morvasaaty/AppalachianTrail-LD-Hikers-Blogs-and-Weather-20-years huggingface dataset:
Date: 2004-06-15
From: West Mountain Shelter

To: Greymoor Spiritual Life Center
Miles today: 13.0

Adam is on the phone; I just touched base with Russ in North Adams and ordered a Thermarest from Neel's Gap. The restaurant here (at the Bear Mountain Inn) opens in an hour at half past eleven. I hiked in early to send home 750 megabytes of pictures before the post office closed, but everyone was awake anyhow, thanks to a whippoorwill at the shelter. After lunch we are headed eight miles to a Franciscan monastery ("spiritual life center")--maybe I can get to mass finally. And I've found a tucked-away outlet to recharge my camera batteries. I left and excellent funny note telling Adam where to meet up with me, and meet up with me he did, but see the note he did not. Once again my artistic genius goes lost and un-noticed! After chasing Adam through "The Jester" I'm glad to have a book of my own: "Have His Carcase" by Dorothy L. Sayers. This morning the postmaster saw my name on an outgoing box and she remembered having a package for me. Two coincidences: first, I was just starting to wonder where exactly I had sent the book (which was in the package); second, I had marked the box ¢ETA 6/16¢--today. Eerie, huh? ¢I always have a quotation for everything--it saves original thinking.¢ -Lord Peter Wimsey in D.L. Sayers ¢Have His Carcase¢
Date: 2004-06-16
From: Greymoor Spiritual Life Center

To: View Entry
Miles today: 19.0

Nineteen miles today; everything aches with a dull and uninjured and somewhat pleasant pain. The big question: should I employ chronological narrative or categorical discourse? Neither, most likely, because the human brain associated and recalls memories according to complex laws still hidden to science. Stanimal and I spent the night at the Greymoor Spiritual Life Center--a Franciscan monastery that runs a homeless shelter targeted at rehabilitating addicts. With us were Moonpie, Tarzan and Mouth (they pressed on tonight past us), Condor, the married Skyline and Sundance, Squish, Einstein, and Rocksteady (who rolled in last night late). A bunch of people, eh? This morning, I woke to a sunset rising over the baseball field we were at the side of, an walked up to the Inn. I got my confession heard (during the first old testament reading), and (yay) finally celebrated the Eucharist for the first time in maybe two months. Fr. Angel invited me afterwards to join several friars for a breakfast of whole-wheat waffles; eggs scrambled with sausage, peppers, and onion; grits; orange juice; and coffee. Everyone except Adam (waiting for me), Tarzan, and Mouth had left by my return. Adam and I hiked out promptly. The hiking was varied: some pointless ups and downs, some stony ride-walks, some level ridge-walks (including a section that was leveled by brute force and stonework). We played with a snake at an afternoon break and ran into a wild turkey that fled for safety according to the following strategy: run in circles and squawk.. Eventually one of the circles led it out of sight and it calmed down. Had some good conversation with Adam. Scored ¢The Doom that Came to Sarnath and Other Stories¢ by H.P. Lovecraft. Adam and I ate our last hot dinner tonight, and will mail home the stove gear from Kent. We can make it to Vermont never carrying more than three days of food and never going more than a mile for it (except once: Great Bearington). Thru-hikers have two distinct modes of walking. Three, if you count the three mile-an-hour clip that gets us to Maine--that doesn't really count. The first is the ¢I've just gotten uup and walk like an arthritic old lady with a walker.¢ That mode lasts until the hiker puts on his pack. The second walk is ¢I've just eaten so much I cannot believe it and will someone please roll me out of here but be gentle so that you don't provoke vomiting because then all the eating would have been for naught.¢ It's less of a walk and more of a bloated waddle. Moonpie has put out a bag of sour gummy worms (¢artificially flavored¢). They are: yummy!
Date: 2004-06-17
To: Telephone Pioneers Shelter
Miles today: 16.6

