Vernon, NJ

I tried to update info while we were in MD for Dan's niece's wedding over the Memorial Day weekend but the computer I was using kept freezing on me when I tried to upload pictures. This computer isn't allowing me to upload pictures either. Hopefully I will get to a computer in the next town we stop to get pictures up!

We had our first zero days while we were in MD for the wedding-4 days! We had a wonderful time with family-3 of our 4 were there, Dan's whole family and most of my family live in the area. So it was a great time to be with them all. The wedding was beautiful and reception was lots of fun. But we were so busy going to bed between midnight and 2 am and getting up between 6 and 8 am so we didn't get much sleep. When we went back on the trail I had a terrible headache, it was hot and humid and I was exhausted. So our first to days back on the trail were very difficult but we got through it.

We hiked over 800 miles now! Our feet still hurt. We've made our way through WV, MD, PA, and will be crossing the NJ state line today! MD has only 40 miles on the AT and there is a challenge that some hikers take up but not us! The challenge is to hike all the way through MD in one day without sleeping in that state! WV has on 18 miles, PA 230 miles, and NJ 72 miles on the AT. Another AT challenge is the 1/2 gallon ice cream challenge at the 1/2 way point on the trail in PA. It began with just seeing if hikers could eat a 1/2 gallon ice cream in one sitting. Somehow it turned into a challenge to see who could eat it the quickest. So some hikers would let their ice cream melt so they could drink it. That doesn't sound appealing to me-I would prefer to eat it and enjoy it! I don't think that we'll be able to eat a whole 1/2 gallon each. At our half way point (think somewhere in VT) we'll start with shaing a 1/2 gallon and go from there.

Before getting off the trail for the wedding, we did our first slack packing day. We had set up a day for Dan's brother to pick us up in Port Clinton, PA. We were going to get there 2 days early than the pick up date so we starting doing shorter miles. We ran into a section hiker who told us to do some slack packing and he gave us a name and phone number of a person who could shuttle us. It worked out so well. We got to Port Clinton and left our big packs with another hiker staying there for some zeros. We were shuttled up 15 miles and we slack packed back to Port Clinton for that day that we were early. Worked out perfectly and it was nice to not have a big pack on our backs but it didn't seem to be any different on our feet. When we got back on the trail after our zeros, we got back on where we started our slack pack day.

When we got back on the trail, we had to start dealing with the heat and the humidity. Also there's been a lot more bugs and biting insects! I'm being eaten alive! We have the full strength deet but it doesn't seem to be working for me-they eat right through it anyway and they even bite through my clothes! This week there's been a slew of caterpillars! They're everywhere-hanging down from the trees in front of our faces, crawling on our packs and us, all over the trail, shelters and picnic tables and are very annoying. Luckily they're life span is short and we won't have to deal with them too long.

Our next pick up will be:
Dan and Debbie McMonigle
c/o General Delivery
Kent, CT 06757
Please hold for AT hiker
est. date of arrival: June 10

Thanks for all your prayers and support!