Almost through VA and almost at 1 K

1000 miles is alot of miles.

I am currently 19 miles south of Harpers Ferry and just about done with the great state of Virginia. Virginia has had its ups and downs,,, mostly literally.

This great mecca of flat lands and easy terrain turned out to be a complete myth. Virginia was hot and filled with large uphill climbs and more recently infested with bugs.

143 of its miles were done via Slack Packing and 100 miles were traversed via an Aqua Blaze. (An aqua blaze is basically when some thru-hikers decide to canoe 100 miles of the Shenandoah River as opposed to hiking the AT) Myself and a fellow hiker "GRolar Bear" both did the aqua blaze.

The trip turned out to be a pretty awesome break from the monotony of the trail... The first day (within 30 minutes) however we swamped the canoe going over an interesting set of rapids.. I wouldn't say that they were extremely difficult,, I would put the spill down to more of a miscommunication and the fact that we had not yet gotten used to the Canoe or paddeling down rapids just yet. Either way it Cost us both in the items department... My beautiful purple $200 ipod got soaked beyond repair and I am pretty upset about it... #1 I can't listen to music anymore and #2 I loved that Ipod.. it was the first ipod that I got ( I had a Zen before that) and I loved everything about it... Soooo many miles and hours of running with my purple Ipod Nano,, listening to music in my car... It kind of sucks...

When I purchased the ipod,, you are able to write inscriptions on the backs of them if you ordered from the Apple website.
I must have taken at least 3 hours to come up with a good one. I still remember it like it was yesterday...
I had just moved into my new Aparment complex (Vairo Village) and I was just about to start my Junior Year of College. It was still warm out and I was still in the midst of settling in to the flow of life. Things were definitely on the upside with my life and I was starting to find my place.
I thought long and hard while I layed on my carpet on my bedroom floor,,, thinking about the perfect inscription that I could put on my ipod,, something that would be there forever,(or at least until it broke or I got a new one), something that I would read whenever I turned the device over and read it while immersed in my favorite music.

I finally came up with a perfect inscription.

Listen & Breathe
j.a.m



j.a.m being my initials


Listen & Breathe..... muisic can take you places as we all know... you can get lost in it and it will move you if you want it to. I left those words however as a reminder to myself to take a step back whenever I read them. A reminder to myself to stop a second and think about things,, a reminder to just be yourself.

Those two words together can have many meanings...

getting lost in music is sometimes as good as it gets.

Listen & Breathe


Anyways... My Ipod is ruined and my phone also is broken. Other then the first collapse of the boat however,, we didn't flip again.. ( we had to both jump out when we went over some Class 2 or 3 rapids towards the end but it was all good.

We went through a 24 pack the first two days and then the 3rd day we were out of beer so we kind of asked around or looked hoplessly tired enough that we got some free trail magic beers ( asking people with a cooler "where the next place to buy beer is" kind of leaves you a good chance) The other time we were just laying down and letting the current take us and some fisherman were like "You want a Beer"

Grolar Bear was like ("did he even need to ask,, he should have just said "Here""" because the answer was an instand YES

The river turned out to be more populated then I imagined however,,

I expected the Shenandoah River that John Denver sings about to be a idealistic picture of beauty and nature.. Instead there were three Power Dams that we had to portage over and the sides of the riverbank were filled with Hundreds of RVs and Tents and Campers that RedNecks had set up... There were many farms too with Cows along the side.. This likely was causing a significant amount of pollution to envelope the river,, and even after filtering the water it was still Horrible. We just drank beer or Coke or The powerades that we picked up instead.

We camped just anywhere along the rivers edge and the last nights campsite especially was awesome. We were right by the river on a flat pebbled bed of rocks that (since we both had ThermaRest NeoAirs) was just as comfortable as anything.... we made a fire, smoked A Cigar that Grolar Bear had,, and ate some awesome Baked Beans courtesy of the Bush family recipe. It was a great night.

Since getting picked up at Front Royal at like noon of the 4th day.. we got a hotel room and went and saw Prince of Persia at the movie theatre and then watched TV until like 1 am (The Movie Yes Man with Jim Carey actually was pretty funny),, and then hiked out the next day. (doing 5 miles after leaving at 3:30) THe next day (yeasterday) rained for alot of the 19 miles.. and today was Amazingly Hot and I could only make it 10 miles over a section of the trail nicknamed the "Rollar Coaster".

Tomorrow I will be in Harpers Ferry and my Mom and maybe Uncle Phil will be coming down to help slackpack me. At this point I think I would Slackpack all the way to Maine if I had the opportunity. Some people frown upon it, but not many...

Today however I read an entry from a guy that I just saw for the first time,, His name is Coal Crusher (cause he is from the Coal section of PA) he wrote in the Trail Journal that he made it 1000 miles in 53 days and that he didn't do any of it via the "Girly" Slackpacking and that he had little respect for people that jump on the chance to slackpack whenever they can...

I don't think he was directing this at me or anyone else,,, but he very well might have been directing it at me.. He worte in the next shelter that he Apologized for the comment and that it was more about people bragging that they did Big Miles while Slackpacking....

I actually wrote in a shelter a while back that I was happy that I did 143 miles in 6 days... so now that I think of that maybe I am not so sure that he was not talking about me...

Either way I think he's kind of a (insert any number of things)

There is a phrase that people use out here... "Hike Your Own Hike"
THe majority of people that I know have Slackpacked at least once and those that have not typically don't object to it... Guys like that who have been going non-stop for 53 days I just don't get..... That means that he started a full Month ahead of me. Sure you're doing very well, making great time yada yada,, but I guarantee that he hasn't met as many people as I have and for sure he hasn't made the type of relationships and friendships that I have made.. You can't be going that fast and get the full experience,, I just don't think it's possible. I could be wrong but I'd put my memories that I've had thusfar up against some speed demon purist's every day.

Ugh!!!!! "Girly" Slackpacking ...... Screw You.

anyways in other news I'm almost caught up to TinTin and Fredo who I'm planning on watching the world Cup with (tintin is from England and I promised him when we hiked together for about a week that I'd be there when The United States pulls of one of the greatest upsets of all time and gives The Three Lions a major whooping)
I'll be in Duncannon on June 12th and I can't wait...

anyways I've been writing this for about an hour and I'm not going to re-read it.
I'm just going to enter it and go...

until next time..

Kashmir