Date: 2014-06-14
From: Warwick Turnpike, NJ

To: Buchanan Mountain
Miles today: 16.6

I woke around 6 this morning on the floor of the church hostel. Instead of waking everyone else, I walked 500 ft to a restaurant for coffee and breakfast. I was in no hurry because someone had offered to take us all to the trail at 9. Since I was 9 miles from where I got off the trail, I was happy to wait. I went back and packed up my dry sleeping bag and clean clothes. It felt good after the wet week we had. Our trail angel driver showed up early with a dozen Dunkin donuts and coffee. This day was off to a great start. I actually made it on the trail just before 9. I passed a couple of other hikers in the first 45 minutes and never saw anyone else today. I am in a strange place on the trail now. Since the group of ten that I was seeing and camping with most days left to take a few days off at the Jersey Shore, I am in a hole. Sure, I pass some of the slower hikers, but there are not many around. The rocks here are different than most of the others I have encountered. I guess they are like the Knife Edge last week. They are really big smooth chunks. Some are pretty slick also. Not more than a couple of hours into my day, I exited NJ for the last time on the AT. There was a survey monument and painted NJ/NY on the rocks. (See my photos) Soon I came to Prospect Rock, the AT Highpoint for NY; someone placed a US flag there. The wind made it stand straight out as I arrived. The clouds were breaking and the sun came out for the first time in a week. The rocks were quite a bit of work to negotiate in this section. A couple of the areas had blue blaze routes around, but I feel blue blazing is cheating. Especially when the route is clearly marked with white blazes. If you look closely at the photos, you can see the blazes. I had heard chatter about a ladder and soon saw the ladder. I guess someone thought the rock scramble was too tough so they bolted a ladder to help us. Another interesting thing about today was that the Mountain Laurels were in bbloom. They have been close as I have traveled north for the last month. I guess someone a week behind me has been seeing them in full bloom for a month. Just after 1 I came to highway NY 17A this is where Bud's hot dog stand is located as well as an ice cream shop. It is a through hikers tradition to stop at these places. When I got to the hot dog stand, a guy ask if he could take my picture. He was doing a story about the tradition of through hikers stopping there. He said he had been there for sseveral hours and no one had showed up. He took some pictures, gave me his card and I ate 2 hotdogs with cheese, chilli and onions. I then went to the ice cream shop for a large coffee flavored cup. All this stuff next to the trail is awesome. I continued for 4 more hours of rocks with a couple of nice views and I started getting tired. I guess the rocks took more out of me than I realized. I found a sweet camp spot 100 yds. from a creek. I set up camp and put a rope in the tree for my food bag. I was too tired to cook so I had some tuna, peanut butter and a cherry pie. I hung my food and went in my tent to write my journal. I found one of those tiny ticks crawling on me so a full body check will be done when it's lighter. My first night in NY is just like my first night in NJ. Solo camping in the forest. My tent dried quickly after being wet for a week. Today I am grateful for the sunshine we had for a few hours.