Chapter One - “Bulletproof or Shot Full of Holes and Doying”
I awoke to the beat of the rain’s drum roll on the roof of our tarp. It had been raining steadily all night and as we peeked out from under the dripping tarp we could see that the hikers who had been sleeping in the nearby shelter were now tented out everywhere in the surrounding woods. Why would they leave the shelter in the middle of the night to set up tents in the rain? We had heard no commotions from visiting bears or complaints of someone snoring like a chain saw but there they were all around us, sleeping out in the downpour. It was now early morning and no one was awake as Toesocks and I packed up our gear trying to be quiet and not disturb the sleeping hikers. We got on the trail before it was fully light and started for what was to be another twenty mile day. We had no way of knowing that it would be five or six hours until we learned what happened in the shelter during the night or that it would also be our last day on the trail. We had hiked 1345 miles of our 2175 mile Appalachian Trail thru-hike. We were now hiking twenty miles almost everyday and feeling bulletproof! During our hike when one of us asked the other how they were feeling the answer had become “bulletproof” if we felt good, or “shot full of holes and doying” if we felt terrible. We had picked up these phrases from movies we had watched before we left our home in Texas, and they conveyed how we were feeling. Early in the hike it was usually “shot full of holes and doying” but after three months and 1300 miles it was almost always “bulletproof”. On the way out of camp I caught sight of a lone hiker in the shelter still asleep? Why was he the only one in there? Something was not right here. I thought about this as we hit the trail. We crossed a road after hiking a short time and the rain was now intermittent as we hiked through a boggy area, first on boardwalks then up to our ankles as our sandals sunk into the mud. Though it was wet and muddy and the mosquitoes were enjoying the breakfast buffet of me and Toesocks , we were hiking through beautiful lush green vegetation and the ferns were waist high on both side of the trail. Because we left the shelter so early we were also the only ones on the trail. Soon we were gaining elevation as the trail took us high up on the rocky ridge of the Appalachians. The wet rocks were proving to be very treacherous and we both slipped many times trying to scramble up the slick rock surfaces. Luckily we hadn’t fallen, but behind me I could hear Toesock’s trekking poles scraping rock frequently as they tried to find purchase. I soon began showing her where it was extra slick and to especially watch out for the black colored rock surfaces as they were just like ice! Several places we had to climb with both hands and feet and she would hand off her trekking poles to me to free up both her hands. I usually hiked without any poles and I loved to scramble on the rocks. We were walking up, over and then down massive slabs of granite that reminded me of a dinosaur’s back, a very big dinosaur! The downward side was where a fall could prove disastrous. In many places I held Toesock’s hand or stood just below her on the down slope in case she started to fall. We went on like this slowly and carefully for a couple of hours and I was growing annoyed because we were not making very good time. I hated it when I thought like this because we had all the time in the world. But the trail does that to you, it makes you think…..”miles…..we gotta make our miles today!” I often had to force myself to relax and not fight the trail. I think it’s a guy thing, and I knew Toesocks didn’t like it. In a short time we would hit the New Jersey/New York border and hike into our eighth state. Soon after that we would also tag the highest point in New York State. Then I saw it! Right there, just ahead of me, I saw NJ/NY painted on the wet rocks! We had hit state number eight! I turned around to holler at Toesocks, “WE”RE IN NEW YORK!” That’s when it happened, she went down hard! I could see by the scared look in her eyes that she was hurt. “Are you OK?” She didn’t say anything! She didn’t get up. She just stared at me, her eyes filled with tears and she started shaking, holding her left leg. Now I was scared! I was already mad at myself for being distracted and not watching her come down that last slope. “How bad is it?” “Give me a minute” I gave her 10 seconds. “How bad!” “I don’t know!” “Well what do you think!” More tears, more shaking. “Do you think it’s broke!” “I don’t know!” “Well what do you think” “Give me a minute!” “What do you want me to do!?” “ I don’t know!” “Can you put weight on it?” “ I don’t know” “Let me help you up!” “Give me a minute!” It went on like this while we both tried to understand what just happened. We then decided to sit there awhile and see if the pain went away or if it would start to swell. If she could not walk on it we were in trouble being this high up on a ridge with actual climbing, not just walking to get back down to lower elevations. I then noticed that we were sitting right on the border of New York and New Jersey. There nailed to a tree was a trail register box. It is a box painted with the AT logo and contained a register log that hikers are supposed to sign stating their names, number in the hiking party and other information to help trail officials, ridge runners and even police in the case a hiker disappears or to report trail conditions that might be of interest to them. It is also a