morvasaaty/AppalachianTrail-LD-Hikers-Blogs-and-Weather-20-years huggingface dataset:
Date: 2003-04-19
From: Kincora hostel

To: Vandervender Shelter
Miles today: 9.0
Weather: broken clouds

i got to sleep in today!!...til 7:30 anyway. okay, this is my plan for the next couple days: there weren't any ~10 mile stretches that my uncle and i could hike north of damascus soooooo today bob, the guy who runs kincora hostel, shuttled me 9 miles north on the AT than where i started. i know what your thinking: "noooo, you're not a purist!" BUT, i'm going to still hike into damascus, meet my uncle, drive back to kincora, hike those 9 miles northbound, which includes Laurel Waterfalls and one heck of a climb straight up (i hope my uncle doesn't disown me afterwards), and then to back to damascus to keep on going north. that means that today i only had a sweet 9 miles to the vandervender shelter. this shelter has one heck of a view of the lake and what a day to lounge around camp too--the weather is incredible! lemming went ahead and hiked the other 9 miles today and he's already here too--he can really fly. we'll do 22 miles tomorrow which will place us just 10 miles ! out of damascus. but these 22 miles don't have any huge mountain in the middle so i should be aok this time. i'm just loving sitting in the sun typing my journal out, this is the life!arilius (gypsy boy), wicked wizard, and lucky came in later to stay at the shelter. jan liteshoe, 2 section hiker friends of her's, hot dog and wench pulled in later. lucky and i chatted for a while around the fire he made. heck, we're regular party animals and stayed up til about 8pm! he, lemming and i had a wonderful plan: get up at 3am and do some night hiking--there's suppose to be a meteor shower this week. course, 3am rolls around, my watch alarm goes off and we all promptly say we're going back to sleep. oh well, it'll happen some day.
Date: 2003-04-20
From: Vandervender Shelter

To: Abington Gap Shelter
Miles today: 22.9
Weather: clear sky

easter sunday!i was out on the trail by 6:45, my eariliest since that silly daylight savings. we had 22.9 miles to do but the landscape from here to damascus is suppose to be very tame--which means that this is the way you're SUPPOSE to hike 20+ miles, without freakin' huge mountains in the middle.things couldn't have been timed better for easter! not only was the terrian mild, but the weather was just as it should be on this holiday. although i have to admit that i miss seeing (and hearing) my many younger cousins run around searching for easter eggs while i try and find my uncle's or brother's so that i can hide their's REALLY well. I was thinking about and missing my family today, wishing i could call them for a quick hi, but not being near a phone until tomorrow afternoon. but if missing them means being out here on the trail hiking a gorgeous section, i won't complain (too much). the miles flew by. i saw a couple of deer, the butterflies were around, the bees were busy, and my feet didn't start hurting until around mile 18: it was a little slice of heaven today. i pulled into the Abington Gap Shelter by 3:30--a great day. lemming got there just before me, the white brothers were also there. lucky came in shortly after that. he was the easter bunny for me and gave me his last cadbury egg!tomorrow, i'll cross over into Virginia. Georgia is gone, North Carolina is finished as of last week, and Tennesee will be completed as of tomorrow. Virginia has the largest section of the AT: it's about 500+ miles so i'll be in there for a while. well, happy easter to all who celebrate it! happy sunday to everyone anyway!
Date: 2003-04-21
From: Abington Gap Shelter