We pushed an extra several miles today, and we are both glad we did. This morning we made good time to NY52 and the Mountain Top Market. A bunch of us ordered a bunch of the "grand slams": two eggs, bacon, ham, sausage, and cheese on a large bun. Adam and I resuplied for Kent (two full days) and then ordered another pair of the mammoth slams. We sat around in the heat with Moonpie, Einstein, Skyline & Sundance, and Condor. When it started to sprinkle (and threaten worse) we headed out, easily making four miles to the Morgan Stewart Shelter.On a whim--and this turned out to be very important--Adam and I pressed 7.6 to the Telephone Pioneers Shelter, with rumors of a good swimming hole halfway. We walked and happily talked with Moonpie as the sky cleared and the rumors panned out. We three found ourselves in a grassy lakeside clearing surveying the pristine and artificial if suspiciously named Nulceal Lake. We set down our packs, inflated Moonpie's swimming frog and dove off the top of a submerged cliff. The sun was out, the swimming excellent, and the company (Einstien, Skyline, and Sundance caught up shortly) in high spirits. Grins were on the house and laughter was on tap. To boot, the swim washed off all the stink and most of the dirt accumulated since Bear Mountain. We rinsed our shirts and congregated on a small square dock to share food and conversation. Everyone enjoyed both; only after a while did we all pack up and walk out.The sky darkened again, but we all beat the rain and Adam and I enjoyed the foot-long ham & cheese subs we packed out from the Deli. And a cup of fresh fruit (Adam would have taken all of the pineapple for his own if I hadn't been keeping an eye on him)."Our zero days are good for the soul, if perhaps hard on the liver."
Date: 2004-06-18
From: Telephone Pioneers Shelter

To: Ten Mile River Lean-to
Miles today: 13.0

Today's hiking was horrible--hot and muggy, swampy, overgrown and thorny. Plus we had to step over a rotten dear carcass swarming with maggots. We are joined tonight by the pleasant Singe; that and a rinse-off in the nearby river has restored us. A few other are camped nearby. A hard rain came down for an hour or so. Fireflies came out when the rain subsided; the field in front of the shelter twinkled. I'm looking forward to Kent.
Date: 2004-06-19
From: Ten Mile River Lean-to

To: Stewart Hollow Brook Lean-to
Miles today: 15.7

Bad: eight miles into Kent over three small mountains. Good: pulling into Kent with the company of Adam, Condor, and Singe (extra thanks to Oatmeal Ninja for the lift). Also good: bags of food hanging at the Mt. Algo Lean-to just before town. Bad again: no lodging in Kent, no laundry, and no showers. Better: haircuts and shampoo for Moonpie, Adam, and myself. Really rocking: new shoes (New Balance 806) and superfeet, new Thermarest (replacing a worn z-rest), new Equinox fleece liner (replacing my worn Marmot Arroyo), and an old Nomad Lite (single-wall sil-nylon tent) for Adam. Back to bad: hiking out on CT 341 after two expensive beers and a burger (which was at least greasy), and hiking out in the heat through thorny brush and up various hills. Good (see the pattern?): hiking four abreast along the Hoosatonic River with Moonpie, Aimy, and Adam (excellent company). Kick-ass: pulling into the shelter at dusk with beer and chocolate all around. Thanks to Adam for hiking in the former and to Moonpie for hiking in the later. An excellent, horrible, great, sucky, roller-coastery day ends quite happily.
Date: 2004-06-20
From: Stewart Hollow Brook Lean-to

To: Belter's Campsite
Miles today: 15.2
Weather: broken clouds

Adam and I left after everyone excepting Moonpie; she rolled out at 11:30 AM. We immediately took lunch at a lovely campsite 2.8 miles out. The rest of the 15.2 miles proceeded just as slowly, but it did proceed. Moonpie, and Skyline & Sundance are here with us. Adam and I plan on Naked Breakfast tomorrow.
Date: 2004-06-21
From: Belter's Campsite

To: Salisbury, CT
Miles today: 10.5
Weather: clear sky

It was very cold this morning--too cold for Naked Breakfast--even hard to get out of bed, but a brisk walk up and down the trail warmed me. I hung out on Belter's Bump to watch the sunrise lift a fog out of the valley below. Moonpie and Adam camped nearby; Skyline & Sundance camped downhill. The hiking went quite easily, and--because today is the summer solstice--the hiking was naked.We've stopped in Salisbury to wait for Adam's phone card at the post office, and followed a long trail of clues to the "secret" hostel here at St. John's Episcopal Church: from the resident trooper in town hall we discovered the clue of the church, from a church bulletin we found the phone number of the rectory, from the answering maching message we extracted the pastor's phone number, and after being screened by his wife, we were in! Admittidly, that's talking the process up a bit.So we have this huge, finished basement to ourselves, and strains of classically religious music float down from the church upstairs. I've discovered Thomas Merton and his "Contemplative Prayer" over coffee:"Unless the Christian participates to some degree in the dread, the sense of loos, the anguish, the dereliction and destitution of the Crucified, he cannot really enter into the mystery of the liturgy."and"Of course, it is true that religion on a superficial level ... easily comes to serve as the 'opium of the people'."
Date: 2004-06-22
From: Salisbury, CT

