Date: 2013-07-17
From: West Mountain shelter

To: Bear Mountain, Overlook Lodge
Miles today: 7.0

Happy Birthday to me! I spent most of the day at the Overlook Lodge at Bear Mtn State Park. But first I had to get down there. I started about 6:00, & there was a bit of breeze.The gunfire from West Point continued. On previous days, they had been focussing on various kinds of armament, one at a time. Today, it seemed they were doing all at once. I got to the top of Bear Mtn.[Is this the 3d or 4th Bear Mtn. on the Trail?] just before 9:00. There was one view point to the North [toward West Point], but not good enough to see much ¢ I continued on, feeling sure that I'd see more from the Perkins Memorial Tower, farther South on the summit. Unfortunately, the tower was closed & had no sign to tell when it would open. So I bought a can of Coke & continued down the Mtn. When I came thru here in 2001, coming up the Trail South-bound, I thought it was the longest stretch of unimproved trail [No water bars, no steps, only a few rocks & roots here & there trying to hold back the erosion] on the AT. WELL, the trail workers have really been busy since then. Both sides of the Mtn. have been re-done with hundreds of stone steps! They've done a beautiful job, especially making the steps easy [7-10 inches, instead of skimping by doing 18-inch steps] so that hikers aren't tempted to bypass them. With sore legs, hundreds of steps are not much fun, but it's lots better than it was. My only complaint is that a few spots, especially the road walk, are not well-blazed, particularly SOBO. Another hot day! I was really looking forward to a swim. The lodge had advertised a pool; so I was disappointed to find out that what they meant was the regular park pool down by the zoo. I walked thru the zoo [small but shady] to the bridge, so I could just start right there tomorrow. It was a hot, half-mile walk uphill to the lodge. I got cleaned up, took a little nap to make it feel like a zero day, & then headed for the post office in Fort Montgomery. I ended up walking a mile or so & had so much mail that I had to leave some for tomorrow. I knew I'd have to come back to mail some things out & lighten my load. I got stuff to eat at two different sandwich shops & got a ride back to the lodge, but by then it was too late to go to the pool. I loafed a bit more, washed some clothes, & worked on Trail Journals [I'm really having trouble keeping up]. Then I went out for a good dinner at the Bear Mtn. Inn, just before 8:00. They said they didn't serve dinners after that, but some people came in just before 9:00 & the chef decided to take care of them too. I wanted an after-dinner drink like port or sherry ¢ the waiter said if it wasn't on the menu they didn't have it. So I walked to the bar [15 feet] & bought ... a glass of sherry! Then I asked the waiter if they had any special desserts for people celebrating a birthday.   He said he didn't think so. However, he must have consulted the bartender because it wasn't long before she came over & told me the sherry would be complimentary. That was nice. Then, while I was sipping my sherry, the chef brought me a fancy brownie with ice cream on it. Then the late-comers at the next table joined me to celebrate. It was a group of women, now living in various parts of the country, who had got together again. They have done some hiking themselves & had a lot of questions about my hike.After all the celebrating, it was nice to take a cool walk along Hessian Lake on a moonlit night to get back to my room. I slept well.