from NYC. He¢s down the hill resting underneath his tarp without much gear. Ah, the joys of being able to take a metro to the wilderness and hang out for a day or two! The shelter is empty.   It was about 62 degrees this morning when we started our hike. It's around 70 this evening. We¢ve decided that we need to call the last few days Code Orange days. Code Orange because there are lots of orange newts on the trail - 2 or 3 of them can be seen at a time. We have to be careful where we walk or we¢ll step on one. However, I think even worse than a squished newt would be a newt shish kabob (via our hiking pole). May we never have the horrible experience of either!Grasshopper found another tick on her leg. It wasn't fully embedded yet and Brakeman was able to get it removed. I believe that makes 15 ticks located either on our equipment or us.Hard to believe but tomorrow we leave New York and enter Connecticut! Goodnight from just shy of Connecticut.