May 25: It was another warm day, but not as hot as I expected and definitely not as humid as it had been earlier, and the trail was relatively flat and easy.
Early in the morning, we passed Caledonia State Park which included a snack bar, but we were too early and it was still closed for the day. We—and when I say we, I refer to Heavyweight who also wanted a cold drink. Superman blew past us not stopping. But Heavyweight and I were pretty sad about the snack bar not being open. =( Come on! It’s Memorial Day weekend! I guess people (other than us) sleep in past 8:00 in the morning, though, because the park was nearly completely deserted.
At the Birch Run Shelter, I caught up with Superman and Peter Pan where we spent an inexcusable amount of time torturing each other with games and riddles to solve.
Superman gave us this one: If you have two ropes that burn for exactly one hour but the burn rate isn’t uniform throughout the ropes, how can you use them to measure out 15 minutes. So, for example, the rope might be a foot long and if you light the end of it, you only know it’ll take one hour to burn. It might burn 99% of the rope in the first minute and take 59 minutes to burn the last 1%, though. It doesn’t necessarily burn at a steady or even rate—you just know that it takes an hour to burn the whole thing. And you have two of them (which don’t necessarily burn at the same rates either—just that they each take exactly 1 hour to burn). So, how do you measure out 15 minutes?
The thing I liked about these puzzles here was that none of us got a cell phone signal where you could just Google an answer. =) I pondered it for a moment and eventually we continued on without my getting an answer. I didn’t want an answer just yet, though. I wanted time to think about while hiking the down the trail and after about 5 or 10 minutes of hiking, I did figure it out. (I won’t post an answer, and I’ll delete any answers that any of you guys might post to the comments! Let someone Google it if they can’t figure it out and want an answer!)
The big puzzle I provided was that if you had 8 spheres that were absolutely identical except that one had a slightly different density than the others, either lighter or heavier—you don’t know that and have to figure it out. And you have a balance that can be used only three times before it breaks. How do you use the balance to figure out which of the spheres is a bit off from the rest, and whether it’s heavier or lighter than the rest? (I will say, I find it helpful to sketch diagrams of what you’re doing in this case because it’s a hard one just to figure out and keep track of that many balls in just your head. They actually pulled out 7 pennies and a dime to simulate puzzle on the picnic table!)
The big news for the day, however, was that we finally reached the halfway point of the Appalachian Trail! It was further south than I remembered it from my first thru-hike and it was marked with a small sign and a register for folks to sign. I celebrated the big moment with Superman, Heavyweight and Peter Pan. They arrived before I did and if they crossed the halfway mark topless, then I missed it. No need to scroll ahead for topless photos, you won’t find them here today! (Being the halfway mark, though, I think that deserved something bigger than going topless, like hiking across the halfway point naked! That didn’t happen either, though.)
For the night, we camped at Toms Run Shelter. There used to be two of them at this location but one of them burned down in 2013. Another quality day of hiking!
The Quarry Gap Shelter had these nice potted plants hanging from the edge of the roof! =) The cutest darned shelter you ever did see. (I’m inside the shelter looking out.)
The number of snake sightings have increased dramatically since the temperatures started getting warm!
Well, hello to you too! =)
The halfway point is near…
There it is! The sign behind them tells us we’ve reached the halfway point on the Appalachian Trail. For the first time on this hike, we’ll now be closer to the end of the trail than the beginning of it! From left to right, that’s Superman (obviously!), Heavyweight, and Peter Pan.
May 24: Despite the huge numbers of people camped at the shelter due to it being Memorial Day weekend, I’m pretty sure I was the first to leave the shelter for the day because I had to break all sorts of cobwebs. They were bad and extremely annoying. The problem with those people who are out for just a weekend—they tend to quit hiking early in the day (filling up shelters before thru-hikers can get to them), they sleep in late (so thru-hikers end up breaking the early morning cobwebs) and carry too much crap (so maybe we can get some free food out of them, but you really aren’t supposed to be feeding wildlife like that!)
