Date: 2007-06-23
From: George W Outbridge 

To: Smith Gap Road (garage) 
Miles today: 13.2

I heard some rumbling around the woods by my tent. I yell over to Blazer, but he has his radio on. He never hears when I am about to be eaten by bears. I shut my light off, a predictable but reliable defense against bears.       When I pop my head out, I see lights everywhere. One yelling hey campers. Figuring he is talking to me, I say: umm¢¦ yeah. He has a herd of Boy Scouts and didn¢t want to scare us. Blazer finally hears the commotion and asks what¢s going on. I think he was hoping someone was bringing him beer.      It got almost cold last night. We only have a half mile walk down to Lehigh River, where we see Monkey and Cocoa. Looming in the near future is Blue Mountain, better known as Lehigh Gap. For weeks the horror stories have been building. Hand over hand drop to your death climb above Palmerton.       Palmerton was named after the president of the New Jersey Zinc Company. The company was responsible for nearly a century of zinc smelting with a plant covering 1,000 acres and employing 3,000 people. It is also responsible for the devastation along Blue Mountain and got a spot on the superfund clean up list in 1982.      In 1999 it was still a big pile of rocks. Much to my surprise the pile of rocks this year had trees sprouting out. The vegetation is due to a product called Ecoloam (municipal waste sludge, fly ash, lime, fertilizer, and seeds). Sounds yummy, and is spread on the slopes. You are sitting in disbelief at my worldly knowledge, no? I wouldn¢t be, I blatantly plagiarized most of it off the maps and other ATC books.      It¢s a steep and formidable climb. We have wonderful weather with temps in the 60¢s, blue skies, and glorious wind. The ascent is steep, it goes up as one can without ropes. We put our poles (walking sticks) away, so we can cling to boulders, therefore slowing our almost certain death when we fall. Besides being terribly dangerous, it is fun! A boulder crawl for 1000 feet. Blazer thoroughly enjoyed it. He hates bouncing along a boulder field, but if it involves clinging to the side of a mountain, bring it on!       Once on top, you are on a highly exposed area, where the damage is still beyond repair. It looks like the surface of the moon, if it had rocks and was covered with dead trees, instead of being made out of cheese. The bright side to all this devastation is the continuous uninterrupted views. The trail is easy up there as you follow a dirt road. It drops you down into Little Gap. Following Little Gap, the trail goes up a boulder filled hellish hill. The rocks are scattered about the trail the rest of the day.      Wing Heart and Castanets find us in our usual positions, sitting down against our packs under a tree. They are slack packing this 2.5 mile section to Smith Gap road. On Wednesday, Castanets slipped on a rock, bruised a rib, and cut his head open. Wing Heart got him down off the mountain and got Mechanical Man to shuttle him over to the medical facility. He received 5 stitches on his forehead, but otherwise seems alright and in good spirits. I told him he should have held out for a helicopter. Wing Heart was taking pictures while he was being stitched up.      We did eventually put our packs on and hiked to Smith Gap road. John ¢Mechanical Man¢ Stempa is waiting to take us down to his house. Hikers are aloud to go down get water, take a cold shower, and sign his register. Castanets paid for our ride down, so we¢d like to thank him. Our gracious and talkative host has offered us to spend the night in his garage. We accept and make ourselves at home.      We meet his wife (Crayon Lady) and son (The Blur). They invite us to the fair, be we declined. Feeding two tired hikers greasy food and putting them on spinning rides is a recipe for disaster. The Blur is an avid biker and put on a show for us. I think he is 9 and jumped his bike over me lying on the driveway. The things I do for my 5.2 readers.       The ¢Mechanical Man¢ also makes alcohol stoves, and turns out to be quite the salesman. Both Blazer and I bought one, if only because it was made from a Yuengling can.       We would like to thank them for the place to stay, and the hospitality. We look forward to seeing ¢The Blur¢ in the Olympics someday. So we nestle down to sleep with moths, and next to a Ford Explorer, now that¢s hiking.