Date: 2005-07-19
From: Tent, New York Hwy 17A

To: Tent, Arden Valley Rd NY 
Miles today: 12.0
Weather: light rain

I hate New York. I hate the "trail" in New York. I hate the weather in New York. I hate the boulders in New York. As you can see I pretty much hate New York.   Today was miserable. I think it was 12 miles of the most miserable trail to date. I use the word trail loosely, very loosely. There didn't seem to be much of a trail today. We would have maybe a quarter mile of trail, which would be followed by a straight climb up huge piles of van-sized boulders. Then if we were lucky we got a little bit of rock face walking before the straight climb down started. I can't tell you how many times I had to hold on to rocks to lower my self down or to pull myself up. This process was repeated again and again and again. When you look for handholds, I think that it is no longer hiking. Sounds like rock climbing to me.   There is obviously some testosterone-laden moron in charge of trail design. You can tell that each state or each maintaining hiking club wants to make you remember their section of the trail. This is where the excess testosterone comes in. They don't try to make their section the most exquisitely beautiful. They try to make their section the hardest, the toughest. It becomes very hard to stay motivated while doing the AT extreme challenge. I can't spend any time thinking and contemplating anything other than where to put my feet so I won't get injured. I can't even worry about where Oblivious or Troll put their feet because I have to concentrate so much. It makes the mental portion of this part of the trail very difficult. You have to keep going and going in spite of heat, humidity, terrain and stupidity. Hopefully it gets better soon or at least I get out of New York.    It was so hot and humid. We were all just miserable. We have a term in the Navy - sweat pump. A person who is a sweat pump worries about everything. They are always sweating (worrying) even if there is no reason to worry. Today I was a sweat pump - literally. The sweat was pouring off of me as I went up every boulder pile. It seemed like the sweat was pouring off of me. If someone had drawn a caricature of me there would have been puddles of sweat on the ground and drops of sweat flying all around. Of course if I am sweating that much, Troll is sweating about 3 times as much as me.   I want to thank the tuxedo hikers. They left water at trail crossings. I can't tell you how much water I drank today. I just kept drinking and drinking. Probably because I was sweating and sweating.    We stopped after only 12 miles. It was too hot and too hard on the feet and knees to keep going. Low miles like that won't help our average. But you do what you can. Luckily we are still being slacked by Gordon and Sue. We try and stay near them at night to visit. Later we might try a dinner break and more hiking between 7 and 9 pm. It seems to cool off by then.   A gross by product of all the sweat is the wet socks. Wet socks make your feet look wrinkled when you take them out of your shoes. All of the extra sweat also adds something special to the overall sock stench. The high humidity keeps the damp socks from drying out. We each have 3 pairs of socks. On the fourth day after laundry, the dirty wet socks from day one go on your feet. And then every day from that point on involves wet stinky socks.    Take care and we will see you on the trail.