To: Hemlocks Lean-to
Miles today: 14.1

Adam and I sat in a light rain and split a loaf of pineapple bread for lunch before hiking out: a bad decision in hindsight. In all other respects, Salisbury is one of my favorite town stops: Adam got new sticks, we caught up on internet access (using an hour an a half of computer time), paid nothing for lodging (thanks again to Mark the trooper and John the rector), dried out our gear in the boiler room, only bought one meal, and had two cups of coffee in the morning.We did learn a lesson, after walking at dusk (that we walked in at dusk is atmospheric detail, not integral to the lesson) nauseous and gassy (that's the effect whose cause we pondered). Of course, we still stuffed crackers, cheese, and mostly-water turkey cold cuts, but as we did so, we thought back--quietly fearing a bad-water bug, looking for something else to blame. Note the following:lunch, on the 21st: 1 gallon of Breyer's Coffee Ice Cream (split evenly)dinner, on the 21st: 2 lbs. of a medium rare roast (delicious, split evenly)breakfast, on the 22nd: 2 cups of coffee and a pop-tart (package of two) and a croissant eachlunch, on the 22nd: half a loaf of pineapple bread (split evenly)later, on the 22nd: one bag of Snyder's Honey BBQ pretzel pieces (a dull flavor, split evenly. next time back to Jalepeno)Perhaps our diet has been to blame. I feel better not hiking and having eaten, but still cautiously anticipate tomorrow.We all (Squish, Condor, Mouth, Tarzan, Singe, Adam, and myself) crossed the CT-MA border yesterday. Ten states down, four to go. The hiking is getting harder again, in spurts. For example: today we climbed up, over, and down three mountains each over 2300 feet. That is as high as we've been in many miles.
Date: 2004-06-23
From: Hemlocks Lean-to

To: MA23 (East Mountain Retreat Center)
Miles today: 16.4

Thank you for the donated dinner, Tell It!(the pizza we ordered last night never made it.)We slept in (everyone at the expansive Hemlocks Shelter, I mean) and hiked (Adam, Singe, and I) under pleasant weather with pleasant company. The day was too long, clouded with mosquitoes, and we didn't meet up with Desperado, but we did stay with Tell It (recovering from a tick bite and ehrlichiosis) and John (who loves his vegetables and avoids a trail name). Tomorrow we hitch in for a resupply and then hike a few miles.
Date: 2004-06-24
From: MA23 (East Mountain Retreat Center)

To: Mt. Wilcox North Lean-to
Miles today: 5.1

The mosquitos! Adam is asleep in his tent, and I in my bug bivy under my tarp am wasting those last waking hours on this journal and my book. Neither of us had much trouble with the hiking today. Both did I lot Great Berrington: breakfast (Macdonalds), resupply (groceries, rather cheaply), internet (at the local community college--I started building my trailjournals gear list and uploaded my first two pictures!).On the other side of the bivy's netting--six inches from my face--a legion of mosquitos swarms patiently. We hit the buggers pretty bad on the driveway out from the retreat center. Which reminds me: people are friendly here-abouts, and hitches come easy.
Date: 2004-06-25
From: Mt. Wilcox North Lean-to

To: Upper Goose Pond Cabin
Miles today: 14.0
Weather: few clouds

Tonight I will have slept sounder than I have in a while, after staying up to talk about just about everything with C'est la Vie and Skyline around a table lit by the glowing flame of a gas lamp. Hoplite will be on a couch typing on his pocketmail at the fringe of the conversation. I know this because (are you seated? take a deep breath and relax your organ of skepticism) I am writing from the future! From the morning of the 26th!Adam and I pulled in around four, and found John here with two others. The caretaker (Joanne) was away till five and please help yourself to the water and pancakes, according to the note. John had already helped himself to the pancakes. Before Joanne's return, twelve of us converged and were congregating on the porch. I recall: Hoplite, Skyline & Sundance, C'est la Vie, Packrat, Cowsie, The Mad German. There were more, and it was cozy when the rain started. But there was plenty of room in the bunkhouse upstairs.We had a good time hiking, aside from Adam's run-in with the poison ivy. Our lunch was taken at a road crossing on a small rock fence above a valley. We ate (a lot) salami picante with cheese (block cheddar for me and pre-sliced American for Adam) stacked with Townhouse crackers.Skyline--named after Cincinatti chili--is an English major and the type of solid, excited (and orthodox, which is what I had hoped "solid" would imply) Catholic. End result: good conversation. I wonder if the upstairs sleepers are waiting for us to shut up.
Date: 2004-06-26
From: Upper Goose Pond Cabin

