Date: 2007-07-09
From: Quarry Gap Shelters

To: James Frye Shelter / Half-Gallon Challenge
Miles today: 16.0

Woke up at Quarry Gap Shelters very early in the morning so Amanda could get to work on time. Hiked back down to the park to get her car and she dropped me off at Shippensburg Road, where we had gotten dropped off the day before to hike south. The hiking today was very very easy but I was incredibly tired from not enough sleep so after a mile or so I stopped and laid down on a big rock and took a nap for about a half hour. Eventually passed the halfway point of the trail and got to Pine Grove Furnace State Park (PGFSP). There's this tradition for thru-hikers of eating a half-gallon of ice cream at the halfway point, and this is typically done at PGFSP. However, the night before, the PA legislature voted to cut funding to all state parks, so the park was closed. But I got lucky (I guess you could call it that) and one of the managers was coming around a few times a day to open up the store to anybody that was there, his way of "sticking it to the man." When I got there, Jake was lying down on his sleeping pad, moaning; he had just finished his half-gallon of Mint Chocolate Chip in an hour and a half and felt pretty bad. I waited around for an hour or so for the guy to get back so I could get some ice cream. Eventually he got there and I bought a half-gallon of chocolate (the place didn't have much of a selection). My progression of thoughts as I went through the challenge are as follows: first there is the excitement of being halfway done with the trail and actually being there to do the half-gallon challenge. Then there is the feeling of being full after eating probably 4 or 5 servings of ice cream (there are 16 servings in a half-gallon). After that is the feeling of nausea, which I welcomed by attempting to vomit into a trash can that was right next to me. This was followed by this thought: "This has got to be the dumbest thing I have ever done," which, naturally, goes along with all the dumb things I've ever done in my life. As many of you know, I've done a lot of dumb stuff, and looking back on the half-gallon challenge, I can honestly say I've never done anything dumber. This part of my thinking came as I was about halfway done with the whole thing, so I still had a long way to go, and at this point the ice cream was all melty and my stomach was all hurty. At this point, my thinking turned to "Just finish it all so you can be done with it" so I started shoving spoonfuls of it into my mouth. After a while it got to be too much, and I turned and BARFED into the trash can. This was the best part of the challenge: the feeling of release as the ice cream shot out of my mouth was one of pure freedom, and at this point I knew I would have no problem of finishing it off. A few minutes later I was pouring the rest of the melted ice cream into my mouth, thankful to be done with the whole thing and knowing that I'll never have to do something like that again. I waited around for a few hours for the manager to come back to the place so I could get my spoon, which is a small wooden sample spoon that has "MEMBER OF THE HALF GAL. CLUB" but he never came back and I still had seven miles to go. So, I decided I'd do a night-hike by myself and get to the shelter. I started at a little before 8:00, passed the midpoint marker for the trail, and it got dark about an hour later. It wasn't real bad, if anything it made me hike faster so I wouldn't get to the shelter too late. Got to the shelter, met up with Jake and his friend Bob who thru-hiked back in '03, and finally got to sleep.