Day 111
Start: Eckville Shelter
End: Tentsite Near Ashfield Rd
Miles Hiked: 19.9
Miles on AT: 1255.3
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The morning was cool and humid when I woke up. After breaking down my tent and getting my things in my pack, I headed back across the street to have breakfast with the other hikers.
When I hit the trail, my shirt was immediately drenched. I hadn’t even started the climb yet, but sweat was dripping down my neck and my shirt was already darker than it was when I started. Humidity is no joke!
By the time I reached the top, it looked like I had been caught in a rainstorm. When people say that being on the AT means being damp for about 6 months straight, they’re right! I could barely see out of my fogged up glasses.
Despite my discomfort, the trail at the top was nice and cruisey. It was a bit cooler today because rain was in the forecast. The caretaker at the shelter had said that it was supposed to rain all day today, but I was lucky that no rain fell during the morning.
By lunch, I was famished! Luckily for me, a hostel called The Lookout Hostel was coming up and offered some snacks and drinks for thru hikers to buy. When I got there, Stretch was standing in the living room; what a surprise!
After catching up, I bought a soda and sat out on the picnic table outside to eat my lunch. The hostel had a beautiful view of the valley below and the owners and their 2 daughters were so nice and welcoming.
After a while, more hikers showed up, so I went inside to socialize for a bit before heading back on trail. The sky looked a little ominous; there were rock scrambles that I wanted to get over before the rain started.
The first rock scramble was called Knife’s Edge and, honestly, it was more of a dull blade than a knife. Large rocks jutted out from the ground at a sharp almost 45 degree angle. There wasn’t much exposure, but it was fun to hop around the rocks and navigate the formation while taking in the view below.
I had a few miles to go until Bake Oven Knob, another short rock scramble, but right as I got to the parking lot before the knob, the sky started to rumble. Uh oh, this didn’t sound too good. I put on my pack cover and tried to get up and over it as quickly as possible before the sky broke open, but I was a few minutes too late.
Just as I started going down, huge rain drops splattered on the rocks around me. Lighting light up the dull gray sky and thunder crashed. This wasn’t going to be a light rain. Since I knew that a rain jacket would do nothing in this type of downpour, I just kept moving down the now-slick boulders, hoping to make it to flat trail as quickly as possible.
Before I knew it, I was soaked through. This was no small shower! I could hardly see through my water-covered glasses and it didn’t help that the blazes were set far apart. I had to stop every few steps to look around and figure out where the trail might go.
I heard a voice behind me and when I turned, I saw Stretch again. He was also having a hard time finding the right path, so we communicated with hand signals since the rain was so loud. Eventually we made it to the bottom, all in one piece. I looked almost like I had this morning, but instead of sweat, I was drenched in water. At least I got a shower today!
Stretch and I had the same idea to camp near the next water cache, so we kept moving. Unfortunately, we had nearly 3 more miles of wet, slippery Pennsylvania rocks to navigate. And let me tell you, it wasn’t fun. My feet were wet and sliding in my shoes, the rocks hurt my feet, and I still had to concentrate hard on stepping in just the right place.
When I arrived at the water cache and campsite, I was so relieved! I immediately changed into my dry clothes to get a little bit more comfortable and hung the wet ones up (even though they would still be wet the next morning.)
A little while later, Stretch showed up, and a little while after that, the other two hikers, Mikes and Skittles, from the last shelter showed up, too. We had a full house! Because of our long day, darkness soon came and we all crawled into our tents, still damp, but drier than before.
And that’s day 111.
A version of this post originally appeared on TheTrek.co.