Time flies out here on the trail. Sometimes I just wish the miles would fly a little faster. We have completed New Jersey and are about 30 miles into New York. This past week has been a week of extremes, with massive heat waves, thunderstorms with torrents of rain, and some amazing trail magic.

Hello New Jersey!

The trail followed right along the edge of Sunfish Pond, apparently a unique habitat due to the acidity of the water. A sign nearby said only a few species like sunfish and yellow perch can survive. Also, don’t swim in it.

High Point State Park (the highest point in New Jersey at about 1700 feet). The views were beautiful, but we enjoyed them a few minutes to long. Just after this we were caught in a huge downpour about a half mile from the shelter we camped at that night.

Lower parts of New Jersey offered lots of planks and boardwalks over marshy soil.

A much longer, more official boardwalk through a wetlands.

We also passed through farmland, with the trail following stone “walls” in the trees at the edge of the fields.

Sometimes the walls and trail were indistinguishable.

New Jersey eased up on the rocks compared to PA, and overall was a nice state to hike through. The weather was our biggest challenge, but with so many towns close by we found that it was easy to find places to cool off from the afternoon heat, or dry out from the latest thunderstorm. We sat by a lake behind a tavern to cool off in Branchville. Inside a pizzeria in Unionville to beat the afternoon heat. Ate homemade ice cream at a farm stand right on the trail outside Vernon, and again the next day at the creamery in Bellvale. After the creamery we caught a ride in and camped at the Warwick Drive-In where they allow hikers to camp and watch movies for free. The day we camped at the Drive-In we started the New York proper section of the trail although the New Jersey section has followed the state line for miles.

Welcome to New York!

I’ve started thinking of these nice flat stretches of rock as nature’s sidewalks. New York has quite a few of them.

Prospect Rock, highest point on the AT in New York. Only a little more than 1400 feet in elevation.

Just past Prospect Rock we got our first glimpse of New York City skyline on the horizon (it’s tiny, I’m not sure if it’s even visible when the photo is at web resolution). Greenwood Lake was just below us.

Across from the Drive-In in Warwick there was a great farm store with a beer garden and cidery. The staff was great and whole place was super hiker friendly. Their ciders were tasty too!

When the trail guide said “ladder,” we didn’t really know what to expect. Rebar ladder up a rock face it is.

More sidewalks through the treetops.

We’ve seen several of these giant caterpillar things. I’ve never seen one like this before, but they were about 4” long and probably 1/2” diameter.

We have also seen lots of strange and brilliantly colored mushrooms and fungus. A shuttle driver told us the climate has been almost tropical the last few years, and with the humidity it sure seems that way.

The trail goes up stairs right next to Fitzgerald Falls. So far New York loves its stone steps.

Another short vertical scramble. The terrain doesn’t have huge vertical climbs, but there have been tons of short fun scrambles to keep us on our toes. They aren’t too hard, but they definitely slow you down.

Sunset at the Warwick Drive-In. AT hikers can camp and watch movies for free on portable radios provided by the theater. It was a big crowd the night we were there.

So far New York has had just as many close by towns, but much more intense terrain. The country is rugged and beautiful with quite a few rock scrambles. Yesterday went fairly smoothly, but the day before we pushed through a section at the end of the day that we later noted on a sign was called “Agony Grind” with intense steep ups and downs for a couple miles ending with a 1000ft steep descent to the road. At the end of the day, the last mile is always the longest.

Sunset on a ledge just before the Agony Grind stretch of trail.

More sidewalks through the mountaintop meadows.

Another slightly more vertical rock scramble.

They call this one the Lemon Squeezer, half way through I had to take my pack off and lift it up onto the ledge above me and then climb up after it. All these obstacles definitely keep it interesting.

Helpful signage along the way. There are many trails in this area.

These sidewalks have views for days.

Great views of the sunset at this campsite on Bear Mountain.

We walked through a zoo on the trail today leaving Bear Mountain, New York. It was tiny, but this butterfly garden was very active. There have been many butterflies on the trail as well.

Tonight we are camped a few miles past Bear Mountain, NY. We’ve slowed our mileage a little bit, but hopefully can manage to maintain a good pace as we prepare for the bigger mountains in the north.

