Day 122
Start: Hemlock Springs Campsite
End: Canopus Lake Beach Shelter
Miles Hiked: 18.0 Trail Miles
Miles on AT: 1429.5
Follow my journey on Instagram (@jenbrownhikes) for more updates!
This morning when I woke up, I had something delicious to look forward to: a deli! Yes, I was in New York, so delis were around every corner on trail. As I packed up my things and fantasized about what I would get, a thru hiker walked by. He looked familiar. I asked him if he had heard the music last night, but apparently he had just gotten back on trail from town.
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention. There was even more music playing in the middle of the night last night. 2 nights in a row, can you believe it? This time the music lasted from 1:30 am until around 3 am. It seemed to move around a little bit, but not much, and the music was of a similar genre to the music I had heard before.
Again, my sleep was disturbed and my nerves had been rattled. I had stood outside my tent in the middle of the night looking for a headlamp, but again didn’t see a hiker. Strange.
By this point, I was ready to be done with New York. There were too many people everywhere, it was too noisy, and there were too many mysterious midnight music fests. All I could look forward to was the food.
It didn’t take long for me to reach the deli. I ordered an egg and bacon bagel plus a beef patty (if you know, you know) to go and sat outside on the picnic tables with the hiker I had chatted with this morning. His name was Cook Out and he was from North Carolina, like me.
We had chatted for a while before I noticed Night Pony, Kaleidoscope, and Limpkin emerging from the forest and heading to the deli. Turns out they were slackpacking today, so they were going to get a 20 mile day done.
I left them to eat their deli treats and headed back onto the trail. Cook Out had already left, but after only a few minutes I ran into a new hiker. His name was Wise and he was trying to catch up to the rest of his trail family, who were only a few miles ahead of him. His buddy, Dying, had had to get off trail due to Lyme Disease, but was hoping to get back on soon.
As we hiked, the sky began to get darker. It looked like it was going to rain, but it was hard to tell when. At the next water source, I ran into a familiar face: Stretch!
“Whatcha been up to?” He asked.
“Nothing much, just hiking.”
We caught up for a while and shared our plans for the day. My goal was to reach another state park with a lake so I could jump in and take a shower afterwards. The lake closed around 6, so getting in the lake had a chance of not happening, but the shower would still be an option.
Stretch started hiking again and I followed a few minutes later. The trail wasn’t too bad today; there were a good number of flat, cruisey sections that made for easy hiking.
At lunch, all of the hikers I’d seen today (minus Cook Out) gathered in the same spot and shared a meal. It was nice to be in a bubble! Sure, it made finding a place to pee difficult because there were so many people hiking nearby, but I enjoyed having the mealtime company.
As we moved on, plans were solidifying to camp at the state park. I was a loud supporter and proponent of this plan and made sure everyone knew about it.
When we were nearly there, Limpkin and I met a guy who turned out to be a Triple Crowner, meaning he had hiked the Appalachian Trail, Pacific Crest Trail, and the Continental Divide Trail. I had gone to see if a spigot on the side of a building was working, and he so happened to be in his car after taking photos for a project. He offered me some water and we just started talking. He had hiked the trails in the late 90s and early 2000s, making his trail experience vastly different from ours. I enjoyed hearing his stories.
Soon, we were in the final stretch to the state park. I started to experience weird prick-like sensations all over my body. It started on the back of my thighs, then spread to my stomach and even my forehead. It was like I was being poked with some invisible needle. The further I hiked, the most uncomfortable I felt. I had no idea what was going on.
By the time I got to the state park, I was feeling very uncomfortable. But, I took off my pack, got my clothes and soap, and took a shower (albeit a cold one.) I didn’t feel the sensations anymore and forgot about them for the most part. I thought maybe it had been a reaction to the DEET bug spray I had borrowed earlier in the day. Maybe washing it off had done the trick.
When I finished washing up and doing some trail laundry, I found a crowd of hikers gathered in the courtyard area. Wow, this was a true AT experience. There must’ve been at least 10 of us. We had dinner together, chatted, joked, and generally enjoyed being (respectful) hiker trash. The rangers at the state park left out ice cold water for us and let us know the bathrooms would be open all night. Sweet!
As the sun set, we all started to migrate to the shelter, which was only about 0.1 miles away from the courtyard area. We spread out among the shelter, field, and trees, and when it was dark, it was lights out.
I think what I really appreciated about this day was being around so many hikers. I truly felt like I was in a hiker bubble with friends and familiar faces. We weren’t a tramily, but we could hike at our own speeds and camp together if we wished.
Finding a group at this later stage in the trail felt different than being among the groups that I had encountered earlier because there was a good probability that we were all going to make it. I mean, we had already come this far. There was very little question of dropping out; these hikers were committed.
I was glad to have this taste of the AT community while I could.
And that’s day 122.
A version of this post originally appeared on TheTrek.co.