Where: Tiadaghton State Forest, PA
# Days: 3
Mileage: 42
Nothing says 4th of July like being out on the trail!
After Tania, Dave, and I went to Black Forest Trail over Memorial Day weekend, I decided I still wanted to finish the loop. Enter long holiday weekend. Dave and I decided to finish the 42 mile loop. And since we knew we'd really be pushing ourselves, we decided the pup should stay behind. Poor Sheldon.
Headed out Thursday, got started on the trail around 1pm. Of course as soon as we started to hike, a thunderstorm rolled in. We kept pushing, hoping it would quickly pass, and thankfully, the storm must've gotten stuck in a valley between two ridges, because while it was certainly very close, it never quite came on top of us. Got about 8 miles in that day, before settling in on a nice river campside just as it started to rain again.
Friday morning we woke up, and just started cruising out some miles. The day was pretty mild, in terms of elevation gain/loss, and we manged to squeak out around 16 miles before settling in to camp, at another riverside site. Unfortunately, since neither of us had remembered to bring a watch, we didn't know, until another camper arrived to pitch a tent with us, that we had finished hiking somewhere around...4pm. Too early if you ask me!
Also too early was our wake up the next morning! 530am David wakes me up, blegh. Not such a bad thing, though, because we had another big day ahead of us. 17 miles later, after trekking through the WORST many mile long unavoidable patch of stinging nettles I've personally encountered, we landed at a pretty dry river camp site, much buggier than previous nights, and long story short, decided to proceed another mile up the trail to the next campsite - so glad we did! Beautiful little spring fed pond, clear as can be, and we fell asleep to the (very annoying) peepers greeting the night.
Technically, we took 4 days to complete the loop, but the last day, we had fewer than 2 miles to the car, so I'm not counting it :) I will add, however, that the last day was most certainly the most spectacular view of the trip.
Hiking in PA isn't always the most visually rewarding (few views - all of the same two valleys) and the terrain is just challenging enough to not be totally boring, but not exciting enough to feel really proud of yourself after a long hard push. Those were the longest days I'd pulled since the AT, though and it gave us a little confidence for our trip coming up to Vermont next week - an attempt of another 100 miles on the Long Trail. I can't wait!