way to communicate to other hikers up and down the trail. I decided to sign in and leave the information that Toesocks had fallen and injured her leg and that we would be limping out to the nearest road crossing to get help. I also knew that the hikers behind us at the shelter the previous night would be coming our way and would learn about our situation. They could be counted on to help us if we needed it. Hikers on the AT look out for each other and will help you if there is any sort of emergency. I also checked our data book and learned that we had about five miles of very rugged terrain to get out to the nearest road. After we looked closely at her ankle and saw that the swelling was not too bad we wrapped it tightly in an ace bandage and she tried to get up and put some weight on it. We did not think it was broken, maybe just a bad sprain. Toesocks would not let me carry her pack, though I did lighten it by dumping her water and taking the food she had in it. We started for the road crossing limping slowly and taking it very slow. We knew that the fastest of the hikers from last night would be catching up with us anytime now. Toesocks was limping along with stops to sit down and cry. I stated thinking that we would be spending the night in the rocks and not make the road crossing before dark. There was no way we were going to be carried out! In some places we had to climb down sheer rock faces using both hands and feet with Toesocks handing her pack and poles off to me before I had to help her up or down a tough section. In some spots she had to use me as a ladder to step up or down on, my shoulder or knee acting as a step for her to make it through the maze of rocky obstacles. We made it to a tenting area and took a break using the log benches around the fire ring. Soon we heard hikers coming up the trail in our direction. It was Sunny and Share followed by Low Impact who we met in Virginia and a hiker from Italy we had met the day before. They all knew what happened by reading the trail register and offered to carry Toesocks and her pack all the way out to the road crossing. We told them hopefully it was just a sprain and that if we could make it out to the road we would call Anton’s on the Lake, a local motel to come and pick us up. There would be a phone at the Bellevale Creamery near the road crossing according to our data book and there would also be ice cream! After a day or two of rest at the motel we planned to be back on the trail. As the other hikers dumped their packs to take a break with us we learned of the events the night before that had them packing up and moving out of the shelter in the rain. Low Impact told us that after they were settled in the packed shelter a section hiker called Disco Dancer came in and they made room for him. Earlier as Toesocks and I were setting up our tarp we noticed him stagger into the shelter area. He came in crashing through the underbrush and nowhere near the trail. He was overweight and over packed and very over heated! He looked like he had tried to break up a fight between angry porcupines! Scratched and breathing heavily he told us that he was too tired to set up his tent. He said that somehow he had lost the trail and was just relieved to have found the shelter! The last we saw of him he was headed for the shelter full of thru-hikers. It was now late at night and the rain was pounding on the roof of the shelter. The hikers were all asleep, dry and cozy as the first signs that something was not right started to appear. It began like someone turning over in their sleeping bag, a soft rustling sound. No one woke up. Then followed a trashing sound, like someone having a bad dream, moaning and groaning but not waking up. A few of the hikers were now awake. They whispered that Disco Dancer was dreaming about being lost on the AT that day and chased by a hungry bear. He seemed to be running from it still as they laughed and tried to go back to sleep. It was not to be. Disco Dancer looked like a newly landed trout flopping around inside his sleeping bag, kicking the wall to one side and the startled hiker on his other side. He was heaving up and down and side to side like if you awoke to find a copperhead sharing your sleeping bag! Groaning loudly now and banging his feet against the floor and wall of the wooden shelter and the hiker sleeping next to him, every hiker was awake and growing angry. The small shelter had everyone lined up tightly side by side to fit in out of the rain. It has been known on the AT for everyone to sleep on their sides to make enough room in the shelter for a hiker when it rained! The thrashing now got more violent and to make it worse he was the only one sleeping! They had enough of this sleeping “disco dancer”! They decided to shake him awake and ask him what was wrong! Was he having a bad dream or did he have some kind of serious sleep disorder? No one had seen anything this strange in 1300 miles of sharing shelters. This had gone way past being funny! Some were concerned for his safety. This could be some kind of seizure! Maybe he was an epileptic? When he was jostled awake and told of his disturbing midnight dancing he said that he did indeed have a “slight” sleep disorder but had been so tired that he failed to take his medication. “Failed to take his medication”? He knew he had this problem and still decided to squeeze into the crowded shelter. This bit of information did not go over well with the tired hikers. Thru-hikers are by nature a very tolerable lot but this was a serious