Date: 2016-05-29
From: Murray Property

To: Wawayanda Shelter
Miles today: 18.5
Weather: clear sky

Great night's sleep with the rain fly off. Whenever I woke up I could look up and see the moon and stars. It cooled off nicely and with the rain fly off the tent was nice and cool.We were up and on our way at 6:30, our usual time, today and eager to sample the town food on our agenda and an opportunity to swim again.We walked two miles and then crossed a road and took a detour for bagel, egg, cheese and ham sandwiches. I had one with a bottle of juice and Santa had two sandwiches with two Mountain Dews.Then off to hike more until lunch. We had everything today- woods, meadows, farm land, wildlife refuge and bogs-lots of bogs. And bogs equal bugs. We both have lots of bug bites and we are pretty itchy.Lunch was at the end of a boardwalk through a swamp. It was easy walking but unprotected from the sun and very buggy. But lunch was close by and delicious! I started with watermelon, a barbecue chicken wrap, a soda and finished with an Italian ice. Santa started with grapes, two barbecue chicken wraps and two sodas plus he finished mine. I got two apple cider donuts to go.The hike after lunch wasn't fun. It was steep and rocky plus hot and buggy. We stopped at a stream to soak our feet and take a bandana bath. It felt so good but once we started hiking we were sweaty again.We are the only ones at the shelter area at the moment but we expect three more people. We had lunch with them and their plan was to come here. We are tenting behind the shelter. It's too buggy to stay in the shelter. NJ isn't very good about putting shelters near water sources so we are being very careful about water again. Plus we both drank 4 liters today. Trying to be smart about the heat and not make myself sick again.Tomorrow is supposed to be a difficult section and it's supposed to rain tonight which will make the rocks slick. We have decided to do ten miles and then go into town-thunderstorms tomorrow afternoon are in the forecast.Trail magic! Time Warp's mom left a cooler of sodas on ice for thru hikers. Helped Santa power through the last climb. I am not finding soda thirst quenching so I passed.We met Has No Horse again. We had met him at Delaware Water Gap. He had taken a bad fall and I gave him some wipes to clean up. When we saw him today he had facial bruises and a black eye. We hiked together for awhile and chatted. He's 74 and hiked the PCT in three sections. He started the AT in March but has to get off the trail in 100 miles to go home for a wedding and work. He says he doesn't care about doing a thru hike, he just likes to hike. He gave himself his name from a book he read about a Native American from his home state of Oregon. There was a lady at the road crossing where we got lunch who offered us a place to stay tonight. We almost took her up on it but have miles to hike to get closer to New England by Friday to meet up with our girls. But Has No Horse doesn't have a schedule so he went home with her for a shower, dinner and a ride back to the trail in the morning.But I am perfectly happy sitting in our tent listening to worship music on Santa's iPod on this Sunday evening.