My first hike was a warm up hike:

After my first Hike on June 15, I began getting ready for my next hike...

I started reading many Appalachian Trail journals. My favorites are:

http://www.2000milehike.com – Gonzo’s AT Trail Journal

http://www.trailquest.net/BR2002ATjrnl.html - Brawny’s AT Traail Journal

I started going through my motorcycle touring gear and tuning it for hiking. I got interested in alcohol burning stoves. I learned how to make Pepsi-Can stoves.

Pepsi Can Stove Assembly Instructions à http://www.pcthiker.com/pages/gear/pepsiGstoveinstruct.shtml

To prepare for the next hike I started going through all of my gear. My goal was to backpack with as little weight as possible, but to sleep in comfort. I have camped for many years. I have experience camping all year round and I have spent many nights sleeping ( or trying to sleep ) in the rain and slapping bugs. It is not fun to wake up in a rain puddle. And although choosing a tent site will have a great effect on determining whether you wake up in a huge puddle or a stream of water run-off; if it is raining hard, it will only determine how much water you will be sleeping in. If you sleep on the ground you are going to get wet. Sewn in ground cloths and using an extra ground cloth helps but doesn’t completely eliminate the possibility of puddles. I found that air mattresses are heavy and ineffective. You might be up off of the ground, but your sleeping bag will still be hanging over into the water. The only way that I know how to stay out of the water is to have a decent tent with a rain fly and to use a cot. Or try the less popular route of sleeping in a hammock and use a large rain fly. Oh, I forgot to mention that I like free standing dome tents with sewn in floors with mosquito netting. I have slept under tarps without a head net. That will never happen again.

I decided that I’d try my best to keep the weight down, that I'm sleeping in a tent with netting and on a cot. That's it. So then the goal was to figure out how to meet those needs ( really "wants" ) with the least cost in weight. So I selected my smallest of four dome tents ( Eureka Backcountry-1, four pounds ) . There really isn’t any way to make a tent substantially lighter than four pounds except by eliminating the rain fly. Yes, you can shave a small number of ounces by selecting lighter materials, but the big weight item to trim of a tent is that rain fly. I am not willing to do that. I already own several of the same type of cot. Each weighs five pounds. Adding that to the tent creates a substantial amount of pack weight. I started reducing weight by attempting to make my cot lighter. First I drilled a zillion holes in it. That made it way too weak. Then I came up with the idea of moving the hardware over to long tent poles and turning my cot frame into two walking sticks. The thought was to make the weight a dual purpose weight. The experiment worked out pretty well. The walking sticks ( cot frames ) looked ugly and clink, but they kept me from falling on the next hike and it was nice to not have to sleep on the ground. My pack was down to 40 pounds with four days of food and way too much water. That's not down to ultra-light standards, but not too bad when you consider that I had a full tent ( with a fly ), a cot, and more than a gallon of water. Some of my equipment was doubled because it was my first overnight hike in many years and I wanted to be prepared and to be able to evaluate some of the equipment. I could have eliminated a few more pounds without sacrificing comfort. Not too bad at all

Teacher’s Convention Hike 2005 - Delaware Water Gap to Culver Lake

11/10/2005 Thursday - started at the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Center.

John ( my son ) dropped me off at the Delaware Water Gap Recreation Center at 2:05pm. I crossed under Rt. 80 and followed the paved road north. It parallels the east shore of the Delaware River. I didn’t know exactly where to pick up the Appalachian Trail (AT), but I knew it was close by. I’ve been on this road and one of the side trails to the AT a few years ago. I was the youth group leader at my church. Pastor Dan was fixated on hiking the Delaware Water Gap. So on a weekend my dog (Maggie) and I got in the car and drove out there to find a decent trail to lead a few teenagers on. I drove up this same road that I was walking on. I wasn’t pleased ( back then ) with the amount of road noise coming from Rt. 80. So I headed north until I found a parking spot next to a trail and then hiked up the hill inadvertently towards the AT. It was a fun, but a hurried hike. Maggie pulled me up the hill in the summer heat. We zigzagged up the hill at then onto the AT. We went north to Sunfish Pond and there I learned that Maggie LOVED the water. I’ve had dogs that liked the water, but never a dog that LOVED it. She took to the water like an ungainly fish. I was in fear as to how to get her back. We had recently adopted her, and I was afraid that she wouldn’t leave what she so clearly enjoyed. So I walked north along the pond and Maggie followed from about 75 feet off of the shore. Somehow I conned her back by waving a tennis ball and some sort of food. We hiked back to the car following the stream that flowed from Sunfish Pond. It was a semi-marked trail. I had the GPS location of my car programmed into my handheld GPS unit. And the hike down from the summit was steep and fun.

