morvasaaty/AppalachianTrail-LD-Hikers-Blogs-and-Weather-20-years huggingface dataset:
Date: 2003-05-13
From: Wapiti Shelter

To: Pearisburg, VA
Miles today: 16.5
Weather: scattered clouds

Another day begins as i wake up wondering where i am. ok, collecting my thoughts...peeking out of my sleeping bag...today i am on the back porch of a barn hostel in pearisburg, va. the holy family hostel. you know, i never really even heard of a hostel before this trip, now i sleep on the back porches of them about every other week. im so used to sleeping on the ground or a plywood shelter floor now that i rarely even crave sleeping in anything resembling an actual bed. ahhh, the hike! it really gets you back to basics.i tried something new last week. instead of eating the usual oatmeal in its own package for breakfast, i started eating cereal. using my pot as a bowl, even with last nites dried on dinner still coating the sides, i just stir up some powdered milk and water in it, and WALA (voila?). honeycomb too, not that bark and sticks cereal. i eat enough of that when i drink my unfiltered water.i'll be zero-ing today, tues 13 may. for a couple reasons. one, ijust hiked for 7 straight days. two, when i went skinny dipping at dismal falls the other day, which was very 'refreshing'(i.e. COLD), i cut the bottom of my foot, so that needs to heal up some...i can still hike just fine though as long as i have it taped up right (dad, duct tape is as good as gold out here). three, superwalmart and wendys are only a few hundred yards across a field from here. and four, im gonna try to go back to damascus, va, this week for Trail Days. thats about a 163 mile hitch. should be easy everyone says. i think spunky and i are gonna make tomorrow our "get to damascus" hitch day. it sounds like a pretty big event there. hikers young and old go there and camp out and just have a big get together. and reps from the big gear companies show up and such. of course, i dont actually know all what happens there, but im glad i stayed there in town a few weeks back so i know the town layout anyw! ay. seems everyone else is going. so i might as well go too. im looking forward to seeing people i havent seen in awhile. should be there a few days.wel, its breakfast time and honeycomb awaits. got it at walmart last nite. with REAL milk. and OJ. mmmm.talk to you all later. (talk to Y'ALL later--being down here, its easy to start talking like the locals).
Date: 2003-05-22
From: War Spur Shelter

To: Sarver Hollow Shelter
Miles today: 12.2
Weather: overcast clouds

thurs,22may,838pm--today was a pretty tough hike. only did 12.2, but some serious ups and they were muddy. spunky and i hiked together from lunchtime til we got to this shelter. so from about 130 til 6. we took pictures of the second oldest tree on the trail, a giant 300 year old white oak. so, marty, your tree pictures have been made! with me and spunky next to it.its been rainy and foggy since tuesday nite. as i look out of this shelter, we are in a cloud. we're at 3400 ft. clothes are wet, temp is 49 degrees. i heard that saturday is the next chance for sunny weather.ive slept in my tarp about 6 times now, and its fine. i still need a bug net for it.im pretty happy with my gear so far. my boots are holding up well. my feet havent been hurting as bad since i got new inserts. i got a size 15 and cut them down. working good so far.somehow, i have a stuffed up nose and a day long sore throat thats going away. a day long cold. hope its gone when i wake up.would you like to know what people eat out here? too bad, im telling you anyway...(: breakfast-poptarts, oatmeal in the pouch, cold cereal with powdered milk, snickers bars, tang. lunch-peanut butter on tortillas or pita, jerky, ramen, koolaid, tuna in a pouch, nutella. dinner-lipton noodle dinners, ramen, snickers, instant cider, cocoa, potato dinners, mac and cheese. snacks-snickers, poptarts, cocoa, gorp, jelly beans, candy.all this and people still lose weight. ive been no exeption.this hike is something like ive never done before. you really notice yourself loving every minute of it. even when you find yourself sliding backwards down a steep hill, in the cold rain, you think, "this sucks", but immediately after that, you think, "yeah but where would you be if you werent here?" at a job, always wishing you were out here doing this. i am loving every minute of it here. every day youre somewhere different, seeing something new, meeting new people, seeing the lands that kept early americans near the east coast for a hundred years. im really glad they made this trail. its yours and mine. i hope you get to visit it someday, or hike the whole thing. its more than just a long walk.
Date: 2003-05-23
From: Sarver Hollow Shelter

