morvasaaty/AppalachianTrail-LD-Hikers-Blogs-and-Weather-20-years huggingface dataset:
Date: 2013-09-24
From: River

To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0

It was such a cold and rainy day. I'm pretty exhausted. Tonight I'm camping with Hawkeye. We saw a moose across the river while we were eating dinner! It was enormous!! This was my first moose sighting and Hawkeye's fifth. I am so glad I saw one. I hit the 2,100 mile marker today. Only 84.2 miles to go! Holy cow! I am so close to the end. I spent the first half of my day listening to podcasts. I listened to Elevation Church, NewSpring Church, and Life Church. I'm trying to figure out what to do with my life when I get home. Part of me is thinking about trying to get a job at my church (ElevationChurch.org for those who are interested). Hawkeye is from Charlotte. And he goes to Elevation! I hiked with him the second half of the day today. We talked about what God has been doing in our lives. I shared my testimony with him. It was nice to talk with somebody about home. I'm looking forward to hanging out with him when I get home. I gotta try to sleep now. I hope I warm up. It's really cold tonight. My feet froze during the last river ford tonight. It actually hurt my feet it was so cold. Yesterday, I had to ford 4 rivers. I'm glad we don't have any river crossings tomorrow. I'm starting to get annoyed by all of the fording. I forgot to mention something that happened the other day. I had just finished fording a river with Turbo and Giggles. They stayed to eat a snack while I decided to keep hiking. The trail got really rocky and practically turned into a creek bed for a while. Then it split off to the right and you have to cross over a bog. After crossing the bog, I saw a white blaze on a tree to my left, so I followed the trail that way. After about 15 minutes I look up and see Turbo and Giggles hiking towards me. I stopped dead in my tracks. I asked Turbo what they were doing. He was like what do you mean? I thought they were playing a joke on me to make me think I was going the wrong direction. I'd heard stories of people taking a short cut to get ahead of somebody, then hiking south to see if they can trick them into thinking they were going the wrong direction. This was not the case here. I somehow got turned around at the bog and managed to hike south for about half a mile. I was so mad! One 'idiot mile' is such a waste of time and energy. Ugh!
Date: 2013-09-26
From: River

To: stealth site
Miles today: 23.0

I was hauling ass today. I did 23 miles! Only 43 miles stand between me and the summit. I saw katahdin in the distance today. It was like seeing a celebrity in real life. I've only seen pictures of it, but today I saw it and all it's glory with my own eyes. It was a weird moment for me. I still haven't caught up with giggles. I left Hawkeye earlier. He wasn't trying to hike as many miles as I was. So, I ended up camping alone tonight. It's the first time this has happened since the beginning of my hike. I'm fine with it. I've been pretty deep in my head all day. I don't really feel like being around anyone right now. I set my alarm for 4:30 tomorrow. I am going to attempt to do 26.6 miles into Abol Bridge. That should allow me to summit the following day. Wow, only 2 more nights on the trail. I am down to the last 2 pages of my guidebook. I still have no idea how I'm getting home. I know I'm going to fly, but don't know which airport I'm departing from. Last I heard tickets were over $300 to Charlotte from Bangor. I might try to hitch to a bigger airport and fly out from there. Well, I better get some rest. I've got a big day tomorrow. I pray that I sleep through the night without any wild animal encounters ;-) Don't worry, I hung my food tonight!
Date: 2013-09-27
From: stealth site

To: View Entry
Miles today: 24.0

It has been an emotional roller coaster today. Knowing that in 2 days my journey will end is hard to wrap my head around. I keep thinking 'this will be the last time I ___'. Tonight will be my last time sleeping in a shelter. The last time I sign a shelter log. I haven't been able to sleep much the last few nights because I can't stop thinking about what it'll be like back home. I also find myself thinking back to the beginning of my hike a lot. I'm getting up early tomorrow to hike to the base of Katahdin. It's a 5.1 mile hike straight up to the peak. Then, you turn around and hike back down. I was able to call my mom and let her know what date to book my flight home. I told her Tuesday, which will give me an extra day buffer in case I don't summit Sunday. It's gonna be an easy day tomorrow. I got a text from Zorro tonight. He, Giggles, and Turbo are just a few miles ahead. They will be waiting for me in the morning. I'm so happy they are summiting with me!
Date: 2013-09-28
To: The Birches
Miles today: 0.0