View from High Rock, just before Pen Mar Park.
Anyhow, while struggling through the cobwebs and wiping them off my face, I managed to sprain my left ankle pretty badly which left me with a pronounced limp for the rest of the day. My ankle was going to be tender for a few days!
I stopped at Pen Mar Park, which lies on the Pennsylvania (the “Pen” in “Pen Mar”) and Maryland (the “Mar” in “Pen Mar”) to admire the wonderful views, which is where Superman and Heavyweight caught up with me. Superman I knew was right behind me, but this was the first time I’d seen Heavyweight since early the previous morning. The park was still quiet this early in the morning and they asked a man if there were vending machines around we could use. There weren’t, but the man was selling cold sodas out of the back of his truck so we all got one. (I didn’t actually realize he was selling the drinks because I missed part of the conversation and Heavyweight and Superman walked off to get the drinks asking if I’d like one. I sat around nursing my ankle and watching our backpacks and only later realized that they had actually bought the drink for me. Thanks, guys! I feel a bit like a smuck for that, though.)
We drank our drinks and threw our trash in the trash cans and continued onwards a quarter of a mile to the Pennsylvania/Maryland state line better known as the Mason-Dixon Line. We had left the south and entered the north! Or, as Blueberry wrote a day earlier in the border register, we had entered the “land of Northern aggression.” (I still hadn’t caught up with Blueberry despite him being so close ahead of me so the “surprise/trap” had set up for me was still a mystery.)
Heavyweight and Superman took off their shirts and hiked across the border topless. I blame myself for that. Early on, I told them a story that I had heard of three women who would hiked across each border topless. Although I believe the story is fake, I still like the story and hope it’s true! And when I shared it with them, they (along with Blueberry and Bostrich) decided to hike across each border “topless” to start a tradition and hopefully get some girls to start following in their example. I didn’t really think that would work, but I was more than happy to get photos of them making their ceremonial crossing into Pennsylvania without their shirts on. =)
The graffiti on High Rock was actually so extensive, it was strangely hypnotic!
The day was a warm one, and the humidity was thick, but the trail was mostly easy hiking. I lost the trail for a bit at the Old Forge Picnic Area, missing a sharp turn. I wandered around for about 5 minutes before I found my error and got back on track.
For the night, the three of us—Heavyweight, Superman and myself—set up camp in the Rocky Mountain Shelters. We were a bit surprised when we arrived and found absolutely nobody in the shelters at all. Where did all of the people go?! There were a few people we could see through the trees just downhill of the shelters in tents, but the shelter area seemed remarkably empty. More hikers eventually did arrive, but all things considered, it wasn’t in massive numbers and we were all left scratching our heads wondering what happened to all of the Memorial Day weekend hikers. It was only Sunday and Monday was the actual holiday. They should still all be out here! But none of us complained about the mysterious disappearance of all of the weekenders. =)
This sign at Pen Mar Park is a little dated… By this point, we had already hiked 1064.0 miles (not 920!) from Georgia and had 1125.2 miles (not 1080) left to Maine! Both numbers listed on the sign are significantly smaller than the mileage today! But still, I love signs like this. =)
I didn’t bother to cross the border topless because frankly, I didn’t see the tradition taking off. If it was a real tradition, though, I’d have totally done it!
Heavyweight (in front) and Superman (in back) crossed the border topless, however.
This is an interesting register entry at a shelter register. It reads: “(In reference to Bismark) He may have committed fraud and killed his wife but at least he stayed true to the trail. Now he’ll do a purist thru hike of the 9 circles of hell. Happy trails!”
