morvasaaty/AppalachianTrail-LD-Hikers-Blogs-and-Weather-20-years huggingface dataset:
Date: 2007-07-15
From: Telephone Pioneers Shelter

To: Schaghticoke Mtn Campsite, CT
Miles today: 18.2
Weather: scattered clouds

(Erin)Last night we picked another bad campsite. It was only bad on Will¢s side. I slept fine on my flat side of the tent but Will didn¢t sleep so well on his slanted side. Oh well! We still got on the trail by 7:30am. We hiked 0.7 mile to Dover Rd. Here we saw the Dover Oak on the side of the road. It is another huge oak tree that I think may be even older than the Keffer Oak that we passed a few months ago. Anyway it was huge and right on the side of the road. We stopped at a purple house to fill our water bottles. Since it tasted like ¢hose water¢ it wasn¢t so good. At least we had water. We kept hiking and on the other side of the mountain ridge we came across the Appalachian train station. Here there is a train that comes by on weekends and nice days and takes people into NYC. I wasn¢t able to take a picture because there was a huge group of people out for a day hike standing all around the station. They were members of the Appalachian Trail Club (ATC) and were in NJ for a conference. Just before the first shelter on the road we found trail magic! It was a cooler with ice cold water and some food and fuel. It was so good to get some good cold water. Of course we stopped to chug some and chat with ¢Matterhorn¢ and ¢Couch¢. We kept hiking to the shelter and then kept going another 4 miles to the next shelter for lunch. We made it there just in time to see a huge storm roll through. It was nice to actually be sitting in a dry shelter instead of hiking and getting soaked. The wind was howling and branches were falling on the shelter. Some other hikers showed up soon after the rain started. They were also trying to get out of the rain. When the rain passed we got packed and kept going to try and get to the next shelter. Instead we made it to this campsite where we found another hiker name ¢Riggy¢ and then later ¢Game On¢ showed up. Kent tomorrowTick Count: Willie 44 Erin 18
Date: 2007-07-16
From: Schaghticoke Mtn Campsite, CT

To: Caesar Brook Campsite
Miles today: 16.8
Weather: scattered clouds

(Willie)What a great feeling it is to wake up knowing that you¢re going to be able to eat 2 breakfasts in one day. First up was our usual Pop-tart breakfast which I was sure was going to pale in comparison to what I was going to be able to get in Kent. It was just 3 miles down the trail. I¢m pretty sure now that Erin isn¢t going to be as much help as I thought she would be with hitching, because when we got to CT 341 we couldn¢t get anyone to stop for us. I thought people were supposed to stop when you had a girl with you. Oh well, it was only a half a mile to town. When we got there we dropped our packs off at the outfitter and headed for Caralee¢s for breakfast number two. Seeing that Kent is way too expensive for most hikers to stay in we headed right for the grocery store once we were done at the restaurant. We quickly got food for the next couple of days and went over to the laundry to chat with Matterhorn, Couch, Riggy, and Game On. While we were there a guy named Mountain Squid (a past AT hiker) drove by and asked if anyone needed a ride anywhere. Seeing how we didn¢t have any luck getting in to town we hopped in and had him take us back to the outfitter to get our stuff and then to the trail.We started the remaining 13.5 miles at about 1:30pm. We hoped it wouldn¢t take that long because it would include the famous Housatonic River walk. Unfortunately, we had to go up and over a mountain and down some killer rock steps before we even got to the river. It was kind of amusing watching Erin try to navigate the steps that were just about as tall as she was. Once we got down to the river it was smooth sailing for about the next 5 miles until we hit the next mountain. After that a mistake in the book fooled us into thinking we were much closer to the next campsite then we actually were. We strolled in to camp by headlight at about 9:00pm yelling only slight profanities. Mosquito swarms large enough to carry us and our tent away capped off a not so perfect evening. Hopefully tomorrow will get off to a better start.
Date: 2007-07-17
From: Caesar Brook Campsite