9-28-13It was my 140th day on the trail today. I'm camping at the Birches campsite. This is a site reserved for thru hikers. There are going to be a ton of people summiting tomorrow. The mood around camp this evening has been melon collie. I can see it in everybody's face they are taking it all in. Our last night together. I may never see some of these people again. For the past 5 months whenever somebody asked me where I'm going, my answer was always Maine. Now that I'm in Maine, I have to say Katahdin. It is crazy to think that I will finally get to take my summit picture tomorrow. For 5 months I've been daydreaming of the poses I would do at the Katahdin summit sign. Giggles did a really cool braid in my hair tonight while we sat around the campfire. My hair is so dirty. I haven't showered in like 8 days. I REALLY hope I can shower at some point before jumping on the plane. I'd feel so bad for the people stuck next to me if I didn't. It's bad enough that my gear smells. I wonder if they'll let me bring my pack as a carry on. The weather is suppose to be beautiful tomorrow. Some people were talking about leaving at 3am to watch the sunrise from the summit. But I think I'm gonna leave around 8 and enjoy the views on my way up. This hike has been such a blessing. I am so glad I did it. God showed me so much out here. I am returning to my old life, but will be forever changed. Goldilocks will always be a part of me.
Date: 2013-10-01
To: Charlotte, NC
Miles today: 0.0

Yesterday, Turbo and I hitched out of Millinocket, ME to Bangor. I wrote 'AT HIKERS - BANGOR' on the back of some cardboard and held it up at the side of the road. It took 2 hitches to get there. We needed to catch a Greyhound bus at 5:20am the next morning. We got dropped off at a hotel near the station. When we found out a room was $108 we decided to try our luck elsewhere. We walked to the station, which also has a 24hr restaurant. We ended up spending the entire night camped out in a booth. We just ordered food every couple of hours. Throughout the course of the night we had 3 shift changes with waitresses. At one point, the manager told us we had to leave. We asked if we ordered food could we stay. She said that'd be fine. After 10 hours, we got on the bus heading towards Augusta, ME. It was so hard to stay awake. If the heat hasn't been broken on the bus, I probably would've dozed off. It was a FREEZING ride to the airport. I was able to get my first flight changed to be on the same plane as Turbo. It was the smallest plane I'd ever been on. There were 7 of us including the pilot. It was the most epic flight! The views were spectacular! It was so clear, and the plane flew really low. In a lot of ways, I felt like I was reliving my hike going southbound. The whole time we were pointing, laughing, bouncing around, and enjoying the moment. After we landed, someone asked us if it was our first time flying. I guess we were a little too excited about the whole experience. I blame the lack of sleep for making me act silly. We parted ways in Boston. I was also able to get my 2nd flight bumped up to an earlier one. I am in Newark, NJ now, waiting for the final leg of my journey. I am on standby for a flight leaving at 7:11pm for Charlotte. I'm praying I get a seat. Otherwise, I have to wait until 9:30 to fly out. The plane wouldn't land until 11:30 tonight. I still haven't slept. I'm so uncomfortable right now. There are no other hikers around anymore. Nobody in this airport knows what I just experienced. My pack stinks like poop, my shoes have holes and dried blood on them, my clothes are tattered, and I just don't really want to be here. It's been a day full of crowded places with stressed out people. I miss the woods. Just found out I got a seat on this flight! Yay! Gotta jet!
Date: 2013-03-30
To: pre-trip
Miles today: 0.0