So there I was hiking up the same trail to Sunfish Pond in much colder weather and no dog happily pulling me up the hill, and with 40+ pounds on my back. And I was a few years older. It was windy and pretty cold. The sun was already low in the sky. I was on the same trail that I walked with Maggie on, not the one closer to Rt. 80 that I meant to take. I figured that the AT must be near the summit ( I didn’t know that I was on the AT with Maggie back then ), so I kept plugging along. Just concerned that I was just starting out on my first hiking trip and I was already feeling the effects of hiking.

So I walked all the way to the Blue Dot Trail and backtracked to the Appalachian Trail. That added a little bit to the hike. It was the same path that I’ve walked before, but it was covered with leaves. I was starting out on my first overnight hike, but thinking about the past. Back then it was sunny and warm. Maggie was pulling me up the incline. Today was pretty cold, gray, and windy and no one was pulling me up the hill. The sun was already pretty low in the sky. I started eating beef jerky and some granola bars and was thinking about how much Maggie loved this hike. As I huffed and puffed up the slope I remembered how I was also on this same trail a couple of years ago with some old college friends. It was a nice way to start out on a three day trip.

It was pretty cold. I made it up to the Backpacker camp site and I pealed off some layers of clothing. Physical activity was making me warm in spite of the cold weather. The sun was already starting to set. I hadn't anticipated that. I expected to have a longer day to hike. This was one of my first things to learn on this hike – days are shorter in the Fall. I decided to continue walking to Sunfish Pond. This was where I saw Maggie swim for the first time ( we adopted her when she was eight years old ). So I relived my anxiety of walking along the pond and worrying about her. She paralleled me back then, and returned to me only because I held up a tennis ball. We returned to my parked car by following the drainage trail. So this time I continued walking on the trail past our turn off. It was nice. The sun was definitely setting by the time I reached the rock art at the north end of the lake. I was a bit concerned because camping wasn’t allowed until another three or four miles. There was no way that I was going to turn back to the Backpacker camp site. So I found a beautiful spot a half mile or so from the north end of Sunfish Pond. Clearly against the rules, but it was getting dark quickly. Like I said, my first thing to learn about on this hike.

My camping spot was ideal. Cleared, flat, and it even had logs to sit on in a semi-circle and a huge nail in a tree to hang things from. I was concerned about bears, so I didn’t cook. I hung up my food/cooking gear bag away from my tent site. The wind was pretty gusty and it was close to 32F. I had my tent and cot set up by 5:00pm. So there I was with nothing to do and realizing that sunrise wasn’t for at least twelve hours. That hammered home my first lesson in backpacking. Gotta plan my days so that I could use my sunlight hours more effectively.

The night was very cold and the wind was gusty. Most of the autumn leaves had fallen from the trees so I could hear the wind gusts coming from miles away. The wind blew through my tent like it wasn’t even there. I put on every scrap of clothing that I had and woke up about every hour. Sometimes every half hour. I pulled almost everything out of my pack and piled the remaining items on top of me for insulation and put the lower portion of my sleeping bag inside my pack. With nothing else to do, I started thinking about how to prepare for tomorrow and fell back to sleep.