To: October Mountain Lean-to
Miles today: 8.8
Weather: mist

It's been a busy morning; Adam and I are watching about a dozen others pack up and hike out after blueberry pancakes and coffee. Soon only Joanne and us will remain. The rain has altered our plans--cut the day in half, actually. Most of the northbound hikers are going all the way to Dalton, MA or the shelter three miles south of Dalton--our original target.We are talking to the caretaker, and she is telling us about a volunteer on the Hemlocks shelter dying during construction while flipping through the pictures on my camera. The rain is clearing out, but we'll probably be here for another hour.
Date: 2004-06-27
From: October Mountain Lean-to

To: 83 Depot Street, Dalton, MA
Miles today: 11.8
Weather: clear sky

Mr. Lavardi is in the kitchen working up a meaty pasta sauce, and I'm out here in front of Antique Roadshow. Adam is in town, and in a few hours arrangements will be made for a shuttle up to North Adams tomorrow (an old college friend).It was a chilly night, but I was shielded from the swirling wind in the shelter loft. Plexiglass windows let reading light this morning; I have "Deep Black Biowar" with me, though it is Adam that picked it up.Aside: commercials on PBS mesmerize, and it takes effort to break free from the reverie to compose a journal entry. So I will be brief, and save the extended musings for an extended quiet time.
Date: 2004-06-28
From: 83 Depot Street, Dalton, MA

To: Mt. Greylock (Russ' place in Adams)
Miles today: 17.0

After ice cream and dinner we went out with Tom for a few drink. Then we returned for a few shots. Then we all passed out for a few hours (although Adam says he hardly slept at all). We woke up at four; Tom was getting ready for work, and made us coffee. I was getting all my stuff together to move out onto the porch. Adam put on his shoes--an action beyond my understanding until he proposed walking out ten miles to Cheshire instead of waiting in Dalton for dawn and the opening of the post office. I consented and made the switch-over to "preparing to slackpack" mode, leaving a message for Russ that I would call from Cheshire.The ten mile night-slack flew by in three hours. Then it became a 17 mile all-morning slack to Greylock. Adam had a fire under his rear. We arrived just before noon under a beautiful sky and met Russ. We had dinner and got drunk after doing laundry and taking showers. I'm glad to see Russ again; he doesn't look a day older than I remember, except now he drives a new four-wheel truck, so I know he's not stuck in a time-space loop or whatever.
Date: 2004-06-29
From: Mt. Greylock (Russ' place in Adams)

To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0

Yesterday Adam found about ninety pictures he wanted to upload, and by five o'clock had uploaded about thirty of them. I voiced a suggestion: slack down Greylock and finish the uploads in the evening. So we grabbed our sticks and Russell dropped us off on top of Greylock. We made it down in two hours to MA2--just beating darkness and rain. Adam left his radio in Russ' truck. We talked and walked and reflected and contemplated.We returned to an AMAZING pork chop dinner Russell threw together: pork chops, oven-toasted stuffing, and ravioli with onions and tomatoes. And a beer-stocked fridge. The three of us spent the rest of the evening (and part of the night) talking, working on the computer (that was mostly Adam), and listening to music (Underworld, various Northern Exposure CDs). I am happy; this stop is about halfway for me, and a good goodbye to the lowland midatlantic states (VA, WV, PA, NJ, NY, CT, and southern MA). Adam and I are off into the mountains now:"What time is it?""About six weeks to Maine."I'm looking forward to summitting Katahdin every day now, and while I still enjoy every day, the end will be welcomed. The AT: an adventure, a pilgrimage, a lot of fun, an escape, a geologic force.
Date: 2004-07-01
From: Seth Warner Shelter

To: Brattleboro, VT
Miles today: 11.5

We slept very well. I slept through the fireworks and musics, they told me. The bugs didn't bother me under my tarp. I've caught up (mostly) for the 3 hours I slept yesterday. Todays hike down to VT 9 wasn't so bad; none of the hiking is, yet. We met Dot, whom Adam had met in VA. She is putting us up at her place in Battleboro, after feeding us hamburgers and ice-cream.Gear Miscellany: Frog Togg (pants) are out. I have a new set of XXL Montane Featherlite wind pants. And new technical running shorts from Hind. And a pair of fleece pants from Hot Chilly's. Except for that last item, it's all splurge, but not a bad splurge. Not like a new sleeping bad ($300) or a new pack ($200).I'm tired now, and ready for bed.
Date: 2004-07-02
From: Brattleboro, VT