Hi everyone my name is Josh and I am planning on hiking the Appalachian trail starting April 5th with my good friend who's name also happens to be Josh. Since I committed to hiking the trail with Josh back in February it has been a whirlwind of planning, training, and more planning. If you read Josh Garrisons Trail Journal you would know that we are trying to put in some big miles hoping to finish the trail in under 60 days. I have been training up around my house in Colorado which sits right around 9000ft and have walk/run a lot of 20 mile days and have done several walks over 25 miles. I don't think anything can prepare you for hiking 36-40 miles everyday for 60 days I just hope I have built enough of a base so that I can adjust to the rigors of big miles on the trail. Currently I am putting the finishing touches on my planning, packing, and mail drop packages. I've also decided to take this opportunity to raise money for my mom, who has Parkinson's Disease, by fundraising (pledges starting at a penny per mile) for the Davis Phinney Foundation for Parkinsons. Check them out here: http://www.davisphinneyfoundation.org. I'm excited to test myself physically and meet all the interesting people who are already living the trail life. Josh
Date: 2013-03-31
From: pre-trip

To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0

This past weekend I began packaging up food for the 11 mail drops along the way. For me this was a stressful time, sitting there questioning your choices as you watch everything get packed away. I did a lot of dehydrating and vacuum sealing which turned out to be rather time consuming but was a cool process nonetheless. Thanks to my sister, mom, brother-in-law, and dad for helping me with this part of the packing process which resembled an arts and crafts project.
Date: 2013-04-07
From: Springer Mountain

To: Neil's Gap
Miles today: 40.0

Hey, it is Josh. Last night we got up almost to the top of Springer Mountain. We camped. It was raining. Rain was freezing on trees and breaking off just onto, well onto the ground, so it was kind of like this weird ice-sleeting rain. Definitely a pretty cold night for me. I'm using a tarp system. Woke me up a few times and had to do some sit-ups to warm myself up. We woke up and it was still overcast and cloudy. We ended up starting at around, I think close to 8, 7:57 or so. We got up to the top of the Springer and started our hike. We had a pretty good day walking through some mist and stuff. And then the sun came out and it was pretty fantastic.The next day there were a few hard peaks. The hardest peak for me was Blood Mountain, not necessarily getting up to the top, but going down the back side just seemed to take forever for me.We got to Neil¢s Gap and there was some free pizza. At the beginning of the day this guy gave me a sugary drink, some trail magic. So that was pretty good. Hopefully we feel good tomorrow and do the same thing again.
Date: 2013-04-07
To: Dick's Creek Gap
Miles today: 34.0

Here we are at Dick¢s Creek Gap. It puts us at 34 miles for the day and we¢re going to do another mile or 2. Its 8:48pm. Its our second day on the trail. Today started off interesting if we start where it began, which is last night right after I left my last journal. Josh and I both passed out only to be awakened by a bear that was drooling on Josh¢s sleeping bag ¢ it literally left drool on Josh¢s sleeping bag. He woke up and then scared it and it pounced by my head. He didn¢t even know it was a bear - he thought it was actually a rabbit or squirrel and so I woke up because of how loud the thuds were by my head and I was like ¢Josh that was a bear.¢ So we got up searched around and sure enough it was a bear. I had gotten into my sleeping bag at 9:30 after eating and that was at 11:30. We got up and hiked about another mile and a half, maybe mile. Found a little bit better camping spot and went to bed there. We got up at 7:00am today and started hiking, a little bit harder day today. A lot of ups and downs again. Yeah, I mean, I felt pretty good, had good moments especially at the beginning of the day. This guy Dale, trail name: ¢Omega¢ and this girl Nicki had this hot dog stand at the base of the mountain, so we ate 2 hot dogs, 2 krispy kremes and a coca-cola. Yeah, we¢re both feeling it a little bit, some aches and pains that we are walking through and adjusting to. The last part of the day here is starting to feel pretty long. We¢re going to hike in the dark here for the last little bit. Other than that, pretty good day.
Date: 2013-04-08
From: Dick's Creek Gap

