Date: 2023-05-29
From: Campsite at 1186.2

To: Swatera Creek Campsite
Miles today: 20.6

Hiking Day 75, Ending Elevation 1531 feetWe awoke to cloudy skies. I thought it was going to rain, but we had blue skies by 9 a.m. We just keep walking through the woods, one foot in front of the other and the brown trunks of the trees appear out of the green understory, lots of lovely ferns lately. The tree trunks stark in their browness, stretch up toward the matching green canopy above. Beyond that is the blue, blue sky and sunlight puddling through the leaves creating a lovely mosaic on the ground for us to walk on. It¢s been pretty much the same every day since the weather got better. It makes our days very soothing and peaceful.About mid morning at PA Route 645, we had some trail magic from Jim, a trucker who lives in Lancaster. He plied us with Pepsies, fruit and honey buns and told us that Eastern Rat Snakes look a lot like the Eastern Racers but are bigger. I think we saw two of the former today and Kerry saw another that he thinks is a different kind of garter snake. Jim also told us that the Rat Snakes imitate rattle snakes, by rattling their tails and looking like they are going to strike, which is exactly what the one we saw in Shenandoah did to us.Further on we came to the 501 Shelter, near which my friend Arthur¢s friend, Ken fell on the rocks and had a concussion causing him to leave the trail for a couple of weeks. Needless to say, Kerry and I were very careful both approaching and leaving the area. We did walk on a lot of rocky ground today, but it was intermittent with some pretty good tread in between. The rocks slowed us down and they¢re tiring to negotiate. Jim told us the further north we go the more difficult it will get, I guess we¢ll know when we get there.We had to fill up on water twice today, an indication of the increasing temperatures I think. Also, we gave a man named Cowboy a half liter of water because he had none. He was traveling with a one liter bottle and no filter. He was a youngish man and he stumbled in to our campsite last night exhausted. He seemed a bit naive and isn¢t going anywhere in particular. Kerry wondered if he was disaffected from one of Pennsylvania¢s religious communities. He told us he was from Dauphin County. He was complaining of stomach problems, possibly from drinking untreated water. We left him with the clean water and encouraged him to carry 2 liters of water and a filter. The night before Cowboy told us he had gone to England and the locals had shared their concerns about ¢all the immigrants over-running the country.¢ Kerry had listened and then commented that people all over the world just want to improve their lives and those of their children, so they tend to travel to places where they think they will have better lives. He didn¢t think anything of it but the next morning Slipper, who had heard the conversation, came over to us and thanked him for saying it. She said, ¢you¢re not Clueless, your name should be Aristotle!¢ This afternoon, as we were walking north of the 501 shelter we encountered a group of women wearing old fashioned dresses and scarves around their hair. Then we saw several more and later in the day we saw some boys and young men in straw hats, their pants held up with suspenders. Kerry and I speculated they might be Amish, so I asked one of the boys as we passed and he confirmed that they were. They were carrying no water or anything for that matter and we wondered where they came from and how they would get home.We¢ve been listening to lots of different birds and Kerry has been listening to them on the Merlin App (also suggested by my friend, Jane) in an effort to identify them, with limited success at this point. And I mustn¢t forget the wild roses; every so often we come across them and are inundated with their amazing smell. Lest I forget, we went over mile 1200 today. Now we are counting down from 1000!It¢s dark now and even the birds have gone quiet.