The big news on the trail around this time was that Bismark, a fellow thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail, had been arrested by the FBI in Damascus during Trail Days. I’d heard something about it, all of which was really hearsay, and it was hard to separate what was fact from fiction from the talk on the trail. Later I did some Google searching and learned more about Bismark and his crimes: AT thru-hiker Bismarck arrested. He had embezzled nearly 9 million dollars! And went on the run by thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail multiple times. What a great way to escape from the law. A place where almost nobody uses their real names, where you can grow a big, bushy beard and not seem suspicious for it, a place where nobody questions your lack of a job or home base.
I never crossed paths with Bismark on the trail (not as far as I know!), but it makes you wonder… how many more criminals are hiding out on the trail that I have met and chatted with? ;o)
May 23: There’s a lot of history that’s happened on the Appalachian Trail even before it existed. Early in the morning, it would be walking through the South Mountain battlefield. It was a battle that took place during the Civil War and not a particularly large or notable one as far as battles are concerned. For A.T. hikers, however, it’s one of the more significant battlefields we’d be hiking through because it’s actually on the trail. The better known battles like Gettysburg and Antietam happened near the trail, but not actually on it. (Gettysburg, as I recall, is about 15 miles to the east of the trail, and the Antietam battlefield is even visible in the distance from the Washington Monument that I’d be passing later in the afternoon.)
This informational signs on the battlefield are all I know about the Battle of South Mountain. (Fox’s Gap is the specific gap that the trail passed through and where some of the heaviest fighting took place.)
I don’t really know much about the Battle of South Mountain since it didn’t show up in my history books and everything I now know about it was learned from the signs marking the battlefield. This particular battle took place during the Antietam campaign on September 14, 1862. At the end of the day, the Union held the field of battle while the Confederates retreated down the mountain. It was part of the maneuvering of Union and Confederate forces that occurred leading up to the much larger Battle of Antietam three days later several miles off-trail.
I spent about 30 minutes wandering around the battlefield reading the informational signs and even followed a short, half-mile trail off the Appalachian Trail to see even more of it.
Continuing on the trail, I passed the Washington Monument—the first monument ever built in honor of George Washington and a signal location that was used during the Battle of Antietam (and from which the Antietam battlefield can be seen—albeit at a distance).
Then I passed the Annapolis Rocks. The actually rocky view was a bit off trail and I made the off-trail trek to see it and get photos. I passed by during my first thru-hike and missed it and had no intention of repeating that mistake! There were tons of day hikers milling about and I found them somewhat underwhelming. There are some nice views, but they weren’t any better than the view from Black Cliffs which was far less crowded and closer to the trail. I’m not entirely sure where the trailhead for dayhikers was located, though. It might have been more crowded at Annapolis Rocks just because it’s closer to a parking lot for all I know.
It’s historic, I tell you! The sign even says so!!!
Consequently, I took a few photos at Annapolis Rocks then immediately left and continued on. Upon reaching the view at Black Cliffs, I stopped for a lunch break to enjoy the view and only shared it with two other day hikers who had made it out that far.
The day, for the most part, was fairly uneventful. There were huge numbers of hikers on the trail. I probably passed hundreds of day hikers and maybe even a hundred backpackers out for Memorial Day weekend including several roving packs of Boy Scouts in groups of 12 (the maximum number allowed in a group in the wilderness). The trails were massively crowded!
Late in the day, Superman caught up with me and we hiked the last bit together. Heavyweight had fallen a little behind on the trail because he had family that came out to visit him and picked him up off the trail but he was expected to catch up again tomorrow. When we arrived at the Raven Rock Shelter, it was packed full and countless tents were set up around it. We decided to continue onwards and find somewhere away from the shelter to set up camp and headed off trail towards the water source of the shelter (which was maybe a half mile off trail—one of the longest distances one had to hike out of a shelter to get water) where we found a family of 4 camped by themselves. We asked if they would mind if we joined them, and they didn’t, so we set up camp there halfway between the shelter and the shelter’s water source.
This monument was located a bit off trail, but I was willing to go off trail a bit to explore the battlefield in more depth.
