Date: 2016-05-20
From: Somewhere in Northern PA

To: Asbury Park, NJ
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: overcast clouds

I've received multiple requests for an update on the lives and times of The Jersey Boys. Lucky for you (and also for me) I got to see 1/2 of the duo for the weekend. The events unfolded thusly:The morning I was due to reach Delaware Water Gap, I sent them both a text, letting them know I would be mere inches from the great state of New Jersey that afternoon. Bryan (aka Road Runner) called me immediately, a lucky chance because I keep my phone on airplane mode most of the day."Ellen is coming to get you," he stated, "she's leaving as soon as she gets off work at one."Ellen is Bryan's girlfriend, a character I later told her I wasn't entirely sure was real based on just how much Bryan bragged about her. I wanted to ask if Ellen knew she would be driving to DWG that afternoon, since I'd literally just texted him moments before, but I was so thrilled he was willing to provide me a free vacation on the beach that I didn't bother.First, I had to hike 14 miles to the gap by 2:30. Off I went, spending a long time on the phone with my mom as I hiked.As I got closer to the Delaware River and Jersey, the views got more and more beautiful. I ate my snacks without stopping for breaks and made pretty good time. I ran into Roller at the next shelter for lunch and updated her on my plans, apologetically. The last few miles were gorgeous, along a straight, flat ridgeline road, then winding down the face of the mountain with beautiful river views.I ambled into town with time to spare. DWG is an oasis compared to the last few PA towns. I picked up a mail drop at the outfitters first, sent by momma Bee and well stocked with backpacking food, wine, and chocolate. Thanks mom!!My next stop was the local bakery, where you can get a hot dog and a slice of pie for $2.95. Roller found me there after she checked in at the hostel.In the meantime, Ellen sent me a picture of the collection of granola bars and trail mix she packed for our trip back to the Shore. I had high hopes for this mini road-trip.Ellen picked me up around four. She was a real person and actually as awesome as Bryan had described. She is a yoga instructor and grew up riding horses (with one of my Ranch Camp alums- Hi KP!), so we had a lot to talk about. Ellen graciously stopped at Target so I could buy real human clothes. At that point, I was 6 days removed from my last shower, 14 from the last time I slept in a bed. Seeing myself in the dressing room mirror was alarming, to say the least. Ellen and Bryan live a block from the beach in Asbury Park. Their place is awesome and I barely recognized Bryan in real people clothes. After a quick shower and change, I looked human-ish again and off we went in an Uber with their neighbor, Faona to a tapas bar. I'm definitely not in the mountains anymore...Faona is a character. She was on a diet so she only drank wine and had a lot to say on the subject. It made for interesting dinner conversation. The food was incredible and I ate myself silly. The highlight was pizza, very unlike the one delivered to 501 Shelter, just covered in truffle oil and ricotta. A glass of red wine and an Italian Old Fashioned sated my booze cravings, and the shared tiramisu and espresso were life changing after my instant coffee in the woods.Bryan works like a maniac, Ellen had to be at the gym at 7 am, and it was well past my bedtime, so we retired to their amazing gigantic couch and fell asleep by 11, watching Parks & Rec.The next morning, Bryan made me a smoothie and pancakes, gave me a brief driving tour of the town's historic landmarks, like legendary music venues The Stone Pony and The Paramount, then dropped me at Ellen's yoga class.Ellen hasn't been teaching long, but her class was great and I felt amazing afterwards. We did a lot of shoulder openers, necessary after carrying a heavy pack for 3 weeks. After the class, she insisted on helping me with my crow pose, which I've always been terrible at. I'm still terrible, but less so than I used to be, thanks to Ellen's persistence.They took me for a tour of the boardwalk, where we ate lunch and vaguely listened to live music. At one point, a spectacularly dressed old man, wearing coordinated lime green and black workout clothes, including knee high compression sleeves, approached the musician, was handed the mic, and began a lovely rendition of The Way You Look Tonight. Ellen and Bryan had a brief back and forth over dancing, Ellen said Bry had to ask her, he did, and they got up to dance. It was adorable and vaguely surreal to watch them dancing on the boardwalk.After lunch and shopping on the boardwalk, we watched more Parks & Rec, then The Interview, which I admit I thoroughly enjoyed. Next up was dinner at a different small plates restaurant, this time with their friends Joe, Lisa, and Blaise. Ellen insisted on dressing me, which was tricky because she's 5'2" and a size 2 and I'm not either of those things. She recruited Bryan to convince me the outfit was okay and off we went in another Uber.At the restaurant, I discussed Feng Shui and airplants and Pink Blazing (http://appalachiantrials.com/art-pink-blazing/) with Blaise and ate food as it was handed to me by the others.Afterwards, we stopped by Joe and Lisa's house (seriously adorable, by way) and continued on to a bar on the boardwalk. At this point, it was already hours past my bedtime and I was exhausted from pretending to be a real girl all day. I struggled through one drink, but the crowd and the house music and the single moms dancing was totally overwhelming, so I apologetically ducked out and caught an Uber back to Bryan and Ellen's place where I promptly fell asleep. I spent the next morning journaling, incapable of sleeping late, then we rode bikes down the boardwalk to brunch. I happily gorged myself on grilled crumb cake and eggs benedict with crab and many, many cups of coffee. We rode back through the town of Ocean Grove, a gated community and spiritual retreat where they used to literally lock the gates for the whole season. You had to be there before they shut and stay until the end of the summer. Jersey is weird.After brunch, I reluctantly packed up my gear again and loaded it into Ellen's car. We got one last cappuccino and headed back to Delaware Water Gap. They dropped me at the church hostel, just as Lois & Clarke and the other Slackers walked up.I was sorry to see Ellen and Bryan go, they had been amazing hosts and my weekend at their place was an incredible break.I know it seems silly, to take a vacation from the trail which is essentially a vacation in and of itself, but it was sorely needed.The trail is exhausting, emotionally and physically. You spend a lot of time in pain, a lot of time alone, and a lot of time kind of bored. It's a roller coaster, both the terrain and your emotions. When everything is going wrong and your feet hurt and your pack is heavy and you're climbing up seemingly forever, you can feel the lowest of the lows. When you hit the peaks and throw off your pack and put on your camp shoes and eat cookie butter from the jar with a group of new, fascinating friends, you feel the highest of highs and it makes everything awesome again. It's exhilarating and it's exhausting. The breaks, where you can spend a few hours being a normal person in the middle of the road, make the highs more fun and the lows more manageable.All that to say, I owe Bryan and Ellen a huge debt of gratitude for giving me a break and ferrying me around. The trail provides.