We are resting is East Stroudsburg tonight after making the trek to Delaware Water Gap yesterday and deciding to take a “zero” here to rest our feet. The good news is, we have essentially completed Pennsylvania! We are a .3 mile town-walk from the New Jersey border, and boy does it feel good to have another state (and a big one, at 229.3 miles) completed.

We passed an amateur astronomer observatory site, it looked pretty professional to us!

A rocky ledge called The Pinnacle, we saw our first (and so far only) Copperhead here.

Copperhead nestled in the rocks. Thankfully in a spot where we could easily keep our distance.

Some rocky sections of the trail have been really fun, mostly when the rocks are big enough to scramble over and you need to use your hands. The ones that aren’t so fun are the little rocks close together. The foot jabby, stabby steps rocks.

The climb up to one of the ridges, I think this one was to Knife’s Edge, a beautiful exposed section of angled rock sitting right along the narrow ridge-line.

On the Knife’s Edge, the trail goes right on top.

Part of the Knife’s Edge. These rocks were fun!

Lehigh Gap is one of the most talked about sections of Pennsylvania. The climb is steep and includes some fun vertical scrambles. I was a little nervous going in, but they all turned out to be pretty easy. It was a fairly steep climb, gaining about 1000 feet in elevation in just under a mile, but most of it was working your way across boulder scrambles with short vertical stretches mixed in.

One of the short vertical climbs in Lehigh Gap.

The view southeast from about halfway up Lehigh Gap.

The last vertical scramble up Lehigh Gap, I’m hiding in the shade in the upper right corner.

After climbing up the north side of Lehigh Gap, this view to the West was beautiful. Due to nearly 100 years of zinc mining the forest on this ridge is less than 30 years old. We ran into several local hikers that said even 10-15 years ago it looked like a wasteland along this section of the trail.

Boulder scramble on Lehigh Gap.

View from Blue Mountain Ridge over a plant in Palmerton, PA, now a superfund site, due to extensive heavy metal mining for nearly 100 years. The wild is definitely taking back over on the mountain top.

After Lehigh Gap there was a stretch of over a mile of walking on soft dirt and grass. It was delightful!

And then we returned to more typical PA terrain.

One of the challenges with reaching out mileage goals has been coordinating our distances with places to camp. From Leroy Smith Shelter here, we chose to do about a 14 mile day to a beautiful campsite just past Kirkridge Shelter. Luckily we had a few extra camping options here, but some days the only options are right near the shelters, either too close together, or many miles apart.

Our campsite near Kirkridge Shelter the night before descending into Delaware Water Gap. A beautiful clifftop meadow overlooking a valley to the southeast. Several other hikers camp there too, including a Ridge Runner (AT Park Ranger) who hiked in with two small watermelons to share with everyone!

The view in the morning.

The descent into Delaware Water Gap was steep and rocky, but more of the fun rocks, less of the foot-stabby kind.

Once a central gathering place in the early 20th century, the Castle Inn is now home to a handful of shops and an ice cream parlor, with much of its old world charm carefully restored.

I’m sure the terrain won’t magically change at the state line, but we should start to see a shift away from the rocks that Pennsylvania is so famous for. We are looking forward to the 70+ miles in New Jersey, which is said to be extremely beautiful and surprisingly wild given it’s close proximity to major cities.

Everyone says Pennsylvania has a lot of rocks, and it does. Then once you start Pennsylvania people say, “oh the rocks aren’t bad until you pass Duncannon.” And then once you pass Duncannon people say, “Oh it gets bad for the last 100 miles.” And then, “the last 50 miles or so are the worst.” Well, we are starting to see what they mean. Pennsylvania is rocks for days, big and small. If it isn’t a boulder-field, it’s a trail so rocky you have to choose every step carefully, mixed with stretches of gloopy mud (with rocks hidden in it) that you have to pick your way through and around. So far we are rising to the challenge!