To: Ball Brook Campsite
Miles today: 23.8

(Erin)Wow, what a day! We were the last ones to camp yesterday and the first ones to leave this morning. We left at 6:30am. It started to drizzle just before we started getting up so we either had to hurry and put the rain fly on or get packed up quickly. The rain held off and we got packed up before anything got wet. Hiking today wasn¢t too hard, ups and downs but not too rocky. After a long flat stretch next to a river we made it to a hydro electric plant where we could get water and have a lunch break. That¢s where ¢Riggy¢ caught up and sat down for a break with us in the shade. The next 7 miles after lunch seemed to fly. ¢Riggy¢ was behind us for most of the time chatting with us and keeping our minds off the hiking. Will and I have had a good amount to talk about but it¢s always nice to have another person around for some new stories. We hiked up a mountain called Giant Thumb, and sure enough when we got to the top there was a giant thumb formed out of a big rock. So ¢Riggy¢ took our picture hugging the rock. ¢Riggy¢ ended up camping about 3 miles before where we had decided to camp so he left us around 5:00. We kept pushing on over Lions Head and headed to a camping spot before dark. When we got there we had some trail maintenance to take care of. For some reason the privy had been flipped over and was upside down. It was just a box with a hole and toilet seat on top, one of the ¢open¢ privy¢s. Once the privy was back in its correct place we could sleep in peace¢¦
Date: 2007-07-18
From: Ball Brook Campsite

To: Rt. 7 Great Barrington, MA
Miles today: 17.4

(Willie)I guess that a perfect day weather wise doesn¢t mean that the night is going to be just as good. We were awaken at 2:00am by rain drops making their way through the tent mesh and had to jump up to put the rain fly on. According to Erin, who spent the rest of the night listening to the rain pound against the tent, it rained pretty hard until morning. We had planned on getting up early so that we could get into town early but neither one of us wanted to tear down camp in the rain. So we decided to get a little sleep and wait for things to die down.We finally hit the trail at 9:30 and headed for Massachusetts. First up, however, was the tallest point in CT. Bear Mountain is 2316¢ tall and this was our first time over 2000¢ since leaving VA. MA made it quite clear that it wasn¢t going to be intimidated by the height of Bear Mountain. Within the first 6 miles after crossing the boarder we had climbed up two mountains that were even taller, Race Mt.and Everett Mt. The climbs weren¢t that bad, but the rocky descents were slightly less then ideal with the rain that we were having. Around 5:00 we were coming back down the mountains and we were being chased by a storm into town. Unfortunately, a large mosquito infested forest stood in our way. We tried to go through it without stopping for bug spray, but it became too much to bear so we had to deet up. It wasn¢t pleasant but it got us to run 3.5 miles in a little over an hour. We got to town and hitched to the hotel just before it started to pour. Good thing, I¢m not sure we would have found too many people who would have picked us up when we were soaking wet.Life Lesson: If you can¢t sleep because the rain is making a lot of noise, try putting in your ear plugs.
Date: 2007-07-19
From: Rt. 7 Great Barrington, MA

To: Tom Leonard Lean-To
Miles today: 6.4

(Erin)We got another wake up call this morning, this time my mom calling at 7:45am. We laid in bed trying to figure out the plans for the next few days and how many days of food we needed to get. Then we went to Friendly¢s for breakfast. We packed up and the motel people were nice enough to drive us to a shopping center with a laundry mat and food store. We did laundry, resupplied and I called work to check in and say ¢HI¢ to people. We ended up getting a ride back to the trail by a nice lady at 1:15. When we got on the trail it was pouring rain. I¢m sure our driver felt bad having to leave us there on the side of the road in a bad storm but oh well¢¦we had to get going. So after washing clothes and ourselves, we were wet in a matter of seconds. It rained for the next 2 miles and then remained wet for the rest of the 6 miles to the shelter. We reached the shelter by 5:15 and met a section hiker from PA. Nice guy. Two other thru-hikers showed up. They were ¢Mougly¢ (from the jungle book) and later ¢Bloody Nose¢ (for obvious reasons). We were in the tent by 8:30 and still the mosquitoes were biting us through our tent and clothes. We were able to read for a few minutes before falling asleep with our headlamps on and books open. 4 more states to go
Date: 2007-07-20
From: Tom Leonard Lean-To

