Summer Break

Well, I reached the 1000 mile mark and the mental halfway point of Harpers Ferry, West Virginia the other day and have decided to take a week long "vacation" from my normal walking. After 2 nights in Washington DC, I now find myself in Red Bank, NJ and will work my way north in slightly faster modes of transportation than my two feet. With any luck, I'll be in the big apple tomorrow by noon and on to Boston for the evening, then maybe up to Maine sometime this weekend before heading all the way back down to Harpers on Monday. If anyone in those locations is available, I'd love to meet up and hang out if schedules permit.

Hope you've all survived the heat....

Apocalypse

More photos

Here's a fellow thruhiker we met near Roan Mountain. His trailname was Greg.

This is the infamous Jesus box, which was full of Cokes and Little Debbies Oatmeal Creme Pies. It may have been the highlight of the trip.

Here are some Wild Ponies.

Here's Apoc on top of the ridge just before the descent into Pearisburg, VA. Notice the beard growth.

Photo update

Here are a couple of photos thus far. Rusty is sans camera at the moment, so hopefully he doesn't see anything cool.

Here's us at Amicalola Falls State Park. Notice how clean we are.

Here's us on top of Springer Mountain - the southern terminus of the trail. We have hiked 8.5 miles since the last photo, none of which count toward the 2,175 of the trail. It's hard to see from this photo, but our beards are starting to come in.

Here's Rusty on the beautiful concrete spacecraft at the summit of Clingman's Dome, in the Great Smoky Mountains. The tower is renowned for the spectacular views it allows, but all we saw were clouds. We had a snack at the top.

Here's Rusty in Hot Springs, NC. We saw an Old Town Canoe and he insisted on a photo opportunity. He's a real diva.

Haze For Dayz

Hot and hazy down here in the south, who would have guessed? Its basically been the same weather report for all 6 weeks of the trip (Low 90's, chance of thundershowers in the afternoon). As you've probably heard, Tyler is at home recovering from tendinitis of the ankle, and I've been pressing on through the endless state of Virginia.

The trail in Virginia is around 550 miles, over a quarter of the entire trail. I just finished a stint of hiking nearby the Blue Ridge Parkway and am headed into the Shenandoah National Park tomorrow after a much needed rest/eating day today. For those of you who don't know, completing a thru-hike is as much about hiking as it is about eating. In town, all you can eat buffets (I ate 5 plates of food yesterday at the chinese place), donuts (breakfast this morning included 4 for me at 320 calories a piece), and ice cream (at the half way mark, a thru-hiker is expected to consume a half gallon of ice cream). The other day, I counted calories just for fun and the grand total was 6350 in one day. On average though, I probably get somewhere between 4-6000 daily. In other news, I think I am the only hiker in the history of the trail to not loose weight, so it looks like I'm doing my job right!

Hope you all are doing well, and can't wait to see everyone when I/we get up to those parts.

Apocalypse (Rusty)

The latest

To quash the rumors: Tyler is in recovery mode in Maine, dealing with ankle tendinitis. Thus far recovery have been pretty smooth - hopefully starting physio early next week...and back to the trail ASAP.

Rusty is pressing on valiantly through the seemingly endless stretch of Virginia trail (500 miles!). He hopes to arrive in Montebello, VA on Saturday.

UPDATE:

Racehorse has incurred an injury. Hopefully will not go the way of Barbaro...

Virginia

Hello! Sorry we haven't updated this in a while. We are in Pearisburg, VA. Things have been going pretty darn well, though we're taking a break here in town for a bit. We have been moving pretty fast since Hot Springs, NC...and now our legs are feeling it. Damascus was a great stop - I had new shoes AND whoopie pies in the mail and we enjoyed ourselves at the grocery store. As always, food is the thing that occupies our thoughts the most - whether it be counting how many calories we can eat or dreaming up new delicious concoctions for when we return to the civilized life. Yesterday Rusty said something like: "With any luck this trip will make us so sick of Little Debbies, Pop Tarts and Snickers bars that we'll never want to eat one again..either that or we won't be able to live without them and will be eating Oatmeal Creme Pies for the rest of our lives." Ayuh...

Our Fourth of July was pretty fun as well - we hiked all morning, stopped at a restaurant for lunch (In Rural Retreat, VA) and then proceded to travel the next three or so hours (in the heat of the day) at an EXTREMELY SLOW PACE due to the oppressive heat and the fact that we'd eaten far too much. That night we camped in what we assumed was an empty cow pasture, which, unbenowst to us, contained actual cows...and lots of them. They were a bit perturbed to see us sitting there, and we were a bit surprised to see 25 cows staring at us. Then, at about 11:30 pm, a nearby group of rowdy Virginians began setting off fireworks, just over the next hilltop. I though forsure that we were going to get blown to smithereens, but we awoke the next morning unscathed...

Cheers,
Racehorse, and Apoc