As the darkness deepened after sunset, we heard a surge of sirens in the distance. None of us knew what that was about, but it didn’t sound good!
The next day, the mystery of the sirens was answered by Heavyweight who had hiked in to the shelter late this night. He said he arrived sometime after 10:00, hiking long into the dark to catch up with us, and when he arrived at the shelter and saw that it was full and could find an available campsite to set up camp in the darkness, he wound up camping on the picnic table in front of the shelter.
And he was able to tell us what all those sirens were…. a forest fire that was apparently started by an out-of-control campfire. Heavyweight had hiked through the area after the fire showing us dramatic photos of the Appalachian Trail on fire! He also said that there were sections of the trail deep in water and mud because of all of the water the firefighters had used to extinguish the fire. Superman and I just shook our heads. “Yeah, we didn’t see any of that!” Obviously, the wildfire had started after we had already passed through. If it wasn’t for Heavyweight hiking so far behind us and late into the night, we’d have never known about it and the sirens would still be a mystery.
This strangely-shaped monument was the first one ever built in honor of George Washington. It existed even during the Civil War and the Antietam battlefield is visible from it, so it was used for signaling messages and a view of the ongoing battle.
View from the top of the Washington Monument.
Crossing over Interstate 70. I waved to some of the traffic that passed below the bridge. =)
Seems to be some construction going on on this part of the trail.
The views from Annapolis Rocks were nice! But what you don’t see in this photo are the huge crowds of people that I managed to crop out of this photo. =)
A couple of hikers laying out on Annapolis Rocks.
I preferred the view from Black Cliffs which were also nice but had a LOT fewer people around. (There were people, obviously… Just a lot fewer of them!)
May 22: For breakfast, I had waffles provided by the hostel then hit the trail early. I didn’t get very far, however, before I was distracted by the sights of Harpers Ferry.
View of the Potomac River in the distance from Harpers Ferry. The bulging land in the distance on the left is Maryland. The bulge on the right is Virginia. And the foreground is West Virginia. There are three states in this photo!
I couldn’t possibly tell of all of the history surrounding this town. The entire city is a national historic park. George Washington himself selected the location as the national armory. Lewis—of Lewis and Clark fame—dropped by to acquire provisions for his little expedition across the country. (Ironically, Harpers Ferry wasn’t a good place for me to acquire provisions for my little expedition across the country—no grocery store in the whole town!) Harpers Ferry saw action during the Civil War when Stonewall Jackson captured it, and it’s been a major transportation hub due to it’s location with both the C&O Canal (now defunct) and the road as it’s one of the few low-level passes through the Appalachian Mountains.
Oh, and then, of course, there was John Brown’s raid, the single event that Harpers Ferry is probably most famous for. Somewhat remarkably, a group of about 20 men were able to take over the single armory housing almost the entire country’s arsenal. Briefly, at least. The raid ultimately proved to be a spectacular failure and John Brown was later tried and hanged in nearby Charles Town. Although the plan to start a slave revolt failed, the event heightened tensions further between the northern states (where John Brown was seen as a martyr) and the southern states (can’t trust those northerners!) and two years later, the United States had fallen into a civil war.
I knew a little about Harpers Ferry from school textbooks and my previous visit there during my first A.T. thru-hike, but this time I did a little advanced research about John Brown’s raid in particular by reading Midnight Rising: John Brown and the Raid That Sparked the Civil War—a thorough retelling of the event. This time when I walked through town, I would have a better sense about how the raid played out, where everyone was and where the killings took place. I knew John Brown had been captured alive and in a small engine building which still stands to this day (albeit a hundred or two feet away from its original location which has since been buried under a railroad), but I didn’t realize what a massacre the event had been. By the time the raid was over, there were dead bodies floating in both the Shenandoah and Potomac Rivers as well as several more scattered throughout the town. In the heat of the moment, none of the bodies were picked up or removed, allowed to rot and decompose. To be fair, the townspeople weren’t entirely sure how many people were part of the raid or if they themselves would be shot (or shot at) if they went down to remove a body.