To: Pickle Branch Shelter
Miles today: 15.9
Weather: overcast clouds

11.9 Miles to go til we're at catawba and this is the closest ive been to being totally out of food. i planned for 5 days. its taking 6. during todays hike, about a mile from here, spunky and i emptied our trash in some cans, and we looked at the trash in them to get some meal/food ideas for our next grocery stop. except, it was full with the stuff we already eat now. oh well.we saw the memorial today for audie murphy, the most decorated american soldier of ww2. he died in a plane crash near there in 1971. i videod as we found the memorial too.the weather today was fog. we would have seen some awesome views since we were on a ridge top most of the day. didnt rain really. temp about 55. warm enough for a tshirt and shorts while hiking, but i kept a warm fleece hat handy for when i got cold, like when i took breaks. you cool down fast when youre not moving.i had a weird dream last nite, so i know that i slept. i dreamed i was looking at a map of the world and for some reason i was pointing to hawaii. then, i was there. in a house in hawaii. well, at least it wasnt as exciting as the dream i had when i was making ham and eggs for saddam hussein. (and as he ate them, i chopped off his head with his sword...a classic dream indeed.) any dream analysts out there?latest cravings...chef boyardee pizza, sprite and rainbow sherbert, chocolate brownies. the usual...whatever you cant get as soon as you want it, thats what you crave. well, tomorrow we'll be inhaling it all. muah ha ha.wow, tomrrow will make it 10 weeks ago that i began hiking. i cant believe it. i still love it too. every minute.well, i think my cold is almost gone now. i had an alka seltzer cold medicine around noon. i think it helped since i just have to blow my nose once in awhile now. no more sore throat.spunky has to get her package at the post office by 1030 tomorrow, so we have to get hiking early. sunday and monday its closed. memorial day, etc. or she'll have to have it sent ahead. im glad i didnt bother with maildrops now. food is pretty easy to get out here, as long as you have a good guidebook. i have wingfoot's. it RULES. well, im post-nasal dripping all over my foam mattress, so i should get to sleep. maybe this will be gone tomorrow. luckily i didnt have any body aches. wish me luck!p.s.-marty, i wont be anywhere near gettysburg this weekend. but probably will be around a month from now.
Date: 2003-05-25
From: pickle branch shelter

To: bluesky and wes' house in catawba, VA
Miles today: 0.0

fast update...im ok. at mile 687.5 total. slept here at bluesky's house in catawba, va, and spunky, slow ride and oscar are here too. bluesky is a friend of atwanabe and spunky, and and now a friend of mine too. (: and wes thru hiked in 1978. great people. im happy to have met them.back on the trail in about an hour or so. its 2pm now. ive been sending my sister my pocketmail updates, but i dont know whats happening to them. i think theyre being returned for some reason. ill have to call her to find out.to everyone who i have kept in contact with throughout this trip and to those of you ive always wrote to, i apologize to you for not keeping you as up to date with whats going on with me as i should be. please dont think im trying to "drop out" and be a social outcast. im not. its just that the days sometimes are long and after i cook dinner, i just conk out and im done til morning. but i do miss our correspondence. i think i should concentrate on updating this journal more often so at least you all know where i am and how im doing. plus my pocketmail device is almost 100% filled, and i have to clear out something to keep it working. AND hike. whew! stay with me though. pics...i dont know about that either. ill just say it must be a technical difficulty for now til i check in with tina.gotta get going now. im still loving it out here. no inkling at all of not finishing. later.
Date: 2003-05-25
From: Catawba Mountain Shelter

To: Catawba Mountain Shelter
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: light rain