To: Goddard Shelter
Miles today: 10.1
Weather: few clouds

It's too late to write; Adam and I spent almost an hour and about 128M of camera memory on the firetower 0.3 miles north watching the sunset from about fifteen feet about the treetops. I'm excited about my new gear (running shorts, long underwear) and glad for the absence of buzzers here, but the bitting gnats out before dusk had me worried. Adam and I were squished into his tent for dinner: crackers with deli-sliced salami and cheese. Too dark to write unassisted--time for bed.
Date: 2004-07-04
From: Stratton Pond Shelter

To: VT11/30 (Red Sled Motel)
Miles today: 10.6

We ran down to VT11/30 to meet Adam's friends Dan and Mike at 1PM. They brought a cooler of beer and after we settled into a room at the Red Sled Motel we day hiked a cold few up to the new Bromley Mountain Shelter. We returned to spend the evening by the pool with beer and pizza.
Date: 2004-07-05
From: VT11/30 (Red Sled Motel)

To: Peru Peak Shelter
Miles today: 10.1
Weather: light rain

Rain this morning helped us sleep in, but loud neighbors woke us. Breakfast at Macdonalds after starting a load at the laundromat, and then we tooled around town (Adam admiring Patagonia running shorts and I buying Aqua-Mira and looking for bug netting) before returning at noon to request a late check out. We packed up our groceries and shaved quickly. We hiked out in good weather but the sky dumped on us over Peru Peak. Our gear (along with that of Mainsail and Saukraut) is spread out to dry under the partly clouded but partly sunny afternoon sky. My camera is drying, too, but no fee-collecting caretaken has shown up collecting any fees; we're all happy about that.
Date: 2004-07-07
From: Greenwall Shelter

To: Clarendon Shelter
Miles today: 8.8
Weather: few clouds

The first sunlight woke me about half past five--I slept better last night under my tarp than I have in a while under any conditions. After packing up and leaving the TP with Adam and eating most of what food I had left, I walked out into the bright, chilly morning. It was an easy and largely downhill hike to VT103, except for the 800 foot climb up Bear Mountain. I stopped at Minerva Hinchey Shelter (a converted cabin, maintained by Mrs. Gorp), but left after browsing the register, under attack by the mosquitos (Adam reported no mosquitos here, and raved about the water source, which I skipped).At VT103 a local picked me up, drove me down to the North Clarendon PO, waited while I mailed home two memory cards and Tom Brown's "Grandfather", and returned me to the general store where I had agreen to wait for Adam. My hunger got the best of me; instead of waiting I walked up half a mile up the road back to trail to the Whistle Stop for breakfast: a three egg omlet with onions, peppers, and bacon; home fries; toast; and coffee (loaded up with creamer and sugar Stanimal style). The menu called it a three egg omlet, but it was the size of a football--reminding me of the Port Clinton Hotel cheese-steaks.Waiting for Adam at the general store, I could reach neither Mom nor Dad on the phone (this was my stated reason for hiking out early), but I did have a good conversation with Bill. Over half an hour we wandered from Tom Brown (tracker and naturalist in the Native American tradition) to Thomas Merton (monk in the Catholic tradition) to language and TESL (teaching English as a second language) to his art and to my writing, and to a couple of places in between. Adam pulled up in the back of pickup, and I got off the phone. After hang-out, resupply, and more phone use, we sensibly returned to the Whistle Stop for lunch: bacon cheeseburgers (mine with fries), battered mushrooms, and (stupidly) stawberry shortcake. I had overeaten.The trail climbs up from VT103--straight up--through a rocky ravine to Clarendon Shelter. A cool downdraft pouring through the bottom of the ravine saved us from otherwise sweltering afternoon weather. Now there is the company of the Maggots (two sons with their parents on the Long Trail) and plenty of time to rest.There's a moderately detailed day for you, except for all the sensory detail I skipped over: morning light in the trees, dull aching knees, euphoric exhaustion and the strangly reverent mountain-top forests, sunlight on the roadside flowers and the blasting heat, the taste of wild strawberries when I'm hungry and the taste of stawberry shortcake when I'm full, the burn of a good calf stretch, the sopping heat of a sweat-soaked shirt, and on, and on. All the thoughts and feelings; I'm to tired to begin.This journal--a random and spotty selection, poorly organized and badly written--records very little of the hike; nearly none of it."conversational recconaisance," a phrase Adam has been for the last month trying to recall, popped into his head today.