To: Damascus
Miles today: 10.0
Weather: moderate rain

lucky, lemming, and i were going to get up early for a night hike AGAIN so we could see the meteors but also to get a warm breakfast in damascus. alarm went off at 4am, we looked out to an overcast and rainy sky and, of course, went back to sleep. it WILL happen someday...i have forseen this (tip for the hat to emp. palpatine). it started raining around 5am and proceeded to a downpour when we finally pulled out of the shelter. oh well, at least we were headed into a town where we could dry off. i got into town exactly at 10am: 10 miles before 10.LT (now known as Kitty) is here for one more night and it was great talking to her. i hope to catch her up the trail soon after damascus. lots of other people are staying at The Place (name of hostel in damascus) that i don't know by name. i went to the outfitter and bought some trail runners to replace my heavy and cheap boots that were beginning to fall apart anyway. the new ones are so light--i'll be doing 20 miles days all the time! (but i don't want to anyway). i also bought a cheap pepsi can alcohol stove to replace my homemade cat can stove--based on watching friends' stoves, they look more efficient (and prettier to watch, it looks like a flower when it burns).the weather in town did a complete 180 in the afternoon and became a wonderful, sunny 75*. lucky and i soaked up some rays on the grassy field where trail days will happen in less than a month. lunch at the side track cafe, snack at dairy king, and dinner at sicily's helped make for a perfect day (sicily's had cheesecake!)and i'm meeting my uncle tomorrow to hike the 9 miles that i skipped. good times. Editor: Dairy King?!? What blasphemy is this?
Date: 2003-04-23
To: View Entry
Miles today: 16.0

uncle jack got up at some ungodly hour...i got up around 6:30am. in this order, we got some yummy pancakes, i got a shower before leaving town, i mailed off a bounce box to atkins, and i picked up jasper's tent from him (my hero). jack and i were on the trail by 9:30 and hiked 4.5 miles together. at that point we snacked and parted ways. jack hiked back to damascus and his car to head back home. it was great hiking with him a couple miles yesterday and today. although...since i was in town and stayed at a hostel, he saw the easy part of what i've been doing out here. but he did say that the hostel bunk bed was too hard :-o it's a tough life i lead.i had 16 miles to do today. with new shoes, i wanted to keep the mileage kinda low. i was carrying my aunt janet's brownies (her x-mas present to me) and my mom's rice crispy treats with me to share with other hikers at the shelter tonight. at one point i was testing one of the brownies at an overlook and lucky hikes up. we stuck together (sorta) for the rest of the day and got to the shelter around 4:30. there was a campsite 4 miles farther on but i decided not to go because my shoes were hurting my toes a little and lucky stayed too. the white brothers, wicked wizard, and goldwing are here too. jasper, ben, and jersey just walked in but are going to hike on a little longer.it was beautiful today, chilly, but a vast improvement from what yesterday was.
Date: 2003-04-24
To: Wise Shelter
Miles today: 17.3
Weather: overcast clouds

i slept in jasper's tent last night and boy was it nice. little does he know that he's never getting it back :-) i even got up later than normal and got on the trail a little before 7:30.   my feet feel better than they did yesterday, still sore but i can take it until my feet get use to the new shoes.at one point i had caught up to Field who i've met before and i hiked behind him for a while. near the summit of mt. rogers, field stops, motions me to stop, and looks off to the right. i slowly inch forward and hear something moving off in the woods but by that point i couldn't see whatever it was. so this is going to be the closest i've ever been to a bear. Field saw the rear end go running of into the woods. now i've HEARD a bear...when do i get to SEE one?i passed into the grayson highlands state park today. from what i saw from the trail, it consists of sveral open hills and mountains covered in really sharp and inconveniently located rocks. but the cool part of this park is that it's full of feral ponies that trot up to you expecting a carrot or apple. i had neither so one nibbled on my trekking pole, didn't like the taste, and walked away. i also saw a little foal, probably only a couple of weeks old.4pm: the plan for the day was to hike 17.3 miles to Wise Shelter. as i'm typing this i'm at wise waiting on lucky and wizard to come in and see if they want to push on to the next shelter 5.9 miles north.while i'm waiting for them i'll type about something a friend asked me about several weeks ago: what i eat. and since food is 1/2 of what we talk about on the trail, this is easy.breakfast is always poptarts. brown sugar is the best so far. depending on how many miles i'm planning that day, i might eat these while walking in the morning or right before hitting the trail. i have a snack every 2 hours or so (dried fruit, candy bar) and around 12 or 1 i get my favorite trail food: when i'm in town i mix peanut butter and honey together, then for lunch i spread this on a tortilla. that's it! but it's soooooo good. and i usually have a little something with this too (another candy bar). finally, dinner can be anything from lipton (most common), ramen with stuffing added in, mac and cheese with tuna (not too fond of this), or a homemade dehydrated stew that my loving parents make and send to me. and, of course, dinner is followed by another candybar. where else can you eat 3 candybars in one day and not gain weight? scary...7pm: we decided to stay at wise shelter tonight. might try for a very big day tomorrow--30 miles. it depends on a lot of variables so who knows what will happen?
Date: 2003-04-25
From: Wise Shelter

