Week 6 - 2024

Bear Mountain, NY/Hudson River to Kent, CT - 63 miles

MILESTONES THIS WEEK:

*We’ve walked 300 miles, a total of 1400 miles on the Appalachian Trail.  Woot! Woot!

*Crossed the state line - NY to CT. Welcome to Connecticut! We are in our 4th state!

*We’re at the Half Way Point for this section!   

 Whoa, we're half way there

Oh-oh, livin' on a prayer

Take my hand, we'll make it, I swear

Oh-oh, livin' on a prayer  (Thanks Judy!)

WHAT WE LEARNED THIS WEEK:

I ♥️ NY.  New York State did not disappoint at all.  I could be partial because it’s our home state, but I don’t think so.  This state offered so many extras for the hiker to enjoy while also hiking in the great outdoors.  We had the drive-in, the journey to the NYC skyline, beautiful views of the Hudson River, waterfalls, deli, pizza, and ice cream stops almost daily, and …

Our alarm was set for 7am, but excitement for our upcoming day had us both wide awake at 6am. It was fun taking a zero day to spend time with friends but it was time to return to the trail, it was calling our names.  It was expected to be a very “bearable” day ahead for us; we could “bearly” wait to get started.

It would be a late start this morning due to this portion of the trail wasn’t going to be open until 10am.  You could take the bypass around if you didn’t want to wait, but we chose to just grin and “bear” it and wait until it was open for hikers.

We arrived early, along with other hikers and stood anxiously at the gate, waiting for them to open.  10am came and went, with no admittance to the trail.  Thoughts of taking the bypass never entered our minds. We were waiting. About 5 minutes later, we hear a golf cart approaching and an attendant apologizing for running late.  “Welcome to the Trailside Museum and Zoo,” she says as she opens the gate. 

We plan to take our time and enjoy what they have to offer.  We heard it was very simple and not much here to see but we are in no hurry.  We view the porcupine, turtles, fish, frogs and snakes (WARNING: snake pictures are posted), but our main interest is yet to be seen. 

As we round the corner and head up the hill, we see a huge lump of brown lying up on a rock ledge.  I’m pretty sure that is Miss Sadie Bear, who I’ve been waiting all morning to see.  She would lift her head occasionally but for the most part seemed very content lying with her backside to us and not turning around to be social.  We stood there a good 15 minutes hoping she would give us a better view but I guess all we were going to get was her bear behind (bare behind, get it?!) .  Didn’t really matter, I was thrilled to see her and would rather see her in this way than actually out on the trail. 

It was time to continue our journey north but first we needed to cross the Hudson River to be able to do that.  I was both excited and timid in knowing I had to walk a half mile on the walkway of Bear Mountain Bridge, as cars and trucks zoomed past me, to get to the other side.  Why did the chicken cross the road? Because I had to get to the other side, that’s why.  With my hat in my hand and my head down (the wind was so strong), we took the long journey across the Hudson.  I looked around at times to get glimpses of the river, the busy highway, make sure FROG was still behind me - I knew I’d never have this experience again so I needed to take in as much as I could. It really wasn’t so bad but I know I felt relieved when we finally reached the other side. And that my friends, made it a “beary” good day!

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Nature’s Sweet Symphony. Having said all the positives of NY, let me assure you it wasn’t always fun and games. The trails in NY had their share of difficult terrain and at times you just wanted to yell, “enough is enough all ready!” One such time happened this week. It was a long day, it was hot, there didn’t seem to be any let up of climbs that included climbing up and over big rocks. We were spent! We had another 2 miles to go and just wasn’t sure if we had the energy to finish.  I do think we are given more than we can handle so that we turn to God for His help, so we stood right there on the trail and prayed for His strength to finish.  More uphill led us into a deep forested area; I stopped dead in my tracks and just listened. FROG caught up with me and I told him to listen.  I don’t know how many birds were there but there were so many different ones singing, it was beautifully orchestrated and harmonious.  It was exactly what we needed to hear!  We listened for a while in awe of natures sweet symphony, being played just for us!  We have no doubt, at that moment in time, God provided the birds to give us the encouragement we needed to finish the trail and finish it strong.  What a God moment that we will never forget!

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I would not make a good flip-flopper!  The definition of a flip flopper is starting at one place on the trail walking one direction, going to the end, then getting yourself back to where you first started then go the other direction to the end. Most flip-floppers start in Harper’s Ferry, WV and hike north to Mt Katahdin, Maine and then find transportation back to WV and hike south to Springer Mountain, Georgia.   We have discovered the age group that mostly does the flip-flopping is our age group. The younger hikers usually are the ones that start in Georgia and head north to Maine.  Not sure why that is.  Both sections have their challenges but in my humble opinion the northern half is so much more difficult than the southern half - if I had been flip-flopping and started with the northern section first (Pennsylvania!), I would have for sure told FROG he needed to find someone else to hike the rest with him.  Sure, It’s been a great experience, but the biggest thing I’ve learned, no matter how you hike it - backpacking the Appalachian Trail is not for sissy’s!  It’s not a cake walk - you better come prepared for some blood, sweat and tears!

