Date: 2017-07-17
From: Tony's Deli, Pawling, NY

To: Schaghticoke Mountain Campsite
Miles today: 15.2
Weather: clear sky

8:35 am, Tony's DeliWho knew sleeping between a road and railroad tracks would be so comfortable? Every time the ground shook from the train, it felt like a little massage.I slept *great*! Lembas was the only other hiker at Tony's last night besides me and TB. He congratulated me on the marathon yesterday and was surprised to hear I've only been on trail 3ish weeks. (There's some bizarre John Wayne movie on with a woman and a cheetah???)9:15 pmSo here's how yesterday happened. Thunderbuns and I did 6ish miles to the RPH Shelter which was in the throes of a 3-day-long hiker feed. EPIC! We had a great time talking to the volunteers, admiring the stellar shelter, and eating. (Or in my case, indulging in this year's food craving: orange juice. I drank 2 liters of OJ this morning before we left Tony's. Two liters! What is going on? Must be scurvy.)At the shelter, Thunderbuns ran into two gals he'd hiked with before. One, Pigpen, was slacking some packs 20 miles ahead to Tony's Deli, and offered to take ours.***Time Out For a Hiker Glossary!***Slackpacking - When a hiker only carries water or a daypack and someone else shuttles their tent, etc to them at the end of the day. It's both kind of frowned upon by purists AND a way to mix things up once in a while / do big miles / go over tough sections.Deli-blazing - Planning your hike around hitting as many nearby delis as possible. This is mostly a New York thing and Thunderbuns excels at it. His goal is to make it to Massachusetts without having to resupply his food.***So we had this opportunity, and the only catch was we'd have to go 20 more miles on top of the 6 we'd already done. But I'd never slackpacked before and this summer is my last long section of the trail, so why not?We didn't have daypacks, so we dumped our stuff out of our packs into a giant trash bag and labelled it. It was kind of scary, taking everything I need to survive and giving it to someone I don't know to leave at a deli I've never seen. :-)But Pigpen is so awesome. Thank you!!!My pack felt silly-light! And off we went.I'd always been curious to know if my pack weight was slowing me on hills, or if it was just my lungs. Now I know for sure, it's not pack weight. I didn't go much faster w/o weight, but I was much more comfortable in terms of heat and rubbing. And it was fun to try something new.At the end of the long day, we passed the Appalachian Trail commuter train stop (!) and turned to the deli. The brief stop to look at menus was all we needed to go into full Frankenlegs mode, more than I've seen this summer. It was awfully funny, the two of us hobbling around gleefully awaiting burgers with mozzarella sticks and ribs and god knows what else in them. I'm so grateful to Pigpen and TB for this truly quintessential AT day!* * *Tony's was so delightful, we got a late start this morning, and the climb out took a while. Today we crossed the border into Connecticut!TB and I had long conversations about fantasy and sci fi (Good Omens! American Gods!), music (The Beards, his Disney playlist), what we're doing with our lives. When we got in it was dark, with no time for making dinner or getting water, just immediately hanging food while we could still sorta see and setting up our tents to get away from the mosquitoes as fast as humanly possible. A 15 after two big days, back to back!