11/11/2005 Friday - Start about 3/4 mile north of Sunfish Pond

After a restless, windy night; I finally decided to get up at 5:00am. Opened up my tent door to see frost on the ground and said hello to a passing bow-hunter. He only waved. I was going to tell him that the deer were passing in large numbers only 100 feet from where we were. But he didn’t seem to want to talk and I figured that I was saving a few deer by not pushing for conversation. I started to make breakfast, which was really dinner. A chicken and rice mix with vegetable oil added for body fuel. I used the Trangia stove, a large Snow-Peak titanium pot for a wind break, and another smaller pot to cook in. I made hot chocolate in the same pot to start cleaning it out and then washed/rinsed it out. That was lesson number two. If you have to limit cooking utensils and pots to cut down on odors for bears to find, then don’t pack more pots than the bare ( pun intended ) essentials. I picked up my trash and food that I stored in a tree away from the site. Brushed my teeth. Packed up my stuff and found out that I was ready to walk at 8:05am. Way too long for a morning ritual. I learned this years ago when motorcycle touring. The morning routine has got to be made as short as possible. Nothing eats into available hours more than the time it takes to get moving in the morning. As I left the campsite I stepped on one of the logs. It split in half, opening up an ant colony to the elements. The ants barely moved from the cold. I probably consigned that ant colony to death. I don’t know how they will relocate their colony in time for the winter. Maybe they will succeed. I hope so.

As I cooked and cleaned and packed, at least a dozen deer walked along the ridge by my campsite. I could only chuckle at the hunter that must have been still searching for his quarry.

I only hiked a mile or so and met two bears. It was a pleasant meeting, because they heard me coming and ran away ( across the trail ) as I approached. This was a perfectly reasonable arrangement for me. My only other bear encounter ( a year earlier ) involved a much larger bear and the two of us looking at each other first and then coming to the same conclusions. We both trotted in opposite directions.

The rest of this day’s hike was uneventful. I continued to learn how to look for white rectangular blazes. I even went on to the next level and learned to look backward for blazes when none were visible forward. Turning into a real AT hiker! I reached the crest of the ridge at the Worthington State Forest and National Park boundary. Met a bunch of crazy National Audubon Society people that hiked south from the Mohican Center ( up ahead ) to watch for migratory hawks. I had no idea that hawks migrated, and none of us saw any migrating. But the people were friendly to talk to. We could see snow squalls in the distance. As I hiked north some of that snow came down. No accumulations at all. It was a fine chilly day, I had a full belly and it was real pleasant to hike. I passed Lower Yards Creek Reservoir. It’s a pumping reservoir. Water is pumped up during non-peak hours and then the water is released and run through power turbines at peak hours. As I walked along the ridge I could see myself slowly going past it and eventually watched it fade into the distance. As I reached another summit, I noticed that it had a fairly serious brush fire. Looked like only a few months ago. It was recent enough to notice the blackened underbrush everywhere and yet long enough ago to see the fresh blades of grass growing next to scorched ones. The blackened undergrowth had no burnt-smell. So some time must have passed. In this same summit was some rock face on the eastern side. It was nice to walk along there and view the countryside. About a mile further I finally came to the Catfish Fire Tower. I met two crazy teenagers, Dave and George from Mountain Lakes High School. They were avid hikers. Youth is wasted on the young. Both were over packed, But intentionally so. One had a milk crate tied to the top of his backpack, filled with assorted stuff AND a full-sized acoustical guitar ( in it’s hinged hard case! ). They were just getting started for the day. They said they were up all night eating a multiple course dinner. These guys traveled in style! But they looked like a couple of Sherba’s carrying ridiculous gear for tourists up Mt. Everest.

We hiked together for a while. They set a very fast pace. We separated when they swung up to the Mohican Center for water. Although I enjoyed hiking with them, I was thankful to be back on my own. My knees didn't appreciate the fast pace. I kept on hiking for a couple more miles. I went up the trail along the power lines and a little further. I camped just north of the power lines at the south end ( the start ) of a dirt road. Not far from the trail that leads to the boy scout camp Nobebosco. I spent a few summers in that camp. My campsite was once again along the ridge-line. So the wind could pretty much whip through the tent. I made an attempt to cut down the wind by tying a poncho ( with brass eyelets that I added to it’s edges ) over the tent. It resulted in a damp tent from my trapped snores. It wasn’t so damp that I was chilled by the moisture, but it was more moist than it should have been. I put on most of the clothes that I had and slept with my feet in my backpack. I still had a difficult time sleeping. I woke up every hour or less. By about four in the morning I decided the heck with the bears. I was cold and hungry. I made a couple of portions of oatmeal and a hot chocolate. I cleaned up and put out the fire and then passed out for an hour and a half. That was the longest spell that I slept for the night. The hike that next day was fine. But the previous two nights were pretty rough.

