Day 119, Sunday, June 10. Penn Mar Park—16.2 miles

I had a dream last night that I was with Cindy Crawford in her house. She looked me in the eyes and said “I’m the only one in the house for the next hour.  I’m all yours. I will do a-n-y-thing you want.” I got up, walked to her, kissed her on the cheek and yelled over my shoulder “Come on Bunny, Cindy is going to cook for us.”  Bunny and I are never more than 50’ apart, even in my dreams. Plus, it’s Cindy Crawford, so you know she’s going to have tons of fresh, organic, healthy food.  Food is the number one motivator for thru-hikers. 

It was with my food dream fresh in mind that I headed to the Annapolis Rocks overlook to catch the morning view.  There was a family from Annapolis up there just staring out into the mist.  We started talking about trips that Bunny and I have been on because they were looking for a longer hike to go on this summer.  As a parting gift, they offered me some extra food they had with them.  The youngest son balked when they offered me the granola bars so we ended up with just some cinnamon graham crackers,  it free food is always magical.

We tried to be optimistic and not use our pack covers when heading out assuring that the chance rain would be 100%.  Even with the rain we made great time because we had such a nice trail.  The AT crosses Maryland in a very narrow neck that is full of history (Civil War Battlefields), state parks, and scenic overlooks.  This means that the trail is maintained in near highway fashion.

Our goal for today was to get to the end of the state.  Upon arriving at the last shelter in Maryland, we found it full of people from Indianapolis.  I was not going to be thrown off again today, I immediately began the 6 degrees of Steve Johnson.  This was an epic fail.  One guy did know A Steve Johnson, but when he started to describe him with “long flowing hair” I conceded defeat.  Next to Steve, I look like a long haired hippy.

Maryland has just 40 miles of AT, but after 37 miles they just ran out of desire to build and maintain the final 3 miles.  “37 is all we have, screw em, give them a taste of Pennsylvania.”  The trail just ran across boulder fields with an occasional white blaze painted on a tree or rock.  We lost the trail a couple of times and had to resort to using Guthook to find our way.

If we had hiked Maryland at the same 17.5 hour/mile rate as we hiked West Virginia, it would have taken us 700 hours (or just over 29 days).  By us covering the state in just 3 days, we have cut over 3 weeks off of our slow travel time.  This means we are very likely going to be able to complete the AT in under a year.

We ended the day at Penn Mar with Pilgrim, Skywalker, and Thumper.  Lady Bug and Stickers had written a Review which included a phone number for pizza.  Stickers practically challenged me to eat a large pizza.  I’m a sucker for a challenge.  I was beaten.  On the bright side, we have left over pizza for tomorrow.  What I wouldn’t give to have Gnome and his beer conjuring ability with us. It was raining steadily so we decided to be outlaws and stay in a pavilion.  Before the caretaker had left, he told Thumper and Skywalker they had to be out before dark (wink, wink) but he wouldn’t be back until the park opens tomorrow. 

I have a friend living in St Louis, let’s call him Dave.  Dave’s dad, Curt (for the sake of argument), noticed that his oldest son had stopped dating and become a sort of hermit. He asked his beloved eldest son what was happening.  Dave replied that he had just gotten a new dog and that his new best friend liked to lick peanut butter off of his body wherever he spread it.  Curt said that this was not a healthy relationship for Dave and he could see Dave had no incentive to meet women when he had a dog like this.  Curt took the dog from Dave.

Within a short period of time, Dave managed to develop a healthy relationship with a woman and life was looking good for him.  The story for Curt turned out quite differently.  Curt, more or less, disappeared from his business.  For four months, no one saw or heard from Curt (other than the Skippy peanut butter deliveries he got from Amazon, no one even knew if he was still alive).  One day, Curt showed up back at his office.  All he would say is “the dog died from diabetes.”

I only mention this because I miss my dog (and no, she doesn’t even like peanut butter).

EFG