#157 Toms Run Shelter to Alec Kennedy Shelter - Day: 82 ATMM1101.1 - ATMM1120.1
Four guys appear out of nowhere, looking neither like hikers nor hunters. They look more like they’ve come to hide a body.....my right hand slides down to grip the handle my knife.
4-8-2023
The creek’s comforting babbles encouraged sound sleep throughout the night. My slow-leaking pad, on the other hand, discouraged it.
Inflating the pad requires rolling off it, blowing a puff of air or two into the pump sack, then rolling the air from the sack by hand into the pad. Then you have to roll yourself back onto the pad.
I woke about once an hour to inflate it. The same problem occurred the last few nights of the 2022 section hike. I patched the hole when I got back home, or thought I had.
The father and daughter team are boiling water to make breakfast and coffee with. They offer to let me pour some of my water into their large pot to boil. I thankfully do so because my fingers are too cold to light one of my fuel tabs. Plus I’ll save a fuel tab.
I pass yet another half-way marker for the Appalachian Trail. There’s no real way to mark a permanent halfway point of the trail, since the length changes a little each year as reroutes are continuously forged.
Nonetheless, there’s still a feeling of accomplishment knowing that you’ve hiked half of a major trail and have no intentions of stopping.
Audrey and her dog, who camped across the field last night at Tom’s Run Shelter area, are near a wooden foot bridge over a small creek. She filters water while her playful companion splashes in the cold stream. We chat for a few minutes - she lives in a nearby town, they are just out for an overnight adventure.
The dirt trail gives way to a two lane road that leads to Pine Grove Furnace State Park where Laurel Forge manufactured wrought iron during the Industrial Revolution.
I walk past the Ironmaster’s Mansion Hostel, which has yet to open for the season.
I walk past the park’s general store, which has yet to open for the season.
I walk past the Appalachian Trail Museum, formerly the gristmill, which, you guessed it, has yet to open for the season, becoming another landmark missed due to hiking so early in the year.
The museum commemorates the builders, maintainers and hikers of the Appalachian Trail, highlighting those in the Appalachian Trail Hall of Fame.
I’ll have to drive up some other time to check it all out, maybe stay in the old hostel.
I pull on the door of a park restroom expecting it to be locked, yet to open for the season.
The door opens. A large smile crosses dirty my face.
An unlocked restroom on the trail brings joy to a hiker’s heart. After washing hands in creeks or with hand sanitizer for a week, the joy of using soap under a running faucet is exhilarating. I let the warm water run over my hands for a few minutes just because today I can.
Audrey and her dog are walking across the parking lot when I step out of the restroom. On my way to the pavilion to take a break we talk briefly.
I move over to pavilion to nurse a nasty looking blister on a toe that naturally slides beneath the one next to it.
A small gathering of people surround a tour guide by Pine Grove Furnace Stack in field nearby field.
The A.T. merges onto an old railroad bed. Day hikers are everywhere, all hiking in the same direction, up the old railroad as though on a pilgrimage. Soon we meet day hikers coming down the long incline.
Just off the ten foot wide path stands a half naked guy by a tent. It’s early afternoon.
I ask, “Early stop or late start?”
“Late start”, he responds.
“Are you Sprawl?” a female voice asks from inside the tent.
“Yes”, I answer to the voice inside the tent.
“Faze mentioned you,” The voice continues, as the owner climbs out of the tent.
“I’m Hippy Rocks and this is Touchdown.”
“Faze told me about you too. You named her, right?” I respond.
Hippy Rocks and Faze had been hiking together but separated to let Touchdown catch up. Faze hiked on.