11/12/2005 Saturday – I started at south end of dirt road. Refer to page 201 NY-NJ book mile mark 2.3 in north-bound direction. Since I slept right on the AT on an old dirt road it was easy to find the trail in the morning. I packed everything up pretty quickly and set out. Right away I could see why the road existed. This was all personal property bought up by the government for the Delaware Water Gap dam project that never happened. I could see all of the foundation holes where houses must have been. Although it was wonderful to hike without civilization, it was sad to look at what was once a vacation community. People’s dreams destroyed by a government project that never was.

I met some day hikers. A few people walking their dogs. Everyone was friendly. I walked by a water source that I was counting on. A hand pump attached to the top of a pipe running deep into the ground. But the handle was removed for the winter. So I continued to hike, but concerned about my limited amount of water. A few hours later I met up with a group of male backpackers near a swamp. They had stopped for a cold lunch. Me, I decided a hot meal was in order. So I boiled some swamp water ( with tiny things swimming in it ) and added a noodle-mix dinner. They filtered some drinking water for me. They left me while I was eating. I tried to catch up to them but I didn’t succeed.

I had fun climbing an escarpment. The trailbook said that there was one coming up. When I walked up to it, I said something like “You’ve got to be $#@%%@#$ me…” Nope, I had to climb the thing. It was fun. It was more fun to see that the white blazes from the opposite direction led right to the face of the escarpment and you could look down at the white blazes. No doubt about where to go when hiking SOBO. I made it up it pretty quickly, and I hoped that that would have helped me catch up with the guys that I met earlier, but no luck.

As I approached the Brink Road Shelter it was starting to get darker out. I was thinking about either staying at the shelter or getting off of the trail. Two hikers “Seashell” and “Fuzzy” were slowly overtaking me near there. They had a car parked up ahead at Culver Lake and were eager to get to it. Fuzzy had a small day pack on. Seashell was just hiking. Both were experienced and wanted to complete this section hike and get back to some hiking friends that met up somewhere. They all knew each other from some website forum. Seashell was the first AT Section-hiker that I had met. She had done large sections of the AT. So I tagged along with them. They set a pretty brisk pace. I kept up, which they remarked that I was doing well considering that I had a bunch of weight on my back. It started getting dark. They seemed unconcerned about it. Seashell had a knack for keeping on the trail so she led us on.

As we hiked in the dark, we reached a summit and looked down on Culver Lake, Hampton, and Newton NJ. While following the trail in the dark we could see the lights of Newton clearly. It was beautiful! A crystal clear night. A bit brisk, but real nice. I had just started working as a teacher in Newton High School. My previous years I worked in urban school districts near my home. So this was a novelty to be in the woods and to be able to look down into the community that I was teaching in. I pulled out a huge chocolate bar and shared it with them. That made them happy and pulled a half a pound out of my backpack. It was a real pleasure hiking with them in the moonlight. Seashell used her headlamp when the AT trail blazes were hard to see. Fuzzy used his headlamp on rare occasions. I used my “Energizer” headlamp and used the option of the two red leds. It worked beautifully. It shined a red light in the dark that didn’t affect my night vision. So we hiked the last four miles in the dark. "Sea-Shell" continued to set a fairly brisk pace.

I had a little trouble keeping up while hiking down the ridge to Rt. 206 at Culver Lake. I slid a couple of times. We found their SUV and they gave me a ride down to Hampton, NJ. From there I called home for John to give me a ride home. I waited in a local KFC for him. I met one of my students while I was there. Which was pretty cool. It's amazing how fast the body reacts to stopping. Up in Culver Lake, I felt like I could have kept on hiking. But after that car ride, my body was in pure rebellion to any form of movement.

11/13/2005 Sunday - a zero day: My calf muscles were real sore from hiking ( duh! ). I had no problems with going to work on Monday.

After my hike described above I found directions to make a "Penny Stove." http://www.csun.edu/~mjurey/penny.html I built one. In some ways it works much better than the Pepsi-Can stove. It is certainly much easier to make, but it takes eight minutes to warm up and get going. It burns for about 22 minutes. If you want to heat up something quickly, then the Pepsi-Can stove is the way to go.

I started thinking about my next hike. To pick up where I left off at Culver Lake and head north towards the Bear Mountain Bridge.