Our first day out of Duncannon we did our longest day yet, just over 16 trail miles. The first four miles were rough, with a noisy road walk, steep incline, and then rocky challenge, but after that it leveled out to follow a (rocky) ridgeline for miles on relatively smooth ground. It felt great to push out some bigger miles, but by the end of the day our feet were totally beat. We collapsed in our tent and got ready to do it all again the next day. The next day happened to be July 4th, and just a few miles into our hike we came across our first real trail magic at a road crossing. As we crossed into the parking lot of a trailhead three local hikers had a huge breakfast spread waiting for any AT hikers that crossed their path! There were sous vide eggs, hot coffee, fresh fruit, roasted potatoes, muffins, and loads of snacks. They had set up an awning and chairs, and even had a few powerbanks if you wanted to charge your phone. It was delicious, incredibly thoughtful, and really fun to sit and chat with a few locals about the area and their hiking experiences.

Our breakfast trailmagic makers! It was amazing! And then over the holiday weekend we experienced two more groups offering awesome trail magic as well! It really lifts the spirits and hikers always love free food!

Our campsite after a long day. Our tent feels like a little haven.

A lovely swimming hole we ate lunch at, an old reservoir in a creek, complete with a rope swing!

It was so, so, so cold. And very refreshing!

More recently we’ve started dealing with a bit more rain. We’ve only been caught out in it a couple times, but it definitely can make things more complicated. Thankfully we have had either a planned town stop or an excellent shelter for the night each time the rain has been bad, so we have been able to dry out and clean up a bit.

We had just decided to head into town for laundry day, when this happened.

We hid under a trailhead awning while we waited for our Lyft driver to come pick us up. He was not exactly thrilled to pick us up at a trailhead in the middle of nowhere in a downpour, but warmed up when we told him about our adventures! Plus we made sure to tip well, it was a pretty remote place for a Lyft!

It was already a bit muddy, but after the last few days of rain, it became a choice of sharp rocks, or very muddy shoes.

No matter how carefully you pick your steps, your feet will be sore by the end of the day.

There haven’t been a ton of views in this stretch of PA, but when they do appear, they are great. Notice, we are still standing on rocks…

Week two has been a blast. Exhausting, difficult at times, bug and rock ridden, but also fun and satisfying. They say that Pennsylvania is ‘Rocksylvania’, and while there have been loads of rocks on the trail it doesn’t seem like it has been that much worse than Maryland. Unfortunately, my card reader for my camera seems to have decided it is occasionally incompatible with my phone, so the attached pictures are from both Brian’s cell phone, and my camera.

The ‘backdoor’ of our B&B in Waynesboro was just as charming as the whole experience.

A well maintained path through the mud.

One of our campsites at a shelter. This one was lovely with a great spring about 50 yards away.

The first few shelters we stopped in were terrific. Nicely maintained with lots of care and springs close by. From Waynesboro we started working on increasing our mileage a little bit, but also trying not to do too much too fast. With that in mind we took our first ‘zero’ on Sunday (a day of zero trail miles). We’ve also started seeing a few repeat hikers along the way, so while we aren’t fast enough yet to really keep up with hikers who started in Georgia, it’s been fun to see familiar faces and leapfrog them over the course of a few days.

A hiker named Jolly likes to leave little surprises along the trail.

We’ve now passed the official midpoint of the Appalachian Trail…less significant since we are only aiming to do a little over half, but still a neat milestone. This sign was from a few years ago, we couldn’t actually find the one for this year (the trail changes slightly each year for various reasons).

Hikers on the AT hear for miles of the half gallon ice cream challenge at Pine Grove Furnace. We didn’t try it ourselves having just started the trail, but we did witness one hiker down his half gallon, and then proceed to eat some peanut butter and a few granola bars. He said he never feels full anymore.

We were a little curious what was meant by ‘rock maze’ but it was great when we found out.

The maze went over the rocks as well as around! So much fun!

Don’t get turned around in here!

In the Cumberland Valley woods divide many crop fields and the trail is nestled in the trees almost entirely hidden from view at times. On this one it was a little more exposed, a dirt line next on the edge of a corn field.

Within 15 minutes of crossing this stile those beautiful clouds broke and let loose a downpour. We were soaked within 5 minutes.

Looking out from Hawk’s Rock over Duncannon and the surrounding valley.

Brian checking out the view at Hawk’s Rock.

