Date: 2015-05-16
From: Crazy Larry's Hostel

To: Crazy Larry's hostel 
Miles today: 0.0

I was up and rearing to go that morning. Breakfast was great as usual as Crazy Larry is a good cook. I got out and started walking down to the park, hailing and being hailed by acquaintances from the trail. It was an exciting day as much of the main events of the festival would be happening today. It was a very full day as I spent the morning working on my blog and the afternoon talking to gear representatives, book authors and bloggers doing interviews. My first interview was with the representative of Astral Designs - producers of life preserves and now footwear. I was talking to Gabe Latini about his interesting looking footwear and was asking if he needed someone to trail test their new trail runner. He said that he would and asked me to take a pair of their new trail runner, the Astral Aquanauts saying he wanted a thru-hiker to test them on trail. He said to me with a smile "Take them out and wear them until they break" on the trail and write a review. So I'll be wearing them into the crucible that is the AT and seeing how they fare. I next interviewed the representative from Trailside Games who make boardgames for hikers to use on the trail. I saw one game where you hike through the Smokies and the other you are doing a thru-hike of the AT. You get food credits and have hazard cards like snakes,bears and poison ivy. You roll the dice and see how far you can go. The person who makes it the farthest wins. The games are so lightweight, weighing only ounces and would be great to have in a tent or a shelter during a rainstorm. I was given a game in thanks for the interview. I visited, but didn't get to interview the crew of the Hiker Yearbook who take pictures and puts out a picture book with the thru-hiker class of the current year. My picture taken by the Hiker Yearbook was taken with me sitting on their camp potty! This of course started a trend! Then I met and did a interview with David (AWOL) Miller Thru-hiker and Author of AWOL On The AT, an account of his thru-hike. He also produces The AT Guide - The most comprehensive and easy to use guide for the AT that I have seen. Then I was very excited to interview Badger and the crew of Appalachian Trials. If I had to point to one source of information that helped me to prepare for my thru-hike, this blog has played a major role in my success thus far. Between this and Michelle Rey's book How to hike the A.T. The Nitty Gritty Details of a long Distance Hike I was very prepared. Lastly I interviewed the representative from Farm to Feet socks, an American company making good wool socks as they had given me two pairs of very nice footwear. I was exhausted from all the walking and I even entered the talent show doing a rewrite of a U2 song (I still haven't found what i'm looking for ) Changed to "I still haven't got to Katahdin yet." I had to sing without music as they had turned off the equipment due to the rain that had started during the middle of the talent show. Soon it was time to head back to the hostel for the night. It was a great day that I'll remember for a longtime. Someone was cooking hot dogs on the fire when I got back and I was happy to get two. I pulled out a 6 pack of the Celtic Dark Chocolate Stout and returned the favor. Someone else matched that by sponsoring a safety meeting in a beautiful ornate hand blown glass pipe. Then I was as spent as a child's money at a candy store so I popped in my headphones and laid down for the night.