To: Upper Goose Pond Cabin
Miles today: 21.1
Weather: few clouds

(Willie)Sometimes I feel a little like we¢re wimping out when we set up our tent in the shelter, but not last night. With the attack of the summer time mosquitoes in full swing combined with the down pour that we got in the middle of the night, I¢m sure glad that we opted to set up in the shelter last night. Once again the extra weight of a free standing tent has proven its self more than valuable. I¢m sure glad we¢ve got that Big Agnes. We got up early to a colder than usual morning to try to make up for only going 6 miles yesterday. Thankfully, the terrain in MA proved to be much more forgiving than the last couple of states, which allowed us to get 21 miles in today. About 4 miles into today¢s hike we ran across our first New England pond, Benedict Pond. It was still a bit chilly to take a dip, but it was nice to sit there for a short break to listen to the sound of the waves against the rocks. It reminded me a lot of sitting on the dock at camp during the summer. We stopped for lunch at the Shaker Campsite before starting the last 10 miles of the day. Shortly after we left the campsite, the weather started to take a turn for the worse. I guess today wasn¢t suppose to be the day that we finally dried out from the rain we¢ve been having. Once the water works were turned on, it rained on us for about an hour, which of course came during the rockiest part of the day. Wet rocks are never fun, but I think that we¢re starting to get used to them.We knew we were getting close to the cabin when we started walking around Upper Goose Pond. Luckily the half a mile trail to the cabin wasn¢t that rough, because we were just about ready to be done for the day. It would have been nice to have gotten here earlier so that we could have taken advantage of the swimming area and canoe. I guess we¢ll have to settle for a night inside, away from the bugs.
Date: 2007-07-21
From: Upper Goose Pond Cabin

To: Kay Wood Shelter
Miles today: 17.6
Weather: clear sky

(Erin) Today was a bit of a surprise, we ate pancakes and cookies at the cabin for breakfast. The caretakers that manage the cabin for weeks at a time make pancakes for all of the hikers that come thru every day. Much better than eating pop tarts again! So we started out today at 9:00 because we had a bit of a shorter day with only 17 miles. Some south bounders had said that the trail was pretty easy all the way to Dalton, MA. For some reason we pushed 8.8 miles before stopping at the first shelter for lunch. I guess the pancakes kept us going a little longer than expected. Then headed 2 more miles to the road where the ¢cookie lady¢ lived. In our guide book it said that there was a lady that gave out cookies to hikers and she had a spigot where we could get some water. We got there and met the cookie lady and the cookie man and got to see their blueberry farm. We chatted for a little bit and then kept going the last few miles to the shelter. At the shelter we met a British couple out for the night, but other than them we were the only ones there¢¦I guess most people pushed the last 3 miles to get to Dalton, MA. We will get there in the morning for breakfast.
Date: 2007-07-22
From: Kay Wood Shelter

To: Mark Noepal Shelter
Miles today: 16.7
Weather: few clouds

(Willie)We woke up to another beautiful morning today. (Erin says "another day in paradise) Not only was the weather excellent, but it¢s always a brighter morning when you wake up knowing that you¢ll be getting a town breakfast in about 3 miles. We shoveled down breakfast number one and then made our way up and over Day Mountain and down to Dalton, MA. We wandered around town for a bit trying to find the Depot Restaurant, which was not where out map told us it was going to be. After asking someone for directions and finding out that the restaurant was closed on Sundays we made our way down town to the Dalton Restaurant. Umm, waffles, an egg sandwich, sausage, hash browns, a donut, and toast sure do go down easy when you¢re on the trail.Once the morning gorge was completed we headed 9.3 miles up the trail to Cheshire, MA. There wasn¢t as much to eat there, but we did manage to find an ice cream stand and a gas station that had sandwiches and microwavable dinners. Man it sure is hard to walk through a town with out stopping to get something to eat. At around 6:00 we decided it was time to head out of town for the day and we made our way 4.4 miles and 2000¢ up the side of Mt. Greylock to the shelter. We¢ll have to finish the rest of the way up to the highest point in MA tomorrow. Life Lesson: Take caution when trying to pick your nose while walking. You¢re bound to end up getting that bugger that was really far in there, or tickling your brain.
Date: 2007-07-23
From: Mark Noepal Shelter