Downtown Duncannon, one of several towns that the trail goes right through the middle of. We are staying at The Doyle Hotel tonight, the brick four-story building in the photo.

Today we hiked a meager 4 miles into Duncannon, PA, where we spent the afternoon at the Doyle Hotel watching the Woman’s World Cup match. We decided to stay the night since the Doyle, a hundred-plus year old establishment, offers rooms for extremely cheap rates. Its age shows, but the proprietors were fun to chat with and it has a sort of dive-bar charm that makes it such a landmark on the trail.

Traveling to the trail included being up for about 36 hours without much more than a cat nap on the plane, so we decided to sleep in Harpers Ferry on Tuesday, our first night, after gathering the last few pieces of gear we needed in town. We walked around Harpers Ferry and checked out a few historic sites before having a delicious dinner at The Rabbit Hole, on their deck looking out over the Potomac River and the lower portion of town. We also stopped in at the Appalachian Trail Conservancy to register for our hike and check out some of their trail info. We were the 318th & 319th section hikers to register this year (we are section hikers since we are doing half the trail, not the whole thing), and the thru hikers (who had started in Georgia) were numbering around 800 who had already made it to Harpers Ferry so far this season.

Harpers Ferry is beautiful and rugged, built at the junction of two rivers on a steep hill.

ATC oversees the trail and organizes a voluntary registry to track trail usage.

Hiker tags by year at the ATC.

Just behind the historic Storer College, the AT quietly passes by almost entirely out of site.

The trail heads straight into the historic downtown of Harpers Ferry.

A church that was used as a hospital during the Civil War in Harpers Ferry.

The bridge crossing the Potomac out of Harpers Ferry leaves West Virginia and enters Maryland.

The view from Weaverton Cliffs looking back toward Harpers Ferry.

Our campsite on night one of the trail at Crampton Gap Shelter. Maryland is very particular about where hikers camp, but the areas that they do designate are pretty dang nice.

Taking a short break on White Rock Cliff. The ridge in the distance is the section of the Appalachian Trail we have already traveled along.

We have seen loads of butterflies as we walk. Tons of different colors and sizes.

Dahlgren Backpacker Campground outside of Boonsboro, MD. Yay for places with showers!

A helpful sign at a fork in the road.

So when a Ridge Runner (sort of an AT park ranger) walks up to you and starts the conversation with the words, “I don’t want to alarm you, but…” you know it can’t be good. In this case, we were sitting on a rock that was the roof to a copperhead den, right by our feet. Needless to say, we found different rocks to sit on. The Runner told us he had already caught 5 or 6 of the snakes, but knew there was at least one or two more lurking under the stones. Yikes.

Views looking southwest from Annapolis Rocks.

Views from Annapolis Rocks looking Northwest.

Fern forests are one of my favorites so far.

Can you see the trail through here?

Crossing the Mason Dixon line and entering Pennsylvania. One state down!

At shelters and other significant points on the trail there is a log book to sign. It’s fun to see some of the trailnames of people we have crossed paths with and see what they wrote and when they were there.

So far we’ve hiked 41.6 trail miles, and 68.16 miles (approximate based on Fitbit) when including hiking into water sources, campsites, towns, or viewpoints. We’ve been on the trail for five days and have completed the state of Maryland. Best things about the trail so far? Fern forests, crazy cliff views, and seeing fireflies almost every night.

Our Bed & Breakfast in Waynesboro, PA., where we are currently about to sleep. More to come!

To make sure their blog works, of course!

I’m about to trade my usual summer shoes for something a little sturdier…

Well, it’s official. Brian and I fly out tonight for our adventure. Once we arrive on the east coast, we will start hiking north from Harper’s Ferry, West Virginia, towards Mt Katahdin, Maine - 1166 miles. I’m so excited and a little nervous!

Obligatory, if messy gear shot. Looks like a lot, but only weighs about 17lbs each, even including a bit of food!

It has been an incredibly busy spring, so I didn’t get this blog set up until last minute, or even really share much about the trip plans. I will do my best to post whenever we get to town. Expect a lot of photos, and a few thoughts about the journey!

Here’s to adventure!

Carly