Date: 2008-05-30
From: Eckville Shelter

To: Palmerton
Miles today: 25.1

(lost the original today)I have a new longest day, and hopefully it will be the last time i outdo myself in mileage. We pushed hard to get here so we could get our drop boxes, and have a true zero day. We made it.... i am tired....but not as tired as i was pulling into eckville shelter or the last longest day. My feet don't hurt as bad as they did going into either of those destinations.Please follow along as i recount the tale...dooodly doo.... doodly doo... doodly doo...We hit the trail at 7 this morning, knowing that we needed an early start because the hike was going to last till at least 6pm. Knuckles was the first out of the shelter, but we caught up to her pretty fast since she stopped to do an equipment adjustment. We'd end up leapfrogging with her all day. motor-a, sash, hike farm and memphis tim were still at the shelter when we left. The climb back up to the ridge was long, but not too steep, so it was over quickly, and we started the ridge walk with some energy still left. There was a lot of old woods road walking or access road walking, and the terrain was fairly flat, so we made good time. Of course, we had fields of rocks to navigate through, or hop through, and that would slow us down. We got to allentown shelter a little after 10am and stopped for snacks and got water at the spring. Nice shelter.... Our next break was near the tripoli campsite because it supposedly had a spring, and we needed water, but when knuckles went down, she couldn't find the water. So we continued on to the next shelter. Then we hit the knife edge. That was a fun rock scramble, kind of like old rag back in SNP. Then we hit bear rocks... just a lot of hopping from one rock to another. Then we got to bake oven knob. great views, and a good rest spot. Then we had a rock scramble DOWN the other side... yoiks. The bake oven knob shelter has good water, but it is WAY down the mountain, so if you need water, take your extra bladders, because you only want to do that climb once. We met some friendly hikers there, from Indiana mostly, and they were fun to talk to. From there, it was only 7.6 down to the river/road and a ride to Palmerton. We covered it in 3 hours, and got down to the road just about 8pm. By then, hike farm had caught up, so there were 4 of us sitting on the side of the road, trying to figure out how to get to Palmerton. There is a blue blaze trail for 1.5 miles from there, but we were looking to see if anyone ran a shuttle. We were tired and didn't want it to be a 27 mile day. Just then, Sue drove up and gave us a ride. Thanks Sue!!! We got to town by 8:30 pm. 13 hours of hiking, if you include all the breaks we took....We managed to track down a police officer, who set us up to go over to the police station to check in for the Borough Hall hostel. It's also called the jailhouse hostel but don't be fooled into thinking you might get to sleep in a jail cell. You are in a basement room with bunks. We met lucky there, who had gotten in earlier that day. Once we got settled we got some dinner, and then came back to the hostel for the night.Gobbles has declared Pennsylvania the "stepchild" of the AT. This is because this is the least-nice state we have hiked in yet, due to the rocks. Although it is mostly flat elevation-wise, these rock scrambles and rock-fields are exhausting, and they chew up your feet. and your knees. and your boots. once again, i have to praise my hiking poles for saving me from many a sprained ankle and/or face plant. We keep asking ourselves where all these rocks came from... i have to jump on the google-machine later to do some research....we also keep asking ourselves if the trail surveyors where on medication or mentally unstable when they plotted out the trail location. What were they thinking? I think they were thinking... "hey, there aren't enough rocks over there. Bring the trail over here. Everyone likes hiking on rocks!!!!"Tomorrow is a zero day! yay!!!only 2 more days and we are done with PA. This makes us excited.