To: North Carolina
Miles today: 32.0

Its the 3rd day. We crossed into North Carolina (new state!), at the beginning of the day and then we had ourselves a couple of hard hills but then at the beginning of North Carolina it flattened out and we felt like we were making really good progress. Josh and I both ended up dealing with some ankle and foot pain. He had some achilles stuff and I had tendon stuff on the front of my foot that we both fought through, worked through for most of the day. It was another beautiful day. Hopefully the weather keeps nice for a while. We put in about 15 12 hours and covered 32 miles. I really don¢t know where we¢re at right now. We are going to bed at 10:38 and we are probably going to wake up really early again because we are supposed to get to our resupply tomorrow before 5, which means we need to cover 30 miles. Josh is laughing. We did have a good moment earlier today where we both started laughing while we were icing our ankles with some ice from some trail magic. We just sat there and were icing are ankles and laughing at what was happening to us at that moment in time. It was a pretty good moment. Just laughing off the pain.
Date: 2013-04-15
From: damascus

To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0

Well...I have been resting for a about 5 days now. The swelling in my ankle is basically gone and I am going to begin hiking again starting tomorrow. I was initially going to shuttle ahead of Josh and start slowly walking 10-15 mile days until Josh caught up to me. When I met up with josh it was clear that his Achilles tendonitis had taken its toll and he decided to take a break. So now I am going to be hiking alone for a while and hopefully will be able to continue into late may. With the time frame that I am working with it is unrealistic to make it all the way to Maine so I am just going to hike until late may. I'm going to start slow and decide my mileage on a day to day basis based on whether or not the tendonitis in my ankle comes back. Hopefully I can increase my miles to the 25 MPD range after a week or so of taking it easy. Its pretty crazy how this trip has gone so far with me getting hurt then Josh. It is really hard for both of us to go our separate ways. Fortunately my time off allowed me to spend time with my mom and we were able to hike some small miles on the AT while I was recovering. We have had a great time and in a way getting hurt was a blessing in disguise, being able to spend this week together traveling around and meeting Josh at different spots. This is the last trail journal I'll be typing for a while so I'll be going back to voice recording and sending them to my sister to be transcribed.
Date: 2013-04-16
To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0

Well...I have been resting for a about 5 days now. The swelling in my ankle is basically gone and I am going to begin hiking again starting tomorrow. I was initially going to shuttle ahead of Josh and start slowly walking 10-15 mile days until Josh caught up to me. When I met up with josh it was clear that his Achilles tendonitis had taken its toll and he decided to take a break. So now I am going to be hiking alone for a while and hopefully will be able to continue into late may. With the time frame that I am working with it is unrealistic to make it all the way to Maine so I am just going to hike until late may. I'm going to start slow and decide my mileage on a day to day basis based on whether or not the tendonitis in my ankle comes back. Hopefully I can increase my miles to the 25 MPD range after a week or so of taking it easy. Its pretty crazy how this trip has gone so far with me getting hurt then Josh. It is really hard for both of us to go our separate ways. Fortunately my time off allowed me to spend time with my mom and we were able to hike some small miles on the AT while I was recovering. We have had a great time and in a way getting hurt was a blessing in disguise, being able to spend this week together traveling around and meeting Josh at different spots. This is the last trail journal I'll be typing for a while so I'll be going back to voice recording and sending them to my sister to be transcribed.
Date: 2013-04-17
To: View Entry
Miles today: 55.0

Well, I just left Mom and Josh today at about 10:30am and I ended up hiking until 8:00 tonight and did about 20 miles. Everything is feeling pretty good, got a little tired at the end there. Pitched my tarp at the top of White Top Mountain right next to a road here. Basically I am going to be hiking another 15 or 20 miles tomorrow hopefully with a few more hours so that I can go even slower and try and keep that pace for a while. Today was pretty funny, I definitely was taking it pretty slow and had some songs stuck in my head ¢ for some reason I had "head and shoulders knees and toes knees and toes" in my head for like an hour until this little bug flew into my eye and then I squished it in my eye and got its juices all up in my eye and it stung really bad but I am kinda thankful for that bug because it took my mind of ¢head and shoulders knees and toes¢ which was a terrible song to have stuck in your head. It was definitely a total bummer to have to leave mom and Josh today, it was really pretty tough to have to say goodbye to Josh for a second time and to say goodbye to mom, I was really thankful that she was able to come out and spend that time with me, hopefully I can keep hking for a while and not have too many problems here and hopefully I can meet up with Josh again, so we¢ll see how all that works out.
Date: 2013-04-17
To: Virginia/White Mountain Starting Location
Miles today: 20.0

