Writing a story with out an ending is a dick move to do. So a year after the fact, I will attempt to recollect my thoughts on the trail from my last post in Salisbury, CT until I stopped hiking (which wasn’t much longer). I believe it was still Mosey, Patchfoot and myself hiking out of Salisbury. We had all made it there in our own ways, mine a stupid 10mile road walk. After getting supplies and lingering we headed up the mountain to the first shelter. There we met a kindly man who had just started southbound and was sleeping when we arrived. He carried news from Pemmy and JJ who had taken up hiking a head of us so that we could catch them while reaccumulating to doing some miles. For at the time we were becoming quite the serious hikers. The plan was for the next day to run into them.

We finished CT, chilling on the border with Harvest and Scout while observing a rushing torrent of water that marked the divide between CT and MA. After that it was time to push on into the cloudy with intermitent weather rain. After a solid day of hiking I was greated with the famed monkey call from Machete at a shelter that was around 12 miles past the one I started the day at. A great reunion this was. All need be done was to wait for George to catch up. Plans were instantly in the brew to a possible hike into town for some drinks for the night to celebrate our long awaited reunion. Upon coming to the road which seemed to be the route and an internet call to Karl back home we believed the route and distance was in had. An hour later it became apparent that during this miscommunication I had botched the direction on the road and we were much further away from when we started. With everyone short on the situation we turned around, tails tucked between our legs, and walked back on the road. Blue and yellow blazing can work, but the trail is the tried and true, you know where it is going. Then the worst thing that could happen did. Pemmy, with her notorious ankle, stepped on a bad patch of road and yes rolled it once again. So much for our hiker reunion. Thumbing up for whatever cars we got a ride up to the trailhead where we decided to make camp and see what the morning was like. Morning comes, ankle still raped so the plan to head to town that night, was transfered to this day to see what kind of healing could be done. Picking up some hitches we landed at a hotel in Great Barrington, MA. This became home for 3 days as Pemmy healed, we drank, and watched the olympics. This, rather somber time in Great Barrington, would be the end of the hike. Enthusiasm dwindled, attitudes changed, bank accounts checked, it was decided that the time had come to go our way. Quite a moment of melancholly.

The rambling was not done though. A ride up to the next trail town was in order. A look at the hostel, a little Tropic Thunder at the theater, a farewell to our compatriot Mosey, and one last feel of hikerdom. JJ headed into the hospital the following day, getting an x-ray for his stress fracture and some crutches. Now what… to New York of course. Pemmy was the closest since all we had was Athens and Patch and myself had never been. Free place to stay on long island, why not right. Just gotta figure out how to get there. Trains were kind of expensive unless we could get further south. Well after two hitches we ended up back in Great Barrington, trust me there was plenty of joking about going back and watching more olympics.

After a relativly effortless 20min of waiting a nice Mexican dude in a suburban pulled over. He didn’t speak English very well and I don’t think of the four of us, we knew any foreign languages but we found he was going to Queens. So he did just that and gave us a four hour hitch into Queens, the heart of it all. It was quite shocking and lucky. We didn’t communicate much, just sat back and listened to his funky techno music. So he drops us off in Queens and Pemmy takes over on the transit, we hop a train and make it into Bluepoint Long Island a bit after midnight greeted by her father.

The following days were a mix of hanging in Long Island, hanging out in Manhattan, and just relaxing at Pemmy’s. George was off to Baltimore to see Bob after a couple days. I headed up to Vermont on Amtrak after a week or so, and JJ stayed with Pemmy on their own adventure. We had all gone our seperate ways not to reunite for a while in Athens.

Even Mosey came for Halloween.

That was the end of the trail for myself at the momment. I’ve got 1200 miles on my belt, Patch has like 1600, Pemmy and JJ headed back out this year, finishing the skipped VA leg and then heading onto Northern VT but then got off due to impending lifes challenges.

Conclusion: The Applachian Trail is amazing. I will be out there again one day. Don’t regret a thing about doing it. Support anyone in wanting to do it. Willing to share anything I know and give any advice I can. GAME 08/?? Much love for the AT.