Church in Harpers Ferry
Walking through town now, it’s hard to imagine the rough-and-tumble town of yesteryears. It was a quiet and peaceful morning, the sun shining bright. The temperature was already quite warm despite the early morning hours and the streets were largely empty of traffic and people. None of the stores in town had yet opened. Of course, there were no longer bodies littered throughout the town or floating in the rivers. There was no sense of panic or urgency among the general public concerned about a slave uprising. Wandering around today, it seemed like any other quiet, cute little tourist town. The small town, in the 2010 census, boasted a population of 286 people. That’s it: 286 people. It was a remarkably small town for such a huge influence on the history of the United States. Back in the day when John Brown raided the armory, it boasted a population closer to 1,000 people, but that still seemed like a tiny number for such a huge, outsized influence on American history.
The Appalachian Trail runs right through the heart of Harpers Ferry, but I took about an hour to wonder off trail to tour where the federal armory was once located and read all of the informational signs about it (and there were a lot of them!)
I still had a full day of hiking ahead of me, however, and limited my off-trail wanderings to about an hour before I followed the trail over a railroad bridge crossing the Potomac River and into Maryland. After less than 24 hours, I had completed the West Virginia section of the Appalachian Trail! =)
The trail then followed the C&O (Chesapeake and Ohio) Canal for a few miles—a few gloriously, completely flat miles. Several bicyclists passed by me, then the trail crossed a set of railroad tracks and headed uphill into the mountains again.
The streets of Harpers Ferry were pretty quiet and relaxed this early in the morning—a stark contrast to the tension that would have been in the streets during John Brown’s raid.
The first shelter I reached was the Ed Garvey Shelter, a two-story structure. I went into it and read the last few pages of the register which had the usual hiker writings about what a great time people had in Harpers Ferry or (for those hikers heading southbound) looking forward to arriving in Harpers Ferry. I ate a snack and as I was munching on a gummi worm when I remembered… a hiker had died at this very shelter back in March. At least I thought it was this shelter, the first shelter on this side of Maryland.
I looked at the register and picked it up again, wondering how far back it went. I had heard the hiker died when a tree behind the shelter fell and struck him, and I remembered it happening either on or very near March 16th. I don’t normally remember dates so specifically months after the fact, but this one happened to be Amanda’s birthday so it kind of stuck out in my mind, and somewhat nervously, I started flipping back to March 16th.
The first entry that popped out was written was one that included a sketch of a tree and what looked somewhat like a gravestone that read “J.P. RIP”. It was dated March 16th and read, “Trees grow and die every day. In memory of the fallen one.” Below it was written more information, like a continuation of the entry but written in a different hand—like someone who wanted to explain the note a bit more. “On Mar 15, 2015, a tree fell just behind this shelter and Jason Parrish was killed.”
This monument marks the original location of the engine house where John Brown was finally captured. The engine house is now a short ways away from its original location—you can see it in the background of the photo! The original site was covered with dirt and gravel when a railroad line was run through. That line has long since been removed, but the dirt and gravel to raise the railroad above the flood plain is still there. Originally, the ground was probably 10-15 feet lower than where it is now.
The next several entries I found difficult to read. A sense of loss and sorry hit me hard. I didn’t know the guy, but he was a hiker and trees fall all of the time. The likelihood of being struck by one is low—wrong place at the wrong time—but this was as close as it had come to me. I was hiking this trail when he was killed. Admittedly, I was a thousand miles to the south at the time, but a lot of bad weather had hit the area there as well. One of the register entries a few days after the event mentioned being able to see a blood stain on the log that that killed Jason.