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Deja-vu!  Those who have read our book know the story of our first date - Brad paying for the movies all in quarters.  We were in Pawling, NY this week and needed to do laundry but of course didn’t have our bounce box that had our quarters in it and we certainly don’t carry quarters with us, much too heavy. So, FROG gets change from a ten-dollar bill (smallest bill he had) so we can do laundry.  Of course, we don’t need that many quarters and we can’t carry all that on the trail, so!  I stood there and watched him pay for our ice cream, all in quarters!  We told the three young girls behind the counter about our first date, how embarrassed he was that I saw him paying with quarters and one of the girls responded immediately, “at least he paid.”  I laughed and agreed with her, but then thought more about it later. Are guys not paying for their dates anymore? Is this now only an old-fashioned thing that the guy would pay? Can anyone enlighten me on how dating is done these days?

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My feet reek! And that might be an understatement!  Because I have Morton’s Neuroma (inflammation in the nerve endings in my left foot), I don’t wear socks. It causes my foot to get overheated and the pain escalates at a faster rate. It’s a process. I have to stop, rub my toes back and forth and then I’m good for another mile, repeat.  You needed to know this, why?  There’s a really good reason, I promise.  At night, because my boots smell so bad we keep them outside the tent.  I’m hoping the smell keeps the bears away but what the smell does attract are worms. You know … the thick, wiggly ones that look like gummy worms, those!  They crawl into my boots and head right for the toe base. Do you know how horrible it is to have your boots on and you feel movement under your toes?!  Very good idea to check your boots before putting them on each morning.

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Mid-way Splurge!  Our goal this section of the AT was at least 600 miles by the end of July.  I think we may achieve that, God willing; going any farther than that will be a bonus. To celebrate that we’ve gone 300 miles, my husband has spoiled me in a big way.  He made reservations at a boutique inn, The Station Inn, for 3 nights of luxury. We are still hiking during the day, but we come back to a hot shower, a flush toilet, a comfy bed, and many options for food! I could really get into hiking like this!  Rooms are quite expensive so just having the least expensive one was just fine by me, well that is, until our flush toilet decided to up and not flush anymore.  Well darn! Now they want to upgrade us to a bigger room, bigger bed and back porch.  Okay, if we must! I promise you; we did not do anything to our toilet to get the upgrade!

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Where is everyone? Our plan that morning was to hike 11 miles to Canopus Beach; the biggest reason to walk that far was that they had a concession stand that was serving food. Y’all know food is a huge motivator!  It’s nice to have another choice instead of eating dehydrated food.  It doesn’t taste bad but if you have an option for hamburgers and fries, which would you choose?  We were still a couple miles away when we saw the sign posted “Canopus Beach Concession Stand open from 8:00 am to 5:00 pm on weekends. The grill closes at 4:00pm”.  We were running late getting there due to all the rocks we had to climb over which was slowing us down (this explanation sure is getting old! Believe me, I’m ready to stop having to tell you we encounter so many rocks!)  We knew we wouldn’t make it there by 4:00 so hamburgers and fries were out but we could certainly settle for a cold soda and a sandwich - we thought surely we can arrive well before 5:00.  You know when you want something so bad that every obstacle seems to slow you down that much more? This was the day.  Not wanting to hurry because we didn’t want injuries but trying to hurry because we were hungry and had to arrive by a certain time.  Tensions were high at times but finally we safely arrived at 4:50 … to a deserted park!  Wait? What?!  It’s Friday night, isn’t this the weekend? The sign failed to mention that weekends were only Saturday and Sunday’s until school let out, or maybe it said it and we missed that important piece of information.  Needless to say, we were so disappointed as we ate our dehydrated spaghetti and drank warm filtered water.  Poor, poor pitiful us.

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Trail Angel, John (aka AT Old Fart 90).  Let me introduce you to our trail angel this week.  John is 90 years old, walks the AT almost every day with a walking stick, is in excellent shape and seriously doesn’t look his age. Wait until you see his picture!  Maybe we should have asked for proof of his age! We stopped to talk with him for a long time, what an interesting guy he was!  He had so many stories to share, he’s a retired doctor, an author, and has travelled extensively throughout the US and abroad.  We had such a good conversation, none of us were really anxious to say goodbye, so he offered to take us to the nearest town to get cold drinks and deli sandwiches.  (We finally got what we had hoped to get the day before at the park!) His generosity and hospitality were so appreciated; what a true trail angel!!

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Tigger beat us there!  Our bounce box has arrived at our next destination…Judy and Les who live in Connecticut (Judy is the sister of Robin, our Trail Angel in New Jersey), they have graciously offered to be our trail angels when we get to their area.  If Judy is like her sister, I know we’ll be well taken care of!  We look forward to meeting you both!!

Stay tuned for our adventures in Connecticut.  Can we stop reporting on so many rocks?