Date: 2018-07-15
From: William Penn Shelter

To: Hertline campsite
Miles today: 9.7

This morning I woke up to the sound of deer antlers crashing. It sounded like two deer trying to establish dominance in the area. There were a few clashes and then nothing else. I went back to sleep until 6:30 am. I got up and packed my bag. I ate some poptarts then hit the trail around 7:30 am for the 501 shelter about 4 miles away. Thunder was already in the air.The trail followed a flat road bed for a few miles. In the distance I could see lightning striking other tree tops. I would count after each strike to see how far it was away. It still seemed to be awhile out. I came to a gap then it started sprinkling. Soon it was a full downpour. I put on my poncho then went sloshing in the rain. The rain fell harder and harder. The trail became large puddles and mud. The storm seemed to strike more and more as the main cell passed over the mountain. It felt like I was going to get hit by lightning but I knew trees were overhead. They would get struck first instead of me except I was also sloshing through puddles of water.  After about 2 miles I came to a small sign pointing me to the 501 shelter.  As I approached the 501 I noticed it had a massive sky light in the shape of an octagon. It was a fully enclosed shelter and had a care taker who lived next door. Rosie and Lupine were already there when I arrived. It was an excellent place to shelter from the rain. A hiker named Smoke and two others were there. With the weather being so bad we were thinking of zeroing here. We also started salivating over the prospect of ordering pizza from the shelter. The care taker walked in and offered us a ride into town. He said the pizza place didn't deliver until 4 pm but we could pick it up. He asked if anyone needed to resupply. Rosie, Lupine, Smoke, and I did. We put in a huge order then headed to town. The care taker needed to do some errands. We stopped at the bank and convenience store. He was pretty quick then we stopped by the local grocery store for our resupply. They had a huge gummy section and I bought 2 pounds of gummies. After the grocery, we headed over to the Italian restaurant and picked up our food. We had pizza, calzones, tacos, mozzarella sticks, breaded mushrooms, and pizza fries. Back at the shelter we gorged on all the food and hung out for a few hours. The sky cleared up and it turned into a beautiful day. Rosie, Lupine, and I decided to push another 6 miles to a campsite with swimming.  The 6 miles went by pretty quick. The rocks in that section were not that bad. At the campsite there was a lot of water. I setup my tent on a tent pad. The rock fire pit next to the tent pad had a rattlesnake curled up in it. The snake didn't care about us around the site. It just poked its head out once and awhile to check out the area. A little further down the blue blaze trail there was an old dam that created a small lake and it had a rope swing. Squirrel and Brian were already there. They mentioned that the water was really cold but refreshing. Rosie swung out first he came up yelling about the coldness. I swung out and hit the water. The coldness hit me and sucked the breath out of me. I quickly swam to shore and got out. After shuffling out of the lake the air felt much warmer. Squirrel decided to go in again except he climbed the tree and he could easily slip off it. He got on the branch then swung out wide and landed in the water with a huge splash. After swimming we all made dinner and hung out. I made couscous which was pretty filling. Jaipur rolled in at about 8 pm. He looked pretty tired from all the rock hopping. Another hiker named Space Bear showed up. He had been battling Lyme disease and had been taking antibiotics. He said that they gave him diarrhea though. It was hard for him to sleep at night because he didn't know when his body really needed to go. It got late and I decided to call it a night.Tonight I hope the rattlesnake doesn't get too cozy next to my tent.