25may/941pm-lying here, away from any town, no decisions, no choices, steady rain falling outside the shelter...what bliss. today we left bluesky and wes's house and they hiked with us for about 6 miles. this morning, at the house, we made 5 pop can stoves. i tried my new one for dinner and it works better than my old one. yay! right now as im writing this, there are bugs kamikazi-ing my headlamp. they must not like rain either.spunky now has her hair in ponytails, but they are french braided. she looks like laura ingalls from little house on the prairie...which is why her new name is half pint, but we made a deal that only i can call her that. ill get a picture later.wow, im almost 1/3 done with the trail. im at the catawba mountain shelter, mile 695.4. 724.2 would be a third. 13 zero days as of now. 10 weeks out here. thinking of how i can make a living doing this. i do love it.we ate at the homeplace restaurant last nite. $12 all you can eat. they say its the best place on the trail to eat. it is good but i dont know of its the best on the trail. when youre hungry, alot of food tastes good. dont you think?at trail days, atwanabe was there. spunky and her and i hiked together back in march for about 2 weeks. she had to get off the trail due to health reasons. it was so great to see her again.well, these bugs are getting impossible; ive been a beacon for them for 40 minutes and they all brought their friends. too tough to type. nite.
Date: 2003-05-26
From: Catawba Mountain Shelter

To: Lamberts Meadow Shelter
Miles today: 8.2
Weather: broken clouds

total miles-703.626may/837pm/memorial day--crossed the 700 mile mark today...yep, i cant believe it either. didnt leave the shelter this morning til almost 1030. ate lunch up at mcaffe knob and vegged there for about 2 1/2 hours, soaking in the sun and the wonderful view. along came 2 women with 4 or 5 girls and they joined spunky, oscar and i for some conversation. the one woman was thinking of thru hiking and asked what we use for stoves, so i proudly pull out yesterdays masterpiece...the new pop can stove i made at bluesky' house.. i tossed it to her and she checked it out, and tosses it back my way. since we're up on a cliff basically, and its breezy, the breeze catches the stove and shoots it right toward a crevice.it lands and rolls guess where?...yep, right toward the crevice. we both got there just in time to see it as it bounced off rocks and and dirt and lands somewhere below the giant boulder we were on top of.later, me and oscar found a path down and eventually, luckily, found it. i'll be more careful with it in the future.tomorrow, we'll be in troutville/daleville, va, just northwest of roanoke, whose airport we saw from mcaffee knob by the way. plan to be on the trail by 7-730am. town is 9.4 miles away, and pizza hut all you can eat buffet is at 1130am. a 4 hour walk = PIZZA!!! motivation is a funny thing.im at the lambert shelter tonite. 3 deer were pretty close to it and they didnt seem too spooked. first deer ive seen in quite a while.in about 20 miles i'll be 1/3 done with the AT. already i think i will hike it again someday.weather today was fantastic. sunny, hot and lightly breezy. had great rush limbaugh reception on the radio, good views for pictures and pretty easy terrain. one of my best days yet.bedtime now. 920pm. 58.5 degrees. shelter coordinates 37 26 05 n/79 59 19 w. fill you all in tomorrow on the day's events. and how the pizza was. (:
Date: 2003-05-31
From: Daleville, VA