To: Sherman Brook Campsite
Miles today: 11.4
Weather: light rain

(Willie)You could tell the second that we got up this morning that the weather was taking a turn. Instead of the calm sunny morning we had yesterday, it was cool, overcast, and windy. It was tempting to put on an extra layer this morning but we knew that we¢d start to heat up once we started to climb toward the top of MA. By the time we had gone .6 miles and climbed 400¢ to Jones¢s Nose, we were sweating. Good thing we didn¢t put our jackets on after all. From there it was a pretty easy climb up the rest of the way to the top of Mt. Greylock (3491¢). The closer we got to the summit the windier it got. I guess that they¢re used to windy conditions there, but even the outhouses were strapped down and cabled into the ground. Everything seemed a little deserted when we got to War Memorial at the top due to the fact that both the lodge on top and the road up the mountain will be closed until 2009 for renovations. We took some pictures of the Memorial and then headed down to get out of the wind.Despite some threatening skies, things stayed dry all the way down to Williamstown where my mom met us just in time with an umbrella. Being about and hour and a half drive from home she was nice enough to drive out to be our chauffer for the afternoon. She took us out to eat at Friendly¢s before driving to the local YMCA for a shower. From there we had just enough time to get to the laundromat and to the store before she had to start heading home. Thanks a lot mom for spending the afternoon with us and helping us out.It¢s a good thing we only had about 2 miles to go out of town to get to the campsites that would be home for the night, because that gave us plenty of time take a wrong turn and get lost. I guess we both had our heads down trying not to fall on the slippery rocks and we missed the turn and continued up the muddy road. We had a feeling that we were going the wrong way, but we didn¢t think to turn back until we noticed that there weren¢t any footprints in the mud any more. Luckily the detour only took us 15 minutes out of our way so we still had time to get to the campsite and set our tent up on one of the tent platforms. Man is it a chore to get a tent up on a platform, but with the use of some extra rope and some rocks we got our rain fly set up and we went to bed.Life Lesson: Don¢t ignore that little voice inside your head when it tells you you¢re going the wrong way. After 1600 miles of walking, it might have an idea what it¢s talking about.
Date: 2007-07-24
From: Sherman Brook Campsite

To: Melville Nauheim Shelter
Miles today: 18.2
Weather: mist

(Erin) Man was the wind blowing last night. We even heard a tree fall in the distance just before we got in our tents. Not the best feeling when there are trees all around. We made it through the night without any trees falling on our tent¢¦thank goodness. Today we made it to Vermont!! 11 states done!! So far Vermont has been very muddy but not as buggy as Massachusetts. It was very foggy and overcast for most of the day with sprinkles off and on. On the way to the shelter we passed 2 camp groups of mid-teenagers heading north for a few nights. Good thing we aren¢t staying at the same shelter as they are, not sure there would be any room to pitch a tent. We also saw 2 more groups pass us going south. I guess it¢s just that time of the summer for all of the camps to go on some over night trips.   We made it to a shelter for lunch, the same one the kids were staying at for the night. When they found out what we were doing and how long we had been hiking 2 of them shook our hands. They were very impressed with what we were doing. Will realized that we were hiking more miles today than the kids were in their 3 days out. We left that shelter with 6 more miles to reach the one for the night. We walked up Harmon Hill at 2360¢ and then dropped to VT9 at 1360¢ then straight back up the other side to the shelter at 2330¢. I just love the pointless ups and downs of the trail. So now we are lying in our tent at 9:45, the wind isn¢t blowing at all, its very weird how quiet it is outside. I also can¢t believe we are in Vermont!
Date: 2007-07-25
From: Melville Nauheim Shelter

To: Story Spring Shelter
Miles today: 17.4
Weather: clear sky

(Erin) Today the weather wasn¢t too bad, but the trail was still very muddy. I do a lot of rock hopping to avoid completely submerging my foot into the huge mud pits along the trail. Sometimes it feels like my shoe may come off in the mud. Sometimes there is nothing else to do but walk right through the mud and listen to the slurping sounds of the mud holding onto your shoes. We met some south bounders (SOBO) that seemed very happy to be done with the hardest part of the trail up in New Hampshire. They still have over 1600 miles left to hike, but it¢s the easier section. Today I fell for I guess the 5th time so far. I stepped on a rock and it twisted under my foot and I fell with it to my knee. It didn¢t hurt too bad I just don¢t like falling in the slippery muddy stuff. At the shelter we stopped for lunch we met a lady ¢Toodles¢ and her son ¢Jolly Green¢. I knew I had met the woman somewhere and soon realized that we met her a long time ago when we were in Hot Springs, NC. We walked with her back to town from the library and she was talking about getting a hold of her son to see when he was going to catch up to her. Toodles and Jolly Green had been at Pen-Mar park on the boarder of Maryland and Pennsylvania and decided to skip up to Vermont because the heat down there was getting to be too much, they now have to go back down and finish a section after reaching Katahdin. Oh yeah, we have been seeing moose poop on the trail. We haven¢t seen a moose yet, but I can¢t wait. I¢d like to see one from a safe distance of course, but I¢ve never seen a moose before so that will be cool. They seem to be sneaky suckers and are never around, only their poop. One more day closer to Maine!Life Lesson: It may seem obvious, but rocks, roots, and logs are more than likely very slippery when wet. Just ask Erin, who went down for the second day in a row.
Date: 2007-07-26
From: Story Spring Shelter