To: Partnership Shelter
Miles today: 30.7
Weather: broken clouds

my alarm went off at 5:30am. and, yes, we ignored it again. it will work someday, maybe when it's warmer than 40* outside. so we got up later and i was on the trail bu 7:30, lucky was on by 8am and he caught up with me after 6 miles. so the whole day we're thinking to ourselves: can we do the 30? our pace rocked, it was about 3 mph and the weather was perfect for high miles: cloudy all day, kinda chilly, only drizzled now and then, but always looked like rain which made us walk a little faster. i think in a previous journal i mentioned that my 23 mile day was a good limit for a while. i think i also mentioned that i'm a fool. yes, we did 30 miles, actually it was 30.7 on the trail, actually actually with other walking, it was 31, but who's counting. So...LUCKY AND CLAIR ROCK THE CASBA! WE ARE THE MASTERS OF THE TRAIL! GOOOOOOOOOO US! yea, we're proud. towards the end we were getting a little slaphappy and started calling for the shelter--"come here partnership shelter! [whistle] where are ya boy? are you hiding behind those trees" and so on. when we saw it we ran and i hughed it. we made it there by 6:30. so everytime i've written about big miles before, i always follow it with something, so i'll say it again and i hope i mean it: i do NOT want to do this again, not for a very long time. this shelter also rocks the casba and was a good reason to push ourselves. it sleeps 16+, has a sink and spigot, has SHOWERS, has a privy with TP, AND it's by a road with a payphone which means...we ordered PIZZA to celebrate our day. this is the only shelter that i know of where you can do this but i think all hikers should petition to make it the norm. mmmmm, pizza. a good end to a long day.
Date: 2003-04-26
From: Partnership Shelter

To: View Entry
Miles today: 14.3

i wish i could say i slept like a log last night cause i probably needed it, but i was tossing and turning and aching all night. BUT, in the morning i got a hot shower so that made it all better. lucky, who is a late riser, was shocked to see me sleep in until 7:30. we got on the trail by 9am. it was 11.6 miles to the hotel where we were going to pick up our mail drops and where i was going to get my brand new pack. woo hoo! we had a lovely stroll through a field where the smell of honeysuckle was overwhelming...if it wasn't for the dairy queen calling my name i might have stopped for a break there. at 1pm we were enjoying our first round of blizzards. after that was sorting out our maildrops and getting ready to send another bounce box to the next town. after THAT we got a hitch to the post office by Michelle, the sister of a thru hiker she was meeting at the road. so, boys and girls, what happens to the post office on saturday? that's right! they close early! lucky and i had totally forgotten what day it was (i think i've mentioned how the Trail lowers your IQ right?). so there we were in the car, stuck with these packages when my most incredible trail magichas happened yet: michelle, who we just met, offers to mail the boxes on monday...wow, how super thoughtful! i give her money to cover the shipping costs and she drives us back to dairy queen. michelle, you rock and i wish i would have gotten your address.well, this is yet more evidence of how cool and nice people are and willing to help others in a pinch. models to live by.so since we were back at the DQ, we got another helping. two blizzards in one day...as life should be. by 4:30 we FINALLY get back on the trail for another 2.7 to the shelter for a total of 14.3--a treat compared to what we did to ourselves on friday.
Date: 2003-04-27
To: View Entry
Miles today: 20.2

