Date: 2005-06-29
From: PA325 / Al & Eloise's House

To: 501 Shelter
Miles today: 29.2
Weather: moderate rain

These are Hopeful's words tonight...   I should be exhausted right now, but even though it's getting late, I have a lot of adrenaline and I don't even feel sleepy yet. I'm excited because we just hiked 29.2 miles (a new record!). My heart is also beating fast because of the pounding rain and booming thunder and light-up-the-sky lightning that started AFTER we pulled into this hostel-like shelter. We're dry! And I just ate a celebration pizza that was delivered to the road about 1/4 mile away. I'm also energized by the good company of those I got to share the pizza with (company that I got to enjoy all day). Red Wing (naturally) and Bug & Ms. Priss were my hiking partners all day long, and the time went by quickly as we talked the whole day and got to know one another a whole lot better. Ms. Priss is someone I talked to online before we started the hike. They also have their journals posted on trailjournals.com, so I found her that way, drawn to the fact that they, too, are a married couple starting from Georgia near the end of March. We caught up with them once prior to last night and today, but have never had a chance to talk about all the sorts of stuff that we got to talk about while walking today.   You might think that we would have ordered a whole pizza each, having walked so far, but the fact is, we had already stopped for a dinner break at the shelter 4 miles back. We discovered a litter of baby bunnies right behind the shelter, as a little side note (see photo journal for a picture). At first we only saw one, and with it's size, and little bit of hair and still closed eyes, Ms. Priss exclaimed, "Look! A mutated mouse!"    At this same William Penn Shelter where we had dinner, we contemplated calling it good for the night, but all ended up giving into the peer pressure and pushing on. We're glad that we did. This 501 shelter is large with nice bunks and a sky light through which we can watch the storm. There's a community table in the center. There's actually a caretaker who lives in a house nearby. And there's a solar shower. It wasn't hot, but nor was it frigid. I got to shower for the 8th day in a row. And you all think that we're roughing it out here on the trail!! It's pretty amazing, and very unusual to be clean so often, especially since five of those eight days we actually did some hiking (3 were zero days with family).    We enjoyed a wonderful breakfast with Al & Eloise this AM-- an egg casserole, baked oatmeal, plus strawberries from their garden. I think that helped to fuel our hike because we didn't get out very early (8 AM is pretty late since it's been getting so hot) and we still, with a lunch and dinner break, got to our final destination before 9 PM, just as it was getting dark. There weren't very many views today, but the forest floor is very green. We walked a fairly evenly graded ridge for much of the day, and only crossed a few major roads-- one though was very major, we went under I 81. Unfortunately, some of the green forest floor included poison ivy. It is everywhere! I'm so afraid of getting it bad again, but brushing against it some is impossible to avoid. I guess I'll just keep washing a lot. The weather was more overcast today, which helped us hike long. Now I really am starting to fade. Time for sleep!