Date: 2012-06-26
From: Mohican Outdoor Center

To: Culver's Gap
Miles today: 17.6

Why do I do this? Once again on day 2 I have pulled bigger miles than I should have. And my feet are letting me know about it!   know I get swept up with the thru hikers and knowing I can make the miles I push harder than I should. I really hope one day I learn better. Maybe 3 times a charm right? I guess that means next time should be my last time making this mistake. AB and I started hiking at 730 and were off to a good start. She keeps telling me I am a liar and there really are no bears in NJ. All she really wants to see is a wild bear and of course so far we have seen none. All day she was talking about "these fictitious bears"... I just laughed... so far on the trail I had seen 17 bears and this is NJ... there was no way we would make it though NJ with out seeing at least one bear! At one point in the day AB looked up the trail (she lead the way most of the time) and said "is that blaze serious?" I smiled and said "what do you think?" Of course it was. The blaze was on a tree right in front of a small rock scramble that basically went straight up. The AT is really good at finding these type of scrambles and taking you right up with them. And I every day since then I smile and laughed when I see a blaze in front of a rock scramble. About half way though our day Jaws hiked up behind us. Which was a surprise. We had figured he would have hit the trail much earlier in the day and be miles ahead of us. But it turns out he stayed with his cousin the night before and was late returning to the trail in the morning. Again we enjoyed laughing and joking as we hiked along through out the afternoon. And again he was hiking past us so he could spend more time with his cousin. Which was fine with us, since we knew we could not keep up with his pace anyway. But then he mentioned to AB that there was a steakhouse at the next road crossing... and that was all she needed to hear. We were going to hike the extra 3.5 miles more than we planned so we could have a good dinner. I left all the decisions on our daily miles to AB. Being new to backpacking I wanted her to feel in control of our days and although I had planned out the basic daily miles we needed to do so we could make it back to her car by Fri, I still wanted her to feel a part of the planning stages.The miles were big for us... but in the end it was a good thing we hiked those extra miles. Late in the afternoon, with Jaws leading the three of us, he stopped short and whispered to be quiet. And there was AB's first bear sighting. It was a big one and he was right in the middle of the trail munching on some berries (blueberries, blackberries and some raspberries are ripe on the edge of the trail). He looked up at us and then slowly ambled off the trail and into the woods. He stopped and looked back at us and then turned back into the woods and kept going. It was a pretty cool sighting... he was looking right at us. Immediately AB named him "Henry". But my favorite sighting came a bit later when we spotted a little porcupine up a dead tree. He was maybe about 10-15 pounds and must have been a bit scared by the tree people watching him, but he was quite cute just sitting up there watching us!What a day of questions... I got another good one this time from Jaws... like I said earlier it's the beginning of berry season and at least this member of "Team Berry Slug" is doing her part to eat as many berries as possible. Well on one of these berry stops, the three of us were picking a munching away, Jaws picked a darker than normal and shinier than normal "blueberry". I said I wouldn't eat it because I wasn't 100% sure it was a blueberry and it could be poisonous. He squished it between two fingers and looked at the juice and asked "should I like it?" Both AB and I bust up laughing... between the two of them I got some good questions that day!After making it the last "extra" 3.5 miles, we finally came out at the road, and just down the street and within sight was the steakhouse... only problem was it was closed. Thankfully Gyp's Tavern was open. We ordered up food and sat at the picnic tables by the lake. Quite a good place to hang out. Jaw's cousin, Leann, was willing to take AB and I to the motel 2 miles up the street so we loaded into her car and went to check in. As we were checking in, 3 state troopers pulled into the parking lot looking for one of the residents... not really a good sign... but two of the guys who also lived at this motel said that kind of this never happened there and it really was a good place... not that we could easily get to another place anyway. But little did we know our night would be anything but restful... the couple in the room next to us screamed at each other ALL NIGHT LONG. I think that was the worst night I have ever had on the trail. Oh well... just part of the adventure right?