Day 121
Start: William Brien Shelter
End: Hemlock Springs Campsite
Miles Hiked: 13.6 Trail Miles
Miles on AT: 1411.5
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In the middle of the night last night, I was awoken from my sleep by a strange sound. Emerging from the haze of dreamland, I could make out the rhythmic beat of drums in the distance. As the fog of sleep lifted, I got even more confused. It sounded like there was a huge speaker not too far away, playing one song for 10 or 15 seconds before abruptly switching to the next.
I looked at my phone. 12:30 am. Who was playing loud music in the middle of the woods at 12:30 am??? Immediately my mind jumped to comments I had seen on FarOut describing a mentally ill man who would harass hikers by playing music in the shelters in the wee hours of the morning. The incident had occurred at a shelter a few miles back and, while there were reports of him for 2022 and 2023, there weren’t yet reports for 2024. Still, my mind told me that an axe murderer was out to get me.
Despite going into a full blown panic attack, I peeked out of my tent to see if I could see a headlamp, but there was none. Hmmm. Maybe the music was coming from down the mountain somewhere. After a long 15 minutes, the music finally stopped. It took me a minute to calm down enough to go back to sleep, but eventually I drifted back to dreamland.
Because of my disturbed sleep, I woke up the next morning later than usual. By the time I left, hikers from the previous shelter arrived to take a morning break. And as I was packing my tent up, I noticed that something had laid slimy eggs all over the bottom of my tent and groundsheet. What a day this was shaping up to be.
I gave myself some grace and took it easy. I reached the 1400 mile marker and stopped to assess the rest of my day. The famous Palisades Parkway road crossing was coming up, and to make it safer for hikers, a new reroute to avoid the road dash was created. But, according to FarOut comments, the crossing wasn’t that bad, so I took the old route.
When I got there, I laughed. This crossing was nothing compared to some dicumey crossings in the MD/VA area. The two traffic directions were separated by a large median, making it a matter of crossing two lanes of traffic twice. Easy!
Once I got to the other side, I started climbing and reached the top before I knew it. When I was a few hundred steps from the top, two guys asked me if I was doing the trail. They were so excited by my journey that they gave me a bag of Hi-Chews and a cold can of iced coffee. Just what I needed!
I sat at the top of the mountain enjoying my view and my cold can of caffeine. My day just got so much brighter.
Full of energy, I bounded down the mountain and up the next one. I ran into Limpkin, Night Pony, and Kaleidoscope when I reached Bear Mountain. As it was a weekend, the place was swarming with tourists. I guess that’s New York for you.
On my way down, I stopped for a burger at a restaurant by the lake. There were so many people out having picnics and cookouts; it was sensory overload. But, I got inside to eat at just the right time because a pretty big downpour started as I ate my meal. As I stared out the window, I contemplated just staying at the hotel to escape being wet. A break would be nice, as well as a hot shower and soft bed. *Sigh* My inner hardcore thru hiker wouldn’t let me wuss out like that.
When the rain slowed, I got back out there, got an ice cream, and made my way toward the zoo. Hey, if I wasn’t going to treat myself to a hotel room, I could at least treat myself to Haagen-Dazs. When I got there, the zoo was closed. Since the trail goes straight through the zoo, I had to take the blue blaze around and then cross the Hudson River.
As I gazed up at the sky, I could tell more rain was imminent. The sky rumbled and I saw lightning in the distance. Just as I got to the trailhead, the sky opened up again. Maybe I should have gotten that room after all. I squeezed myself under the small trail info kiosk in between a trail magic cooler of sodas and a guitar.
Once the rain stopped, I was on my way again. I wasn’t going to go far, just to the next campsite. Unluckily for me, it was alllll uphill. Wet, a little grumpy, and ready to sit down, I arrived at my campsite. There was another tent already there, so I set mine up in the free spot, ate dinner, and crawled in for the night.
And that’s day 121.
A version of this post originally appeared on TheTrek.co.