Rock Maze, July 7th

I slept in late again today, my body needed it. I felt a lot better. I feel like my cold is going away, I'm still feeling cruddy but it's much better. The power kept going out which delayed breakfast at the hostel that turned out to be pretty awesome. I found myself particularly hungry after not keeping any calories from yesterday evening inside. A group of us arranged some last minute slack packing to the next town of Boiling Springs, PA. It kept raining on and off in the morning but now it seems like the rain will hold off for the rest of the day, but who knows. Weather reports are highly unreliable out here in the mountains.

The terrain has been lovely. We have just been flying down the trail. I just finished the audio book of A Walk in the Woods. It's about the Appalachian Trail. A lot of people are out here right now because of it's recent popularity of being made into a movie. It was a pretty funny movie too. I watched it right before I left. It was a lot different from the book though, still quite entertaining. I listened to it on my phone from an app called overdrive, Scout and Sun told me about it. It lets you check out audio books from your library for download with your library card and will automatically delete and return itself when it's due back so you don't have to worry about it being late, or not having service to do so in my case. I'm impressed on how little battery it uses on my phone.

Before listening to A Walk in the Woods my friend Axel gifted me a werewolf audiobook called the Amazing Wolf Boy which has gotten me hooked on listening to auidiobooks out here. It really helps pass the time and makes the day more interesting. It's been pretty rough out here with the heat so it's really useful.

The easiest section of this trail

It was so nice to hike these parts!!!!

We passed an interesting piece of trail called Rock Maze and it most certainly was a rock maze. It was challenging to get through and I am most grateful to have not have had my pack on for it. It was hard to follow in places and required actual rock climbing with your hands was involved. The trail had to make up for the easy miles earlier I guess.

The trail let out into an open farm field which was a refreshing change after being in the woods so long.

Some beetles doing their thing

The guy who slack packed us was waiting on a road between farm fields with our packs. We hiked over to the town's campground for hikers which was obnoxiously out of the way from town on the edge of a field and set up camp.

Uncle Puck, Hobo, and I set off for town after that. As soon as we hit the road a car stopped and offered us a ride. She had opened a new hostel this year that isn't in any books yet. She was trying very hard to convince us to repack all of our things and stay at her hostel. It was already starting to get dark and everything was set up so we weren't very interested. We went to a nice restaurant, probably too fancy for us, we were sat in the bar area in a corner. I ordered duck and it was the best, most juicy duck that I've ever eaten in my whole life. There was a delicious glaze, apricot I think, that complimented it so well. I finished it all off with an awesome vanilla bean creme brulee. We made some wrong turns on the way back with it being completely dark outside but did eventually find our way back to the tents.

Best Duck Ever!!!

Tonight in boiling Springs, PA I'm at mile 1121.2 with 1068.6 left to go.