Date: 2010-07-07
From: Palmerton, PA

To: Gateway Motel - Wind Gap, PA
Miles today: 20.0
Weather: scattered clouds

~~~Patel Motel $$$~~~Hiked out of Palmerton this morning with Stix and Fat Man Walking, and it was a tough hike to leave such a wonderful hiker town    Because of the severe heat wave and lack of water on the ridge AND having the data book list the next section as "unmaintained and very rocky," the guys used their "oh so brilliant" ATC Map and decided that a road hike was more feasible as it would give us access to water. We were originally going to hook up with the trail by way of the Blue Mountain Ski Slope, but it was again decided that the road hike was a better plan.Just to let you know, road hiking is actually much harder than hiking on the trail; concrete is terrible on your feet and knees and a Hummer came so close it almost took all three of us out. The heat index was past 100 and with the added heat bouncing back up from the road, well, it was no wonder that we drank through ALL of our water. It was a tough slough and boy did we pass a lot of trash on the roadway ~ why do people litter??? Several people stopped to offer us a ride but we decided no yellow blazing for us, we would push on to Wind Gap, parallelling the AT ridge the entire time. There was a auto garage that we got cold water from, a real treat and entertained three guys who were very interested in the hike. Late on, one of them passed us and handed out a bag of those root beer barrel hard candies ~ they were great. Met this guy on a bike that had bags all over it. He had rode this bike from California and was going up the East Coast and he thought WE had it hard with the backpacking. It's a toss up.Made it to the outskirts of Wind Gap to the Gateway Motel. Now in the data book (and did I mention to never trust ALL of the info in the data book) this motel was run by two guys, Pete and Mike (I'm looking at the business card now) and that the hiker rates were $59 for a single. It's actually run by Grandpa and Grandma Patel from New Delhi and the rate is $70. "You look so hot, do you want a Gatorade?" Grandma asks. "Do you want an ice cream?" I choose just the drink, the guys choose both. After everything is consumed, that will be $3 for EACH. $15 later for $3 worth of food. We realized, Ahhhhh, this is one of THOSE motels. The building is circa 1952 with cigarette burns on every conceivable surface and it smelled like a Vegas back alley bar. But, it did have a TV and an air conditioning unit, both of which were immediately turned up full blast.Took a very long, hot shower, because the plug for taking a bath was missing and watched the Germany/Spain soccer game while waiting for 5pm to meet with the guys and Grandpa Patel who was giving us a ride into town for dinner (for a fee as the "free shuttle" listed in this data book was only for Pete and Mike who are obviously not in charge anymore).A whole three minutes later, we turned into a plaza that had chinese and pizza. We choose pizza and agreed with Grandpa Patel that we would only be one hour. Unknown to the guys, but known to me as I could see him, Grandpa Patel actually waited in the parking lot next to his car the whole hour. It was too funny, so surreal. Took the three minute ride back to the motel and were charged $10 for the three of us for that glorious shuttle.So, total from three desperate hikers was $235 for approximately 15 hours of bliss. Towns can be expensive but, really ~~~ To top it off, I developed a heat rash over both legs from the road walk. Lucky for us, the trailhead was within walking distance from the lovely Gateway Motel. No, we did not ask for a shuttle. No more $$ to the Motel Patel.