I can confirm that the spider communication network is functioning and well. It would appear that the bridge spiders I was messing with when we crossed the Susquehanna River sent word ahead that I needed to be taught a lesson but not hurt. They at least recognized that I didn’t hurt or kill any of them so they held back their brown recluse and black widows cousins…this time. I woke up several times throughout the night with spiders crawling on me. They made sure to let me see them as a warning.
One of the guys had warned us that he was going to get up at 5:30 and apologized in advance for making noise while getting ready. What he didn’t tell us was that he was going to set his alarm clock and not put it on vibrate. Oh, and that he would snooze 4 times before getting up. It ended up that we got up a little before 7 when he finally left. We were hiking by 8:15.
Today was a lot of ridge walking. The ridges in PA are not what I had pictured in my head. I thought we were going to be walking over all this exposed rock with very little foliage to protect us. What we are really walking on is a tree covered ridge about 1000’ higher than the valley floors with very limited views of the valleys because of the dense tree cover. The rocks of PA have yet to appear in the diabolical form we have repeatedly been warned of. Like most of the trail has been so far, you must watch your feet a good portion of the time to prevent tripping.
Even with watching the trail, nearly constantly, I manage to miss things along the way. Unfortunately, Bunny is right behind me and she ALWAYS manages to spot the snakes I miss. It’s like she has built in snakedar. Today, it was an allegedly huge black snake. She told me about the snake as we approached Kinder View. There were two guys sitting there and they received a text from one of their friends ahead that there was a rattlesnake in the trail just a little ahead of us. Rattlesnake ahead, black snake behind—we’re surrounded. Time for a little Stevie Ray Vaughn…🎶 I’m stranded, caught in the crossfire 🎶
We had been warned that we today was going to be hot, Africa hot. We were tired and weak from the heat. We had been told of a creek at a road crossing that had some good camping upstream from the road. We considered stopping there after just 7 miles of hiking, but we saw Nightengale and Slip ‘n Slide there getting ready to head out. Making It and Rex were there soaking their feet. We decided to settle for a lunch break and a possible dip in the stream to cool off.
I eventually built of the nerve to completely submerge myself in the stream, but it was cold. The boys were protesting, so much so, that I came up a soprano for a while. We were talking with Making It and Rex and we all agreed that we were surprised by how redneck Pennsylvania is. It’s the Texas of the north.
After lunch I called Big Agnes to get our sleeping pads replaced. We had bought new sleeping pads in Franklin, TN but froze our asses off sleeping on them in the Smokies (this accounts for about 50% of our weight loss on the trail; it’s pretty amazing how much weight is in the average ass). We exchanged them after the Smokies for “better” pads. The new pads have all had microleaks. Not just for us, but for everyone out here who has bought them. They’ve got a problem and I’m tired of inflating my pad each time I get up to pee. They agreed to refund us the amount and send us our old pads back to a hostel we plan to stay at Wednesday night.
We caught up with Hard Hat, Slip n Slide, and Nightengale at Yellow Springs. This is the site of an abandoned mining town. It was already past 5 but we needed to make another 4 miles today if we are going to make Rock ‘n Sole hostel Wednesday, so we gallantly pushed on.
The mosquitos were terrible. This is when I made a discovery about flying insects on the trail. The little bastards are lying in wait for any passing food source, be it bear, deer, or hiker. The lead of any train draws the brunt of the pests. This is how I came up with the term “mosquito bait” and why I allowed Bunny to lead. The trick is not drifting too far back that the little bastards can detect a gap but staying close enough to not trip the lead hiker. It helps a lot to keep saying “I love you” while hiking second in line (not recommended for two testosterone filled 20 something males that have just met and started hiking together).
We are trying to use up all of the food we are carrying with us. This is how we developed a new dessert tonight. Back in Shenandoah, a girl gave us a package of vanilla icing because Bunny thought it looked good. We also had some extra fudge packages that our angel, Alice, had sent. I decided to try tortillas with icing and fudge as a treat. I think we would have had less of an insulin response it we had just eaten packets of sugar.
EFG