Date: 2008-05-13
From: Boiling Springs PA

To: Darlington Shelter PA
Miles today: 14.3
Weather: clear sky

Day 86 ¢ Tuesday May 13 ¢ Darlington Shelter PA ¢ Miles Today: 14.3 Total Miles: 1124.0It was so sad having to say goodbye to Mr. & Mrs. Grasshopper but it was fun to head back to the trail and have them join us for a while! They hiked about 1/4 mile through the town of Boiling Springs and then about 1/4 mile into the woods with us! I guess we can now call them section hikers! It was a neat experience to have them participate in our grand adventure not only as a Trail Angel but also as hikers with us today. It was a lovely day. The sky was blue all day, with temps in the 70s and a cool wind at times. The only conditions that weren't fun - actually they were fun - were the muddy trails. After 48 hours of rain, the trails were quite boggy. At one point in time, the planks that we were supposed to be walking on were actually floating in the water! As we walked on them, they sank a couple inches or so to the bottom. But luckily the muddy water did not go up and over our shoes, so our freshly washed socks are still quite clean. The shoes, on the other hand, are caked with a 1/4" of dried mud and look like they just came off a motor-cross dirt track. Our legs also look like they participated in a dirt track event all the way up to our knees - just solid caked dried mud. It made it quite an interesting day. What actually made the day even more interesting was we ran into Chris again. We have said our final goodbyes to him numerous times now!   And then we run into him again!! The last time we saw him was on May 3rd when he boogied 20+ miles into Harper's Ferry to visit some friends. His 1-day planned visit turned into a 5-day visit! About a mile into our walk this morning, he caught up to us as we were taking a snack break and we spent the rest of the day hiking with him. It was great fun, though Grasshopper who was setting the pace for most of today, set a really fast pace so as to not slow Chris down. Chris has a much different hiking style than us - he just ploughs right through any water on the trail - running through it just like a kid. He kept us laughing every time he¢d splash through the puddles and mud. At one point the trail basically turned into a small lake due to all the recent rains. Ah, it looks like the area trail crews know that this is a low point on the trail, as a new bridge was in the process of being constructed. However, the new bridge was closed off because it wasn't finished at the other end. We had two choices.   We could climb over the 2 x 4s blocking the entrance to the new bridge or we could wade through the small lake to the old bridge. Chris, of course, runs right through the small lake to the old bridge. I'm not quite sure if he thinks running through the water will keep his boots and socks drier or what. Once he arrived at the other side of the lake, we hollered to him and asked him to check the condition at the other end of the new bridge. ¢It¢s dry¢, he says. So we climbed up and over the hurdle of 2 x 4s blocking off the new bridge, crossed the nice new bridge, jumped down at the other end where steps are yet to be built and off we went down the trail still with dry socks. It¢s our first day out of town ¢ we don¢t want wet socks yet!Today we had to take a detour from the official white blaze trail, the first time this has happened to us. We were supposed to go underneath a bridge but the stream had overflowed so much that there was no longer a path underneath the bridge. Chris quickly scouted out another route for us by crossing the road and going down the other embankment where we were able to pick up the trail again. So once again, we were able to keep our socks dry!Chris tried to educate us a few times on various plants and trees along the way. I think that after a while, though, he realized it was pointless because when he said that he would be giving us a test at the end of the day and we just moaned. He surely realized that not too much was being retained by these old brains. But it was quite nice to hike with him, a 23 year old, and to get an education of the area biology along the way. Sadly we learned that Chris passed through Pine Grove Furnace State Park, while we had the sign up for Josh and Amanda to visit us in the cabin, but we did not see each other. We had debated as to whether we should add his name to the sign too, but figured he could not be behind us! He saw the sign, thought it might be us in the cabin, but did not knock on the door. Bummer. The good news is though, that because Josh and Amanda did not show up for their Trail Magic, we were carrying it with us and were able to share some of our extra goodies with Chris. He scored a couple Little Debbie Rice Krispie treats, a Nutrageous candy bar, a hard-boiled egg, a homemade oatmeal bar and a couple pieces of dark chocolate. So, all in all, I think he did pretty darn well but he could have had eggs and bacon and who knows what all else if he would have just knocked on that cabin door. He said that it was a horrible cold miserable day hiking yesterday in the wet 40-degree weather.   What a shame that he didn't knock on the cabin door and join us! We even had extra bunk beds for him!We took a lunch break in a cow pasture at a pond complete with picnic tables! As we had our leftover ham and cheese sandwiches, we watched the geese having territorial disputes on the pond. Chris would predict the timing of next dispute for us and sure enough he was right every time! The geese did not mind our presence. However, the cows did not like having us in their field and started to come down behind us, mooing as they came closer. Luckily they never got too close and we were able to finish enjoying our break.After lunch, we continued our walk through the cow pasture, which was quite an experience. The mud was inches thick. Even when we stepped on what we thought was grass, up came the mud and water forming a little mud puddle around our feet. Just awful muddy conditions today and I think we'll probably have more of the same tomorrow. Just short of the shelter, which was up the side of a mountain, there was a little bench built into the stone mountain side. The three of us sat there and looked into the valley below us where Boiling Springs lies and looked at the mountains in the distance that we crossed a few days ago before arriving to Boiling Springs. A very nice, lovely place for a break. Now, I must admit that everything is relative out here including this so called mountain that we climbed - it¢s a Pennsylvania mountain ¢ a whopping climb of 1200¢. Woo Hoo!   Despite our long lunch break and our break on the stone bench overlooking the valley below us, we arrived at camp a bit after 4:00. We enjoyed our dinner sitting around the picnic table with Chris and 2 new hikers ¢ Dave and Kathy, who are flip floppers. They just started in Harper's Ferry and are headed to Kahtadin and will then turn around and go to Springer. They have had a rough start. If our memories serve us correctly, Kathy had Achilles tendon issues and they had to get off the trail for a week, shortly after they started! Hopefully they have better luck going forward.Around 7:00 we decided to head to the tent to relax for the evening. The ever so young, Chris, could not believe his ears that the socializing hour was over! Given that we were calling it a night, he decided to head onto the next shelter, which he really should have been doing anyway. He was scheduled to hike 7 additional miles today as he has July commitments. It seems that every night we pull into camp together and he 's supposed to hike on that he never does. We are obviously a bad influence on him and cause him to do shorter days quite frequently! He headed down the trail literally running and hollering goodbye. Must be nice to be young!Unfortunately, due to all the fields today, our tick count went up by 3 putting us at 14 total. Chris also had a few on him today. It is still a dangerous time around here. We will also soon be approaching the high bear population area, so we'll have to make sure we're cautious about that as well.It's 8:15 and in low 60s. Tomorrow we have a long day - 22 miles - so I think we're going to call it a night. Goodnight from 2 well rested and well fueled hikers. Thanks again, Trail Angels, Mr. & Mrs. Grasshopper.