It occurred to me that it’s possible Jason himself had signed this register before he was killed, but if he did, he used a trailname because I didn’t find any entries that appeared to be him. The last register entry before he was killed kind of tugged at my heart as well: “Spending the night after a big day – 4 miles. First night with other backpackers. Friendly group. A little rain today but nice. Into H.F. [Harpers Ferry] to resupply and back on the trail. Hope to do about 15 [miles] tomorrow. Lookout NOBO’s [northbounders]—heading south!” It was signed The Duke. Could that have been Jason? I don’t know.
It was dated the 14th, the day before Jason was killed. Even if it wasn’t Jason, though, it’s very well likely the person who wrote that was at the shelter the next morning when Jason was killed. He might still have gone into Harper’s Ferry that day, but I kind of suspect he didn’t walk the 15 miles south like he’d originally planned. It’s a little sad reading an entry like that. So full of excitement and plans for the future, knowing the tragedy that would strike the next morning and throwing all that out the window.
I left the shelter feeling more than a little sad and depressed. Life can really suck sometimes, and random acts of God suck even more. On my way out, I couldn’t help but take a closer look behind the shelter for the tree that killed Jason. I didn’t notice it on my way in, but someone had created a large cross out of branches and a large, noticeable tree laid on the ground nearby. I didn’t see any blood stains, but it was over two months later now. I didn’t really want to see blood stains either, though, and didn’t really search for them.
A close-up of the engine house where John Brown was finally captured. It’s one of the few original structures from Harpers Ferry to survive the Civil War.
I continued onwards, eventually stopping for the night at the Rocky Run Shelter. When I arrived, the shelter and area was packed with people. It was Memorial Day weekend and I expected a heck of a lot of people on the trail this weekend, but it was a little dispiriting to see what seemed like a hundred people milling around and setting up camp. One level of the shelter was filled with a bunch of students from Roanoke College and they surrounded a campfire they had started.
I sat down to rest a bit and eat a snack thinking I might go on a bit more and find somewhere to camp that wasn’t infested with so many people. Until Heavyweight and Superman arrived shortly after I did and decided to stay in the shelter. It was kind of remarkable, really, that there was any room in the shelter at all given the huge numbers of people camped in the area, but the college students took up one level of the two levels of the shelter and I think it “scared off” other hikers from trying to get in. Other hikers… except us thru-hikers who’ll barge our way into anything. =)
I really enjoy the company of Heavyweight and Superman, though, and decided to stay at the shelter after all to hang out with them. They quickly made friends with the college students—about their age and I figured they were probably checking out the girls (who were, I’ll admit, very cute). So we regaled them with tales from the trail. They were actually out for a class which must be the best class ever because I never got to backpack for any of my classes! They were actually backpacking several sections of the Appalachian Trail during the school term, and this time they were out for about 5 days, if I remember correctly.
Eventually we all headed off to sleep, though, and that was the end of the day.
The trail crosses the Potomac River on this railroad bridge. This river also marks the dividing line between West Virginia and Maryland. (I took this photo from West Virginia, but that hill back there is Maryland.)
The trail followed the C&O Canal towpath for several wonderfully, easy and flat miles!
Some of the men from John Brown’s raid who were shot while trying to ford the Potomac got caught up on the rocks. The river is really quite rocky!
This is a bridge that cars can use to cross the Potomac.
I took a quick snack break under the bridge where the trail came out next to the river.
Turtle on the trail!!!!
This pair of railroad tracks essentially marked the end of the flat C&O Canal walk. =(
Looking down on the Potomac River.
Snake on the trail!
The Ed Garvey Shelter where Jason was killed.
A very somber shelter register.
The memorial created for Jason. The cross is made out of branches and I actually missed it when I walked into the shelter. The log behind it (I assume—it was the only fallen tree close behind the shelter that looked fairly fresh) is the tree that killed Jason.
Caterpillar hiking the trail!
The War Correspondent's Memorial in Gathland SP.
The Rocky Run Shelter actually had a second, smaller shelter hidden further up the trail from the new one where Heavyweight, Superman, the college students and myself stayed—and they got this nice covered chair/swing to sit on!
