Date: 2017-08-27
From: Pine Grove Furnace State Park

To: Fayetteville, PA
Miles today: 20.3
Weather: overcast clouds

Woah, we¢re halfway there.Woah, livin¢ on a prayer.Take my hand, we¢ll make it I swear.It was no surprise that one particular Bon Jovi song was on my internal playlist today. This archetypal hair-band power ballad from 1986 might have an ironic appeal in 2017 but we were indeed now ¢halfway there¢ on our hike from Katahdin to Springer.This was not a singular event. Yesterday we¢d had the halfway ritual of the half gallon challenge. A couple of miles into today¢s hike, we came upon the elaborate formal halfway marker which, because of the way the total trail length keeps increasing as more switchbacks are added to the southern half of the AT, is about four miles short of the actual halfway point.And then we had the real halfway point, which features a much more modest sign which is moved around each year based on the exact length of the trail, which was 2181.0 miles at the time of the formal halfway marker¢s construction but which is now 2189.5 or so. Just how much this has changed over the years had been shown the previous day, when I ran into a group of day hikers north of Pine Grove Furnace State Park. They were looking for the halfway marker, which one of them remembered from 15 years or so before had been on this trail. I set them straight and said it was now in the opposite direction from the state park headquarters.For our little troupe of Sriracha, Sweetblood, Dirt, Dirt¢s mother Scarlet and cousin Sandy, it meant something extra: the end of Scarlet and Sandy¢s brief hike with them. Their car was parked a few metres away from the 2017 halfway marker at Dead Woman¢s Hollow Rd. More importantly, they¢d bought a 30-pack of PBR, a bottle of vodka and stuffed them with lots of ice in a cooler in the back of their car, so they could celebrate. Even after several days, the beers were still cold. Better still, they were kind enough to include me.I¢d run into them again about an hour into today¢s hike and hiked with them to the halfway point, which provided the chance to get to know all of them a little better. Scarlet and Sandy were doing exceptionally well for people who were trying to hike alongside those who had a 1000 miles of trail fitness.It also confirmed that Sriracha, Sweetblood and Dirt are a fun group with whom I was hoping to hike some more, which was ironic because having just caught up with them again I had to hike on ahead because I was trying to get to Harpers Ferry in a few days time so I could go down to Washington DC to visit a friend I¢d known from Abu Dhabi. I knew Sriracha was aiming to do the four-state challenge and figured they¢d catch up again. Despite the deleterious effect on hiking aspirations of trying to empty the 30-pack and bottle of vodka, we gave it a solid shot and then packed out the rest with us. I had three cans but Sriracha stuffed half a dozen or so into the mesh pocket on the back of his pack. I might have lost any ultralight cred I might have (which isn¢t much), but it seemed that each of our respective campsights would be convivial.After watching a heartwarming display of familial affection between Dirt and her mother as they prepared to part ways, I headed off down the trail because I was aiming to get to Route 30 that night.The AT remained in green tunnel mode for the rest of the day but that was at least conducive to cranking out the miles. By 5pm or so, I reached Quarry Gap shelter, which was renown as one of the nicest on the AT.Some benevolent caretaker had really gone to town on the place, which featured a series of improvements such as a swing chair, hanging flower pots overflowing with blooms, the best spring I¢d seen in weeks and even a two section shelter, which I automatically assumed would be divided into Snoring and Non-Snoring. As I arrived I encountered Lapsang and Footprint. I¢d been following the latter, a young Austrian woman who¢d hiked the PCT the year before, in the log books for months and she¢d been just ahead of me for a long time. Lapsang was her boyfriend but who was only meeting her on weekends because of the demands of having a job.It turned out I¢d just missed the mysterious benefactor of this shelter, who¢d they said had left shortly before my arrival but only after pointing out to Lapsang and Footprint the various edible mushrooms growing on fallen trees nearby.Lapsang was wondering if I had any oil to fry the mushrooms. I didn¢t but I offered them a still-cold PBR from my pack, which prompted his eyes to open wide in a mix of delight and surprise. I was really tempted to stay but I¢d only started this leg with a few days food and needed to resupply in Fayetteville tonight for the final section into Harpers Ferry.After half an hour for a stop I¢d envisaged would only last five minutes, I reluctantly booked it down the trail and reached the road shortly before dusk. There was a new diner about 0.4 miles down the road, to which I walked and sated my carb and cholesterol needs before calling the phone number associated with the Trail of Hope hostel in Fayetteville.The guidebook suggested they would take hikers to resupply on the way to the hostel and the man on the phone offered to do that. It took much longer than it should for me to twig that the hostel was not a commercial venture but a Christian one, with the $22 fee going to fund the associated church¢s outreach programme for the community. Like a depressing number of other towns along the east coast, this area had a raging opiod problem. My driver was a church volunteer.But he amenably drove me to a Dollar General to resupply and then dropped me at the hostel before heading back home. The hostel was entirely empty so I had the whole place to myself.Life is good.AT fact of the day: The question of when we¢d meet our last nobo had been on our minds for some time but despite the five day gap since Parkour¢s group, I predicted we would meet a truly delusional nobo who remained convinced they could reach Katahdin without flipping or skipping. I was somewhat disturbed to be proved right by encountering Tree, who said he had a hard deadline of October 9 when he had to be back in California ¢ even shorter than Parkour¢s ambitious aim to complete his hike by Baxter State Park¢s nominal closing date of October 22. Tree hadn¢t even got to the halfway point and despite taking months to get to here was predicting he could ¢pull 30s through Maine¢ and complete his goal. I thought back to when I was struggling to do a mile an hour through parts of Maine but kept my counsel to myself, offering instead a simple: ¢Well, good luck.¢