To: New York (temporarily)
Miles today: 415.2

217pm--where am i today...right now? I hardly believe it myself. I am in NEW YORK! yes, NEW YORK. why am i here? let me explain...I guess it all started wednesday. we were leaving daleville, va, all packed up and right near the trail. we stayed the night before at the best western hotel, also near the trail. near is like a hundred yards or so. so we cross the road to get to the pay phone at the gas station next to pizza hut, and i had some messages to send from my pocketmail, and spunky needed to call her mom about her grandma, who was in the hospital near where spunky lives, up in connecticut.so she calls, around 5pm and finds she needs to call back at 9pm. so we have a few hours to kill to walk 1.5 miles to troutville. we were gonna just call from there. but we find theres no payphone in troutville. so we walked to troutville and are at the grocery store around 7pm, where we find out about the no phone in town gig. so we ask another lady about this and she confirms it. then she says hop in her vehicle and she drives us back to daleville, about 3 miles away.we find some payphones and spunky makes the 9pm call. not good news about her grandma. so the plan is for her parents to drive down and get spunky the next day. well, this, to me means that if i keep hiking, i may be quite far ahead of her by the time she gets back...and we've been hiking together for over 10 weeks. which means we might not see each other for quite a while. very likely not for the rest of the hike. this was discussed and we didnt want it that way. so it was decided...i'll come to connecticut.we got a room with me, spunky and her boyfriend oscar (princeton), and her parents arrived around 1030m thurs morn. we left at noon and got to the hospital 500 miles away by around midnite.looking back now, its a good thing spunky decided to come back with her parents. because when she was in the room with her grandma, who was in a coma by the way, it, as far as i understand, was somehow comforting to her knowing spunky was next to her. her condition steadily declined from that point and she passed away that morning. i never met her. but she and spunky had a special relationship. she knew spunky was hiking the AT, and they were both excited about that. and now, in the last few hours, they were together again. im happy spunky got to be with her.so, the new york part? right now, we're on the way to oscars house, in new york. spunky is diving her car. and its raining pretty good out. and its foggy.so i'll be up here at least til tuesday or wednesday.her father is aranging for spunky, oscar and i to work with the moving company that spunky and her dad work at, on monday, which would help him out since he's shorthanded and will make us a few extra bucks for staying on the trail longer. which makes me look at my hands and see how 'un-worked' they look.so, when we get back, we'll be at mile 714.5. serious mile days are ahead. i already miss the trail. but it will be there when we get back.
Date: 2003-06-03
From: Connecticut

To: Troutville
Miles today: 0.0

I believe tonite we'll we leaving connecticut to get back to troutville to resume the hike. after all these off days, i really dont want to have any more. this is one case where my trail experience is getting in the way of my hiking. from the adage, "hiking is getting in the way of my trail experience".yesterday i worked a long day with the muscle man movers...left here at 730am, got back at 1030pm. talk about an upper body workout. my arms are quite sore, along with my shoulders and upper back. it was great to meet and work with spunky's gang at the movers...big mike, richie, johnny, mike, mark and ira. great bunch of guys doing a really hard job. it was a hard day of work, i admit. but i did really good, fit right in...even some of the guys asked me what i did for a living. for not having worked at a moving company, they let me know that they were impressed with how well i worked. one thing is that ive had some really good bosses to work for. its easy to work for people that appreciate you. but this job reminded me of one of the hardest jobs ive ever done...i.e. bricklayers helper. you only have to think of work when you hike though. and im ready to get hiking again.the funeral for spunkys grandma is happening right now. i am at her house getting ready for when we leave tonite. packing and organizing, etc. so i am recuperating from yesterdays moving job and tying up loose ends before we head south. i will update again when we get to troutville. wonder who is past us on the trail now. where are you, journey?
Date: 2003-06-11
From: Waynesboro

To: Montebello, VA
Miles today: 92.0

just a fast update, since im in montebello, va, and im just here to get mail and some food and to make a few calls. at 807 miles now. i did get your mail,tina. thank you. ive done about 92 miles in 6 days including todays 4. so im booking. will be in waynesboro friday. just missed fire angel, but shes in this town somewhere. have met alot of new people...cathy and gus from albany yesterday, and renegade and tomboy who fed us hikers near the reservoir. thank you both.gotta run and get more miles. maybe ill just walk. yes, i will walk. (:
Date: 2003-06-15
From: Waynesboro