violation of shelter etiquette. Some voted he should be tossed out into the rain. He did have a tent after all! Others said it was a medical condition and not his fault, though he should have known not to use a crowded shelter with this disorder. To make matters worse he didn’t even seem aware that he had done anything wrong. The disgusted hikers just got up, packed up their gear and dragged their sleeping bags out into the rain to find a place to tent out. They left him alone on the dance floor! Sitting around the fire ring now we told them what he had said about being too tired to set up his tent. This made them angry all over again and they wished they had chewed him out more for being lazy and inconsiderate! Toesocks and I had a good laugh hearing this story because we had slept soundly and dry under our tarp not knowing of their miserable night in and out of the shelter. Then we all had a good laugh about it. It is just the way of the trail, you cannot fight it, you just have to adjust to it. After checking that we would be alright they threw on their packs and fast hiked north. After all, ice cream was only a few miles away! Ice cream on a long thru-hike can be a big motivator, even with an injured leg. We envied Sunny, Share, Low and the Italian as they hiked out of sight. They would be enjoying ice cream hours before us, that’s if we even made it out to the road before dark. We were hiking less than one mile per hour, but at least we were getting out of the high rocks as the trail started climbing down to slightly more level terrain. After what seemed like a long time, picking our way slowly down the trail, we made it out to the road. Although Toesocks was hurting with her injured leg tightly wrapped up, we walked on the road away from Greenwood Lake and headed to the Bellevale Creamry to get some much deserved icecream and to use the phone there to call for help. As we limped into the creamery we saw that all the hikers who had passed us on the trail were waiting for us there. They were all concerned about Toesock’s condition and very happy to see that she made it out on her own. She had not only made it out on her own, she had carried her pack the entire way refusing many requests to carry it for her. “We had never slack packed or blue blazed or missed a single white AT blaze in 1350 miles”, she said and was not going to start now! Toesocks in fact had even made sure that whenever we took a shelter loop into a shelter we took that same loop back out onto the trail even though the outgoing northbound loop would have saved us a little backtracking. Yes, we had started this hike as “purists” and would hike every blaze on our way north or not hike it at all! We took a seat at the many picnic tables outside the little ice cream shop and enjoyed a couple of heaping ice cream cones with our fellow thru-hikers. We called the motel listed in our AT data book, Anton’s on the Lake it was called, and soon Robert who own’ s the motel with his friendly wife Tricia arrived in a mini van to take us to his motel to rest and figure out what our next course of action should be. As we departed we said good bye and happy trails to all our hiker friends who we had come such a long way with and I for one was extremely envious to see them don their packs and start up the road to the AT. One thing we knew, that Toesock’s was not going to be hiking for a couple of days if at all, and we had to come up with a game plan. After getting settled in our room, complete with a Jacuzzi tub, we rewrapped Toesock’s ankle, iced it down and put her to bed, a very big bed with fancy pillows. Anton’s is a very well decorated and comfortably plush motel right on the lake and the bed and towels and amenities were far better than we had expected and a whole world away from the spartan hostels and low budget motels most thru-hikers frequent while on the trail. Our plan now was to rest, ice, wrap and see what it looks and feels like in the morning. A soak in the Jacuzzi could not hurt either! The next morning her ankle was not swollen much and as it never really swelled very much as she hiked out on it we decided to give it another day as it was definitely not any worse. By that next evening we decided to keep it wrapped and see if she could walk into town to get some dinner. It took us quite awhile but we made it slowly up to the nearest place to eat, a pizza joint and ordered the spaghetti. She was not in a lot of pain but it was clear that we were not going to be getting back on the trail any time soon. It was time to go see a doctor and get some x-rays done. Our walk back to the motel was slow and mostly silent as we both were thinking about going to the nearest hospital in the morning. Robert and Tricia were unbelievably helpful even though they had a busy motel to run and a major remodeling of the main building going on. They offered to drive us into Warwick and the emergency room the next morning and found an old pair of crutches in their storage building for Toesocks to use. The next day was all a blur as they did X-rays, put a splint on her leg and confirmed our worse fear, her leg was broken! The fibular was broken clean through! I still don’t know how she managed to walk on it! 1360 miles, 3 months of hiking…. through cold rain, snow, intense heat, fatigue, gnats and mosquitoes, ticks, snakes and shelter mice, steep mountains, bears, bear dogs, wet rocks, scrapes and falls, bad food, no water and ……..the most breathtaking scenery and experiences and many amazing new friends! Now it had to end!