i was going to wake up at 6:20 this morning--you know, get an early start and all that. however, the first whipporwill (type of bird, not sure if i'm spelling it right) decided that i should be awake at 5am instead. yea i know it sounds very pleasant to be woken up by bird calls but this bird makes the most annoying sound imaginable. so i was up a little earlier than i was planning on and was on the trail by 6:40 or so. today, i made a conscious effort to slow down my pace from what lucky and i have been doing. of course, when i wasn't conscious of my pace, i started to speed up again, but i balanced that out by taking several long and lovely breaks throughout the day. unga bunga, me like breaks. breaks gooooood.so virginia is a relatively flat state (compared to GA, NC, and TN anyway) but one of the few mountians in VA had to be climbed today: chesnut mt. and it has a cute little shelter on the top and that's where we are for the night. we're in for one heck of a sunset AND sunrise. this makes for a 20.2 mile day. ah i remember the good ole days when 15 miles was pushing it...my feet are blistered up bad right now and i'm giving them every opportunity to heal. lucky and i have decided to hike until this coming saturday but probably part ways for a while. his schedule is too darn aggressive for me and my feet say "na way" to lots of high mile days.on that note, tomorrow we hike ~21 into Bland for resupply and for a free night at a trail angel's house. good times had by all.Editor: For more on whipporwills, read "The Dunwich Horror" by H.P. Lovecraft. I just love these little editor's notes.
Date: 2003-04-28
To: Bland
Miles today: 21.5
Weather: clear sky

we did it! we finally pulled ourselves out of our sleeping bags in the middle of the night! the mountain that our shelter was settled on is bald on the top so it was perfect for star gazing at 1am. it was an impressive test of will, but we did it and it was worth it. we also had a perfect sunrise, that got us up unusually early. i had my first big scare today: more of a "this could have been reall bad" than a scare i guess. it was in the morning which means i was hiking alone since i'm usually the first one out of the shelter--lucky usually catches me around mile 10. so i'm hiking along at a decent pace and the trail is following a ridge-line but it's slanted downhill. my right foot decides to introduce itself to a root or rock which means that my face was headed straight for a tree growing up in the middle of the trail. suddenly: slow motion and i remember thinking to myself that lucky is going to walk up behind me in a couple minutes and see an unconscious Clair on the trail. then, either instinct or luck kicks in and my right knee bends, sending the rest of me sliding down the hill, missing the tree. so my head was fine--i still slipped a couple of feet down hill and did a neat flip onto my back, but besides a couple of scrapes, I'm doing a heck of a lot better than i could have been doing. just another of those "what if's". besides that, the day was lovely--a bit on the hot side but that's just going to get worse with each week, so i won't complain. we stopped to wade out in a creek that crosses the trail and you just can't pass up splashing some water on your face when you walk by. at one road crossing there was a big cooler full of V8's and juices for hikers--gotta love trail magic. next year, i'm definitely coming back to the trail to do some magic for the next group of hikers.we hiked 21.5 miles today to get into the city of Bland where we needed to resupply and stay the night. since i was in charge of getting a hitch (cause i don't look like the unibomber), i got the first car to ride by to pick us up and take us to...DAIRY QUEEN! by the time i'm done with this hike, I plan on having tried every blizzard flavor they've got...i'm on a mission.a couple of days ago we heard about this couple who takes in hikers for a night in Bland. as i'm typing this, i'm in my bag on a lovely carpetted floor in a lovely house owned by the lovely George and Murray Ann Ziegenfuss. it's not a hostel, just their own house that some hikers stay at. they're wonderful people and cooked dinner for us and said we'd get EGGS tomorrow too! woo hoo! these people rock and will definitely be getting a picture of me summitting on Katadin at least. thanks george and murray!
Date: 2003-04-29
From: Bland

To: Dismal Creek Falls
Miles today: 20.5

i slept so well last night on that floor, it was great. heck, lucky even got up before me! that's a first. murray ann and george made yummy eggs and pancakes for us and took us to the post office so lucky could pick up some letters. they dropped us off at the trail a little before 10am. this couple is amazing and so generous with their time, energy, money, and spirit. the fact that they're Tolkien fans didn't hurt either.it was a great day overall: a rolling trail, no big ups or downs and some nice views when we were ridge walking. we hiked 20.5 and camped in our tents next to Dismal Creek Falls--which is a stupid name since there's nothing dismal about them. and there, lucky and i got to take a swim! it was SO COLD and i didn't stay out in it for long, but i did get clean... maybe that's going too far--i got cleanER. after a dinner of lipton noodles (yum), lucky had a fire going and brought out some marshmellows he bought in Bland. oh yea: a great way to end the day. i'll carry the marshmellows tomorrow so that i can eat more of them next time. we met up with some new hikers today too: orb, firefly, chunky, sticky fingers, and kool-aid luke. LT (now known as kitty) is only a couple miles in front of me--i'll catch her one of these days.
Date: 2003-04-30
From: Dismal Creek Falls