To: Staunton, VA
Miles today: 0.0

10:08am--im at a motel in staunton, va,(pronounced stanton to the locals), with spunky and atwanabe. we were gonna camp overnite after our hike yesterday at the ymca for free in waynesboro, in fact, while we were sitting in atwanabe's vehicle in the ymca parking lot, contemplating our next move, deciding whether to set up tents in the yard or going to find the walmart in staunton or finding somewhere to eat, we decided to go find walmart and eat. set up tents later. so we found walmart, ate outside at burger king (right next to walmart), and thats when the deluge of rain convinced us that we wouldnt be tenting. we did the first 16.5 miles of the shenandoah nat. park yesterday. ended up at the riprap trail parking lot (mile 862.9). it was extremely hot outside, too. the hottest day yet.over 90. not hot enough for me, though. i function very well in the heat. others i see are just dying, drenched in sweat, saying, "i cant take this heat". for me, its so simple...i just close my eyes, picture 6 feet of buffalo snow that lies ahead of me, needing to be shoveled, feel the disgust of having to do that, then open my eyes. no bigger smile can come to my face. make it hotter!we have about 87 miles left in the shenandoahs. we have our food for the week. my hair and beard are long. i keep balancing whether i get a haircut or not. the other day decided for me. here's how. my hair, when it gets long, is curly and kramer-like. frizzy sort of. so im walking in the woods (as im sure you know i do from time to time), and this big horsefly is buzzingaround my head. as luck would have it, my frizzly curls perform a venus fly trap effect and BAM, the little bastard is stuck. hehehe. gotta move fast now. 1. put right hiking stick into left hand along with left stick, therefore freeing right hand, 2. slap head with right hand, killing annoying bastard horsefly. 3. big smile! 4. decision to not get haircut more clear.i talked to my dad and joanne last nite from the motel. joanne is back in the saddle again and she loved it. her and julie were at a horse riding place last week. im real happy for her. and dad is flying with the CAP. he loves that. and im hiking, which i love to do. isnt life great?
Date: 2003-06-15
From: Staunton, VA

To: Shenandoah National Park
Miles today: 871.1

sun,15june,623pm--happy fathers day, dad. im sitting on the rock wall that runs along the skyline drive in shenandoah national park (snp), at mile 871.7 total as of now. its extremely foggy, maybe visibility up to 50 yards. i hiked from riprap parking area to here, big run overlook, which is 8.8 miles. i got a very late start, 205 pm, and got here with no breaks at 536pm.
Date: 2003-06-16
From: Shenandoah National Park

To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0

0757am,16june-im at the camp, site A29. last nite, i walked to where atwanabe said that journey was camping (A1c) and sure enough, there she was! it was so good to see her again. even though it was dark. we talked for about an hour and a half. i havent seen her since day 3. and today is day 94.atwanabe has to go back home today. it just stopped raining, so ill get up and pack and she will take us back to yesterdays overlook so we can get back to hiking. it was really good to see her again.should be out of the SNP this week. harpers ferry by next week. then i can get some maps for the folks back home so they can see where i am. so, til next time (whenever that may be), take it easy.
Date: 2003-06-18
From: Rock Spring Hut

To: Pass Mtn.Hut
Miles today: 15.3
Weather: overcast clouds

day96/18jun/743pm-im in my sleeping bag now, all fed, watered and my bear bag is hung up. today was an early quit...got here at 556pm. at about 545 the sky opened up and dumped the rain. i didnt feel like getting drenched again like yesterday. today was hazy, but sunny and it didnt rain at all. totally opposite from yesterday. all day it was a downpour and my boots are still soaked. my feet look like dishpan hands. i did 24 yesterday and 16 the day before. just 15.3 today. from now on, id like to do 20 a day, average of 20 a day anyway. if i can keep to this, i will finish by the end of august, early september. but if early quits like today's mount up, it might not be possible. but at least i have a plan.shenandoah nat. park is pretty cool. there was quite a few places where the trail is near real bathrooms, gift shops, restaurants, etc. nice to be able to get drinkable water from a faucet right next to the trail. havent seen that before.yesterday, during the rain hike (not recommended if you enjoy hiking), i was getting close to lewis mtn campground, where they had a place to do laundry, use a phone, get some food. but i figured thered at least be a restroom with one of those hand dryer things. and there was. so thats where i spent about 2 hours, drying my clothes, warming up the room and eating lunch with one hand (other hand doing the drying). but of course, i was back into the torrent and wet again in no time. at least i got my clothes back to sponge-able condition. (:i should be out of the park by tomorrow at the end of the day. 22.9 to go. so i'll get up early and move out by 7. front royal is the next town. im looking forward to seeing massanutten mtn. ive seen it quite a few times on trips to civil war reenactments. im sure i will think of those times of yesteryear when i see it. if it aint fogged in!