Date: 2005-07-28
From: Pochuck Mountain Shelter

To: Wildcat shelter
Miles today: 23.8
Weather: few clouds

This entry is dedicated to Mothers. Mama Bears, Mama Piker and Mama Mileage. We love Mamas!Yesterday, as Piker and I were strolling throught the Wildlife Reserve I was reminded of the tranquility that exists out here. Complete stillness with wonderful wilderness noises. It was a wonderful part of the trail.This mporning the day started off with a bang. We woke up at 5:30 am after our first evening alone in a shelter. Piker was gung-ho and I was a bit hesitent. Really, I was just sleepy. I am definitely not used to being an early riser. We broke down rather quickly and then sat down to breakfast. We were so excited to try our new cereal... Uncle Sam's wheat flakes with mixed berries. Piker took the first bite and he immediately made a disgusted face. "Oh, Nasty!" He then examined the box and saw that it was sugar free and contained flaxseeds. YUCK! We added all of our dried strawberries and blueberries to try and add some sugar.. it was still gross ! We literally choked down the rest of the bowl and vowed to throw away the rest of Uncle Sam as soon as we found a trash can! We packed up and still talking about flaxseeds, threw our packs on and started down the trail to the AT. We were talking and cinching straps on our packs when I looked up and immediately saw a bear. We were not 20 feet from the shelter, and the bear wasd about 15 feet from us. My adrenaline skyrocketed... now I was awake. The bear stopped and looked right at us. I said " Piker what should we do?" He replied "Exactly what we are doing... being still." The bear continued to look at us and smelling the air with its muzzle, slowly moving its head from side to side. It was adorable and a bit scary at the same time. Piker said that we should walk slowly, so we took a few steps. As we did, the bear also began to move along slowly. We stopped to watch it walk away and all of a sudden her little cub came walking clumsily behind. This was the first cub that we have seen on the trail. I was so surprised that I gasped out. It was so cute, like a little puppy. We stood there beaming until we couldn't see the cub anymore. We could still see the Mama, and she was big. Thrilled about our encounter, we slowly moved on. What a cool start to our day.We had buzzes from our bear encounter and the hiking was nice and cool at 6;30 am. We were moving pretty quickly until the F word took effect. Flaxseed! We couldn't even say the word without feeling thAT WE MAY HAVE TO VOMIT. As a result of the gross breakfast, we had to take a few pitstops.Our first great spot of the day was Pochuck Creek. A beautiful suspension bridge and walkway that went for .8 of a mile over swamplands. It was such a nice spot to begin our day. We saw a few locals out on their morning jogs.We arrived at Heaven Hill Farm at 9:20 am. Wow! Usually we would not even be hiking by now. The farm was perfect. Food and water. Of course, we overindulged a bit. Pastries, donuts, 3 pieces of fruit each, chocolate milk, coffee and OJ. We needed a couch and a TV when we were done. But no, we decided to walk 17.3 more miles instead. We lounged around for about an hour... digesting, and left the farm about 11 am. It was quite a climb coming out of Vernon. We chatted the whole way up and it didn't seem that bad. Our first break was the shelter, and when we walked up there were Litmus and Crickett. Yay... thru hikers, and two that we really wanted to see! We were so happy. Crickett told us how he had Lymes disease and were off the trail for a while. He is now the fourth person that we know who has gotten Lymes disease. It is a very serious thing. I check for ticks multiple times a day. As we were chatting Crazy Horse walked up. It was a big ole reunion.We still had11.8 miles to do so we heded out. We hiked with Crazy Horse for most of the day from there. The three of us crossed over the NJ/NY border together. Another state down. It is very exciting! Today was a lot cooler than the last few days. The weather report said it was 21 degrees cooler today than yesterday. A huge difference and you can really feel it. There is not a lot of water on this section which means we were basically out of water and feelin' it. We ate a peach and two power bars for energy, hoping it would help us make it to the shelter. It gave us a huge boost! When we arrived at the road there was an H2O cache and I almost cried. We really needed that water. That gave us the energy and strength we needed to push the last 2.1 to the shelter. We made it in under an hour and were so happy to see that shelter sign. Crazy Horse was already there. Litmus, Cricket, Beefsteak and Treetop arrived later. We had an awesome dinner, top 2 for me. Black bean dip with veggies. Delicious. We have another earlier start planned tomorrow. In this case we will be racing to town for our mail drps. Tonight we were treated to Crazy Horse on the guitar which is always awesome! We have been thinking about the Bruces a lot lately. We miss you boys tons. The adventure will not be the same....Peace & Love, Mileage