To: doc's knob shelter
Miles today: 14.2
Weather: light rain

after all those marshmellows last night i was worried i wouldn't be able to get to sleep--no problem there, i guess the 20 miles from tuesday helped. i was on the trail by 7:30 and had a pleasant hike for the first 4 miles. after that, it got rocky and took more time to get through. 4pm: the original plan was to hike to a campsite 3 miles south of pearisburg. since lucky was still sleeping when i was ready to leave, so i'm currently waiting for him at the doc's knob shelter, 14.2 miles from the dismal falls. i got here around 1pm and at 3pm a thunderstorm rolled in--no lucky yet.I'm assuming that he's either on his way or stopped at a hostel 2 miles south of here to avoid the lightning. i doubt we'll continue to the campsite if it's going to continue raining and we'll just hike farther tomorrow.6pm: lucky hiked in an hour ago. he said he slept in and didn't get on the trail until 11am--that's so wrong!we're staying here for the night, no reason to camp in the rain.on a totally different note: this is some grafitti on the shelter wall:"the beet is the most intense of vegetables. the radish, admittedly, is more feverish, but the fire of the radish is a cold fire, the fire of discontent not passion. tomatoes are lusty enough, yet there runs through tomatoes an undecurrent of frivolity. beets are serious."yea, hikers can be weird...Editor: Ah, but what of the noble potato? I dare you to compare your mild mannered beet to a nice russet or even a properly done sweet potato.
Date: 2003-05-01
From: doc's knob shelter

To: View Entry
Miles today: 15.0

it's may! woo hoo! an arbitrary day!i don't think i've explained The Plan yet. so here's The Plan: my mom and possibly brother are going to meet lucky and i at a road crossing about 20 miles north of Pearisburg, VA on friday around 11am. from there, we're going to hang out and talk and eat (not in that order) until late morning on saturday where we separate and go our separate ways. so now you know The Plan.anyway, got up early this time and was on the trail by 6:45. we'll be walking through Pearisburg today but not staying anywhere in town until tomorrow night. i just needed to find a payphone to call my mom one more time before tomorrow. I hiked ~8 miles to the phone, which just happened to be located in the parking lot of a supermarket... so i had to stop and get some goodies. heck, if there was a dairy queen right there i would have never left town. i just grabbed some cookies and oranges for lucky and I. after that it was another ~7 or so to the shelter where i told lucky i'd wait for him (he slept in more than me). i got to the shelter around 1pm, then a thunderstorm rolled in with some rain, then lucky rolled in dripping wet. i tried not to rub in the fact that i was dry and he was not... too much. after a couple minutes the rain stopped but more thunder/lightning could be heard coming around the ridge. we started walking on and the storm was either trying to talk to us or talking to itself really Loudly for a while. then it decided that we weren't listening hard enough so it started raining pretty hard for a while. we're listening now! i did what i've always done in a downpour, when the thunder and rain are making so much noise: i sing really loud. usually, it's "rain drops keep falling on my head" or "singing in the rain", but today it was "the rain will make the flowers grow" from les mis. lucky for lucky, he was walking too far ahead of me to hear me.question for the day: so lucky says that 200-400 people get struck by lightning every year. hmm, i wonder if most of those people are walking a ridge in the middle of a storm?anyway, the rain stopped and the storm moved on after maybe an hour. we came to this great field on top of the ridge which we just couldn't walk away from. so instead of pushing on to the next shelter (which would make a 27 mile day!) we're going to camp in the field. the dark clouds in the distance makes for a very cool constrast. it should be a great sunrise too.lucky got a fire going and used a rock in the middle of the fire to cook on. neither of us knew what kind of rock it was, but it's NOT the kind of rock you should put in a fire, cause it kinda exploded. nobody go hurt, but it was freaky. lesson learned.oh, and by the way, several concerned friends have emailed me about how to spell CASBA. i deeply apologize for my mispelling in previous journals and hope i haven't offended anyone by spelling CASBA wrong... but i still rock it, so there. :-)