Date: 2007-07-24
From: RPH Shelter

To: Telephone Pioneers Shelter
Miles today: 16.6
Weather: broken clouds

Today marked my four month anniversary on the AT. That's a pretty long time to live in the woods. I feel as if I've permanently crossed some invisible line marked "those who use privies/those who use flush toilets". I'm fearing, that at this stage in the game, returning to civilization may be very, very difficult. Really, I'm enjoying myself too much out here.Snack Break, Splendora, and I had a big ol' girls day again today. I can't express enough how awesome it is to have women hikers to hang out with...I woke pretty early at RPH, packed up and cleaned up a bit, then took off for the Deli on Rt. 52, a mere 5 miles away. The terrain in this neck of the woods is lovely, and the trail is really well maintained, thanks to people like Ralph "Elvis Trailsley" Ferrusi and Ollie Simpson, both maintainence volunteers.I trotted over Husner Mountain (marked with one orange-painted rock courtesy of Ralph whose leg was broken tripping over it) and found myself at the deli in not time. The folks at the Mountain Top deli are uber hiker friendly. In fact, they're just plain friendly to everyone, saying hello to everyone who walked in the door. I ended up spending 2 1/2 hours there and eating a lot of processed meat. The hikers from RPH steadily trickled in, and our gear and stinky bodies took over a good part of the parking lot. It was hiker trash paradise! Tennessee Jed bought a case of beer and handed them out to us to pack out to the shelter.The ladies caught up with me near a stream just as I was finishing up a bird bath, and we walked to Nuclear Lake together (the lake is named that because it was the sight of a nuclear research facility). We broke out some of TN Jed's beer, laid down our gear, and went skinny dipping. We were sitting out in the grass sunning ourselves and drinking beer, when two other thru hikers came up and caught us! They proceeded to strip down (to varying degrees) and enjoyed the radioactive waters too. It was like being little kids again, running around naked in the sun and water without a care in the world.Splendora, Snack Break, and I then proceeded to hike the remaining miles to Telephone Pioneers without our shirts on. We passed some older day hikers, and one of them yelled out, "now that's the way to hike!". Needless to say, we created quite a commotion when we got into the shelter! It was really cool and comfortable to ditch the clothing -- I'm going to make every day hike naked day. I am, afterall, known in certain parts as "the naked librarian". Now if only I didn't have that strange rash on my bum...A reasearcher is camped out at Telephone Pioneers. He's conducting psychological surveys on thru hikers to test the effects of the wilderness on folks like us. I'm sure when he saw us walk in to camp topless, he made a notation, "crazy, crazy, and crazy"! Actually, the survey was interesting and hopped around between a few key topics:The significance of obedience, feelings of self worth, sexual assault, and a few questions that I'm pretty sure were inserted to identify who the communist hikers are.I'm excited to see the results. I can tell you this... by this stage in the game, we're all a little (lot?) kooky.