Date: 2009-04-01
From: Stover Creek Shelter

To: Hawks Mountain Shelter
Miles today: 5.0
Weather: overcast clouds

Hike NakedApparently the tradition on the Appalachian Trail on April Fools Day, is for everyone to hike naked - or so I was informed by Liz. But either everyone ignored tradition, or someone tried an April Fools joke on me. Like the latter, but possibly just a traditional April Fools joke that everyone tried. I fashionably chose to keep my clothes on.We started off the day very late because it rained all day long, most of our gear was wet, including us and Einstein. Just out of the dread of packing up wet gear, we had a leisurely breakfast of coffee and pop-tarts and took our time in the shelter watching everyone else hit the trail. Eventually we finally broke camp, packed up and prepared to hit the trail - when we met McGyver, a gregarious woman several years older than me, who was arriving to be Sally Jo's hiking partner, since Pierce would soon be leaving. Once we got on the trail the rain let up, but it was very muddy and slippery at the start. But once the sun came out and everything warmed up, it turned into a glorious day of hiking.Along the trail we met two more hikers, Julio and Muscles, and Julio's 'service dog' Patience Jr. Julio is deaf and mute, but I quickly suspected that Patience Jr. wasn't really a service dog - a fact he later confided with me. Muscles is young, tall, pretty and very slender - but got her name after taking on many of the guys at the hiker hostel in an arm wrestling contest. Einstein didn't initially take to Patience Jr., and we had to keep them separated most of the next few days.We also met a troop (battalion, squad, platoon?) of about 35-40 Army Rangers. They were coming down one of the mountains as I struggled to get to the top. They weren't actually on the trail, but were in the woods about 10-15 yards off the trail, and must have been in silent mode because they were only communicating with hand signals. They all looked very young, and made me think of my nephew Matt who just graduated from Ranger school, and probably endured the very same excercise - possibly on the very same mountain. Almost every one of them gave me a half salute, wave or a thumbs up - while it was all I could do to raise my trekking pole in return. At the time I was gasping for breath, my quad muscles felt like they were about to explode, and I just kept plugging on hoping not to trip or collapse in front of all these guys, revealing what an out of shape wuss I was while they were lugging a 100lbs of packs, guns and cannons on their backs.It was only a 5 mile hike to the next shelter at Hawk Mountain, which was crowded with about a dozen hikers in the shelter, and a couple dozen more with tents. Most had started the trail that day, so we were already falling a day behind everyone. But we reminded ourselves that it wasn't a race, all the advice we got was to ease into it, and we had to 'hike your own hike'. It was a clear night and we had a great time around the fire, and met many new friends I would spend the next few days with, including Ezra, a 20 year old New Jersey native and Adam (now Ten Sticks) from Orlando, Florida.When I turned in around 10pm or so, it was getting a bit nippy, but the sky looked clear and we didn't worry too much about keeping our gear dry or taking anything off the clothesline - a decision we would regret the next morning.