On-trail journal entries from adaptiman
Got a really late start from Pogo campground and decided that I would take a short day and end up at my scheduled stop, which is Ensign Cowell shelter. I arrive there around 5 o’clock, and there were a few slack packers in the shelter, who are not very friendly. So I decided to set…
Left the Dahlgren campground early at 7:23 AM. My destination was the Pogo campground. I had heard that there was good water there and indeed, that was true. The day was relatively uneventful. The first part consisted of a number of moderate ascents. I ate lunch at Pine knob shelter, which is a terrible shelter without…
Since it’s a short day, I slept in kind of late. I stepped off from camp at 9:20 AM, three minutes earlier than yesterday. I guess that’s an improvement. My destination was the Dahlgren campground, I lovely place maintained by the Maryland state department. There is running water, showers, bare poles, and tent pads. I’m…
The day didn’t start out well. I walked down to the post office, only to find out that it doesn’t open until 9 AM. So I walked back to the bolivar bread, bakery to get a roll, only to find out, they didn’t open until 8 AM. So here I sit waiting for them to open…
For those of you who have hiked the AT before, you know that the southern terminus of the trail officially starts at the top of Springer Mountain in Georgia. Springer Mountain is a tall mountain, and somewhat difficult to get to. Most hard-core AT hikers will start at Amicalola Falls, which is a hard days…
I posted my first trail package this morning. Using the “hold for pickup” service, you can post a package to a U.S. post office which will keep it for you until you get there. In this way, you can stage boxes of consumables to be picked up during your hike. It’s a bit of a…
Carl Philipp Gottfried von Clausewitz is often misquoted as saying, “No operational plan extends with high certainty beyond the first encounter with the main enemy force.” In fact, it was not von Clausewitz, but rather Helmuth Karl Bernhard Graf von Moltke who said that, even though it’s a fair restatement of the battle philosophy of…
As I finalize the items that I’m taking, as always, I’ve packed too much. I’ll pack my gear several times before Friday and begin to cut items that would be nice to have but I really don’t need. Once on the trail, as I make that first ascent, I’ll vow to cut another group of…
As the time draws near for me to step-off, the reality of being gone for a month is beginning to sink in. Routine things like paying bills, adding chlorine to the septic tanks, bathing the dog, and checking the mail have to be addressed. Of course it helps to have a family that will take…