To: Spruce Peak Shelter
Miles today: 18.3
Weather: scattered clouds

(Willie)I don¢t know if we¢ve mentioned it yet, but we¢ve been seeing a large increase in the slug population since we¢ve gotten into VT. We¢ve gotten them in our water tank, in our shoes, on our pole straps, and on our tent. Well, last night Erin decided to start fighting back. Apparently one found its way between the bottom of our tent and the footprint. Well, he didn¢t pick the best spot to stop because he ended up right under Erin¢s sleeping pad and was quite squished in the morning! Seeing how it caused a bit of a mess that might be one thing that we start to look out for.We cleaned up the tent, took down camp and started to head toward Stratton Mt. Besides the trail being covered in shoe sucking mud the 3.7 miles to get to the mountain were pretty easy and went by quickly. The trail up Stratton had a lot of switch backs so the climbing wasn¢t that hard but it did take a while to get all the way up to 3936¢. Since it was a nice day we decided to stay on the summit for a nice and long lunch break. I guess you¢ve got to stay on top of a mountain when the weather is gorgeous and you have a fire tower to get you another 56¢ higher and overlook all the trees to see some amazing views.We must have lingered there a little too long, and a bee was nice enough to tell us it was time to go down by stinging me on the foot. At first I thought that my foot just itched but when my toes started to go numb and swelled up I decided we needed to get down the mountain to the Stratton Pond to cool it off. The pond didn¢t end up being that cold, but we went in anyway for a little freshening up. I don¢t know if it was Benedryl or the water, but my foot started to feel better so we pushed on 8 more miles to the shelter. Along the way we passed the 1,630.5 mile mark. Not ringing any bells, how about the 543.5 miles to go mark. Still not ringing any bells? Alright I¢ll tell you, we are officially 3 quarters of the way done with the AT! It¢s really hard not to think that we¢re almost done, seeing how we still have over a month of walking, but we¢re definitely getting there.
Date: 2007-07-28
From: Big Branch Shelter

To: VT 103
Miles today: 15.9

(Willie)Somehow we managed to luck out last night and we didn¢t end up paying for staying in the tent. I don¢t think it rained at all which was really good seeing that we were camping right next to an already swollen river. The water actually dropped a good bit by morning. Seeing that it wasn¢t raining you¢d think that we would have been able to get up early and start the 16 miles to VT 103 where my mom would be picking us up for a zero day. But when we got up Erin mentioned the idea that she could use another 5 minutes of sleep, and that 5 minutes turned into another hour a lot faster then we thought it would of. Oh well, if the weather stayed somewhat clear we¢d still have plenty of time to make it to the road by 6:00.We started walking around 9:00 and thankfully the miles were going by quickly. We stopped on White Rocks Mountain for a lunch break among an endless number of rock cairns. The skies started to get dark so we decided it would be a good idea to get off the top of a mountain, but not before Erin made her own cairn to add to the rock party. It started to sprinkle on us a little on the way down, but the dooms day forecast that we had heard didn¢t materialize and sun even came out and graced us with its presence for the rest of the day.My mom met us at the bottom of the Clarendon Gorge and took us to the Ponderosa for dinner. Last trip I made the mistake of looking forward to this Ponderosa visit from GA and ended getting a stomach bug right before we got there. This time I let it sneak up on my stomach so it wasn¢t able to ruin the gorge. Ummm, Ponderosa, good. My mom dropped us off full and smelly at my sisters house where we let their pool and hot tub do round one of the cleaning before taking showers and heading to bed after 1:30am.