Date: 2019-07-16
From: Deli campground near NY Route 52

To: Stealth Camp near Pawling Nature Reserve
Miles today: 16.0
Weather: clear sky

Day 106 AT Railway Station In the middle of the night the quarry/cement plant started operations making lots of noise and bright lights. The tranquility was broken but I slept through it. Funny how hiker exhaustion does that. Others however slept fitfully and moaned of the disturbance. I made myself some coffee in the morning and chatted with the group. Sadly this included a number who were ending their hikes due to injury, lack of motivation or plain bad luck. But they cheered us on as we headed off. The weather was cooler but not by much. The hills on the other hand were getting steeper! Another deli was a short 15 miles away and I had that as a goal. Alongside the way I stopped by Nuclear Lake, a very beautiful and picturesque place to pause by for a while. I was fascinated to learn how it got its name. Apparently it was named after a Plutonium Plant that blew up. It was a private research facility licensed by the government to experiment with bomb-grade uranium and plutonium. The lake was chosen for the operation because it was "the largest convenient and available tract that was not crossed by public roads and could be adequately guarded for secret experiments.¢ But then in December 1972 there was an explosion that resulted in an unknown amount of radioactive plutonium dust dispersing throughout the structure and surrounding shoreline and woods. The blast blew out two windows in the experimental nuclear research lab, which was positioned alongside the lake. Those folks who were living nearby were not so happy about this so the plant was closed down and after some checks the government handed over the lake as a park saying all was safe. Despite those official assurances, the local residents were not so convinced so they did their own checks. They¢d heard rumours of barrels being dumped in the lake in the middle of the night. Their report indicated that "unusual objects" were found to be in the lake. So then the government sent in scuba divers (presumably in radioactive proof suits) to go take a look. They didn't find any barrels, but they did find rocks, tree stumps, a sunken jeep and a sunken boat." Sheepishly the jeeps owner came forward and admitted that the jeep found its way to the lake bottom when it was driven out on the frozen water in winter, the ice cracked and the vehicle fell in!!! So the area was deemed safe and is now part of the AT. Despite these assurances I decided not to fill my water bottle from it or anywhere near it. It was beautiful though and a number of Canadian Geese gently swam by. After A 15 minute break I moved on and next came across the Appalachian Trail Railway Station. I was surprised to learn there is even a functioning railway station named after the trail and true enough on weekend for $44 return I could get a ride to New York City. Trouble was it was not the weekend. From the station I did a 0.5 mile detour ( 0.8miles in reality) to Tony¢s Deli. They had excellent sandwiches and air conditioning that did not work. But I was out of the afternoon heat at least. Later we ( a rag tail group of 5 hikers) were back on the trail and up another hill to a stealthcamp. In the open woods it was beautiful indeed as we watched the sun set over sandwiches made with care from Tony¢s place.