The Way I Go Along The Appalachian Trail

Today is Day 2 of our Final 4 Hike Countdown. This will  also be our LAST long hike (18.4 miles) 👏 as the 2 final hikes are just about “Nero’s” by hiker standards 😉.  It’s just the way the parking matched up… don’t forget we’re “Platinum” Slack Packer’s 🙄. Today we are continuing hiking from Pen Mar County Park (1066.6 NoBo) to the I-70 Footbridge, US 40 (1048.2 NoBo) for a total of 18.4 miles.  We began hiking at 8:00 am. We were hoping to have breakfast with “Fresh Ground” but he must’ve set up his “Trail Magic” further SoBo 🥲. This is a vintage sign as total is 2193.1 miles not 2000 miles. Hike started off simple enough… Then a few rocks…  And a few more rocks…I don’t want to dwell too much over this but if I didn’t know better, I'd swear I was back in “Rocksylvannia” 🤬. If I had to guess, I would say 70% of the trail today was rocky. Then there were  better trails too… So I thought …. 🤯.  I tripped over a root half covered with leaves. Turtle Powe...

So we are back on the trail wrapping up our final 4 hikes and unbelievable, incredible journey on the AT. It was a welcomed break,  rejuvenating and resting my weary bones. My knees have bothered me a little the last few weeks where I have been  using KT Tape (Kinesiology Therapeutic Tape ) on them  but they feel much better today… just 4 more hikes 🙏🏻. There’s a chance that we may get wet today but we’ve hiked in the rain before 😡…. Now that I think about it, we’ve hiked in the rain, sleet, snow and gale force winds. I wonder if that qualifies us to work for the USPS 😂? Today we begin the first of our final four hikes of our thru hike starting from US 30, Fayetteville, PA (1084.8 NoBo) to Pen Mar County Park (1066.6 NoBo) for a total of 18.2 miles.  Every day we will set new hiking milestones: today we go below 50 miles left to hike. We also crossed another state line, entering our 14th and final state of Maryland. We began hiking at 8:00 am and the skies are th...

Today will be our last hike for this week as we are going off trail for a few days. Jean and I are going to Wisconsin for her Aunt Rose’s 90th birthday celebration  🎂🎉  and Turtle Power is having his mothers Memorial Services this weekend; remember she passed on Mother’s Day. I’ll be thinking of Turtle Power and his family on Saturday 🙏🏻 .  Then we’ll come back to the trail ready to complete the remaining 4 hikes and our “Platinum Slack Packing Flip-Flop-Flip Thru Hike”.  Today we are hiking from Whiskey Springs Road (1117.9 NoBo) to Pine Grove Furnace SP (1104.6 NoBo) equaling 13.3 miles.  We began hiking at 8:00 am. A nice easy and scenic start going through Pine Grove Furnace SP.  We completed our first climb and begin descending towards the James Fry (Tag Run) Shelter and run into “Papa Groop” one final time who is 4 miles away from completing his thru hike. His wife is meeting him to celebrate 🎉. We chatted a few minutes but it was obvious he was ...