This will go down as one of the worst night’s of non-sleep I’ve ever had. I had the constant high pitched whir of mosquitoes in my ears all night long. They weren’t in the tent, they were trying to lift the tent off of the ground. I did have the misfortune to have to get up to pee in the middle of the night. As soon as I stuck my head out of the tent, I was lifted off of the ground. This was really a time saver as I started peeing as soon as my feet left the ground. I swatted my neck, killing 40 of the little beatches (everyone knows it’s the women who are blood suckers). They dropped me and I was able to crawl back in the tent. My compassionate wife rolled over and told me to quit moving around so much.
We heard a few hikers swearing and swatting as they ran by our campsite. When Bunny insisted we get going, she tried to convince me to go out and get the bear bag. I refused. She bitch-slapped me and told me to “man-up.” She went out to take care of her morning water run. When she got back in the tent, she made the declaration we were not eating breakfast here. We packed up as fast as we could considering we each only had one free hand because the other was always slapping and killing mosquitoes. We had a death toll that would rival any of the daily kill totals from the Vietnam War.
There was thunder in the distance but we didn’t hold out hope for relief from any rain. It had been thundering all last evening night and only produced just enough moisture to allow another hatch of the number 1 enemy of man (mosquitoes are responsible for the more loss of human life than all wars combined) and to raise the humidity level another 10%. Thanks Obama.
We got to the top of Rattlesnake Mountain (seriously, NJ is pure trail hell) and could see a storm below us to the west. I felt hope, Bunny felt uncontrollable fear because there was lightening in the sky. On the bright side, we did make much better time coming down the mountain—much closer to running rates than our pitiful 1 mph rate of the last 2 1/2 days.
We stopped at Brink Road Shelter to get some water. This is the shelter that people had told us was the worst location for mosquitoes in the world. If I had possessed a military radio frequency to call in air strikes, I would have called for a napalm drop on my signal. The fire storm would have provided relief. Flip Flop and Caveman were holed up in the shelter with their citronella fans. Murphy came in behind us. It was exactly like the scene where Willem Defoe gets shot down in “Platoon”. We already thought he was dead, but he made it up from the water source to be eaten alive before our eyes.
Flip Flop and Caveman decided they could make it the 6 miles to the next shelter with the thimble full of water they had between them. Bunny and I were desperate for water. We drew straws. I won. Bunny said she wasn’t going, I had to go or we don’t get any water. This is marriage at its darkest hour. Of course, my life doesn’t matter. I poured deet over my head like the monks did gasoline in Vietnam. I tried to set myself on fire to keep the mosquitoes away, but deet doesn’t burn. I ran to the spring but I don’t think my feet ever touched the ground. Everyone in the shelter could hear my screams, but NO ONE came to help.
I lost 2# of blood in this run. The 1.5 liter of water I recovered was not worth it. As soon as I got back to the shelter, Bunny loaded up and ran off down the trail. I had to repack before I could leave. It took me 15 minutes to catch up with her once I got going.
We practically ran the two miles to the highway. We wanted out. We got to the road and immediately threw up our thumbs. We didn’t even know which way it was to the nearest town or what it’s name was. Before I could get our “please help” sign out of Bunny’s pack, a kind soul stopped and offered us rides. We are definitely not in PA anymore.
Art is a hiker himself. He said he would have picked us up sooner, but he saw a trooper pass us. Hitchhiking is illegal in NJ and NY. How he could have picked us up any sooner, I have no idea. We threw our packs in the back and climbed in front. He gave us each a bottle of water. Art told us he was going to go hiking today but decided against it because it was so hot. Art drove us to the closest hotel and waited until we got in a room. He then drove us down to the pizza joint and grocery store. He even gave us some natural insect repellent that he had when he saw all the welts all over us. Some day, he wants to hike the AT. He has already built up a huge karma bank for when he hits the trail.
After we ate, we went to the grocery store. People inside recognized us as thru-hikers and offered us rides wherever we needed. We thanked them, but declined. There was a Dairy Queen across the street and we weren’t done eating yet. Coming out of the store, we ran into Maverick and his girlfriend. They offered us a ride as well. We were ride rich. My opinion of NJ has definitely improved off of the trail.
We went to DQ and got our ice cream. We started walking the mile back to our hotel when another driver pulled over and told us to get in. We weren’t even hitching. He took us right to our door. He said “we know how to take care of hikers in New Jersey.” We hadn’t even tried to hitch back.
It was only 3, but as soon as we got inside we fell on the bed. Actually, I checked for bedbugs first then got on. The place is a dump and we had been warned to check first. It may be a dump, but it has working AC and a bedbug free bed. We were out for the night. We didn’t even shower.
EFG