Well I had a pretty interesting day today. I really had a poor choice of sleeping spot last night and I knew it as I was coming up just approaching 20 miles. White Mountain is kind of this bald mountain with no protection, but because it was getting dark I just decided to camp there anyway and sure enough Virginia welcomed me with a big ¢ol lightening storm. So that was pretty close, it was probably under a mile away and I was up on top of this mountain so it kept you awake a little bit and then I ended up getting a little bit later start because of the rains. I started at 9am and it rained for about the first 2-3 hours today and after that I came to a shelter and sure enough there was a wild pony trying to get out of the rain at this shelter and it was just chillin¢ there so it wasn¢t really all that wild at all and it was about a foot away and it started licking this guy¢s leg who was also at the shelter so that was pretty crazy. I got a video of this wild pony licking this dude¢s leg, but it just really wasn¢t a wild pony. I ended up hiking the rest of the day with some folks, a guy named Wild Blue and I met Tin Man and I met this girl named Wild Rain ¢ all really good folk and I might encounter them again here. I ended up hiking a few miles past where they stopped, but I wouldn¢t doubt if I saw them again here in the next few days. You can check the video out here:
Date: 2013-04-19
From: Virginia/White Mountain Starting Location

To: View Entry
Miles today: 50.0

Hey everybody. I¢m at the end of my 2nd 25 mile day here with Wild Blue. We¢ve been walking for most of the last two days and we just got to Fresh Grounds here who is this guy who is doing traveling trail magic and he keeps meeting people 200 miles down the trail and he pretty much just hooks you up with everything you could ever want: hot chocolate, hot dogs, green beans soaked in butter and bacon fat, I mean its pretty fantastic. I had 2 pretty good days, we got rained on going underneath the 81 underpass pretty much all day yesterday and then today was quite a bit colder than the rainy day, but was really nice and sunny and hopefully will be a little bit warmer day and still have the sun for a little bit here. I¢ll probably do 2 more 20 mile days to Pearisburg and then stay at Woods Hole Hostel.Any thoughts Wild Blue?: ¢Yea, Fresh Grounds is the man, but I ate way too much¢ That¢s the moral of the story with Fresh Grounds. Alright, see you all later.
Date: 2013-04-21
From: Dismal Falls

To: Woods Hole Hostel
Miles today: 70.0

Hey guys, its Josh again. Yesterday I made it from Fresh Grounds at Laurel Creek to Dismal Falls camping area. I think it was about 27-29 miles. I found a group that had a fire and ended up sleeping right out next to them. It was a pretty good day, walked this really beautiful trail, it was smooth and fast and I was having a great first 20 miles so I decided to keep going. I started at about 10am and had done about 20 miles by 4pm and so I was thinking I was going to do the same pace in the evening and got out on the trail and I was going down these downhills and decided to get my forest gump on - just running down these down hills and for some reason I just couldn¢t make any ground up so I ended up stopping a little before I wanted to. I was basically running down these hills and I still wasn¢t getting anywhere, but its all good. Today I have about 13 miles into town where I am going to stay tonight at Woods Hole Hostel. I have a package there. I¢m just going to take it easy today, rest up and see how I feel on ma±ana. Alright.
Date: 2013-04-23
From: Woods Hole Hostel

To: Past Pearisburg, VA
Miles today: 22.0
Weather: clear sky

Hey guys its me. Yesterday, 4/22, I hiked my 13 miles to Woods Hole Hostel ¢ its a cool little place run by Neville and Michael and they have this farmette and it reminded me a little bit of our Cannon House days, obviously a little bit bigger project than that, but they just had the cows and the goats and the chickens running all over the place. I stayed in a bunkhouse there and Neville cooked us some delicious lasagna and lots of homemade bread that was really hearty and delicious and this morning we had good eggs and this peach crisp that was delicious as well. So a pretty good stay last night, got a lot of rest in yesterday, feeling pretty good today. I'm going to try to go to Pearisburg, I have about 3-4 miles until Pearisburg. I¢m going to try and do about 10 more miles after Pearisburg which will make it about 22 miles.