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The following has been transcribed directly from the journal that I kept while hiking the Appalachian Trail (AT).

Thursday, March 8, 2001

   After weeks of lose planning, Tim and I are on our way to Manassas to link up with Todd (Livin’ Life), Kevin Koellish (no name as of yet) and Dixton Delancy (not a trail hiker yet).  Kevin and Dixton are former Blackhawk helicopter crew chiefs who did some great things for us while in the Army.  Kevin is the new man to the trail on this trip.  We are planning on a nice dinner/visit with Dixton whom we haven’t seen in 8 months or so.  He is not hiking with us.

    As we finally linked up, the jokes and laughs began almost instantly and continue well into the morning.  We had dinner at a new restaurant in Manassas called Chicago Grill or something like that – and it sucked.  We all agreed it was a horrible meal with horrible service.

   After dinner, we took a few pictures and then drove back to Todd’s and played pool in the basement and drank a few beers.  Had a great time but, perhaps stayed up a bit too late.  We finally went to sleep around 3:00am.  We knew it would be hard to get an early start now.

Friday, March 9, 2001

   The recent snow storm has cleared out of the arena and the forecast calls for highs in the upper 40’s with lows in the low 30’s, clear with no rain.

   We were all very slow getting out of bed and ignored the alarms and tried our best to ignore the barking dogs.  We got a slow but eventual start out of the house and made a stop at the ABC store, the outdoor store and the grocery store all for various supplies.  Finally we were off.  It is about 12:30pm and we are headed to Cascade, Maryland.  There we will drop off Todd’s truck and head south to Burkittsville to begin our North bound hike.

    2:00pm we arrive at the Post Office at Cascade which is near Fort Ritchie –a former Active Duty Army post which was recently closed in 1998.  Todd spots a truck with an Appalachian Trail sticker on it and asks the driver for directions and a good place to park.  She directs us to Pen-Mar park.  We drive up to it, but it’s gates are closed so Tim and I wait while Todd and Kev drive up ahead to look for a parking spot and signs of the trail.

   Weather here is cold. Mostly cloudy with an occasional view of the sun.  There is snow on the ground up here in the mountains (hills) but not so much in the city below.  We also saw a few snow flurries but they are now gone.  The wind is strong.

   Todd and Kev were gone longer than we could stand, so we drove up the road to find them.  They discovered a blue blazed trail on top of this mountain, but no real indications of the white blazes of the A.T.  It is 1.8 miles from Pen-Mar park.  The trail that they found had an awesome overlook: will be nice to see it (although I think the trail crosses the road a bit sooner than this blue blaze).

   2:10pm Todd parks his truck in a gravel field across from Pen-Mar and we all load up in Tim’s truck and head south to Burkittsville.

     3:40pm After stopping for a last minute lunch at Wendy’s, we arrive in Burkittsville.  Gathland State Park where Todd and I left the trail a few months back.  Sure is windy! 

    4:05pm Hike on!  Cold but gets warmer as we move on.  We quickly encounter a climb for about 15 minutes and then mostly easy going from there on.  We hike for 2 hours straight with no rests or breaks and make it to Rocky Run Shelter as the sun is setting.  We passed through some left over snow fields on the way but there is no snow near this shelter.

    6:11pm The shelter has some cool things: picnic table on a deck, a swinging chair, a fire pit with grate for a grill and a great fast running stream.  We quickly begin to set up our campsite in an effort to beat the darkness.  I start on a fire and set up the cooking stove.  It wasn’t windy when we first got down in this valley, but as the night progressed, so did the wind and cold.  It is around 35ºF and very windy.  Todd, Kev and Tim all worked to collect a huge pile of firewood for which they had to climb the crests of the valley walls since this place has been picked clean by previous occupants. 

    We cook our dinners – Kev and I split some mac-n-cheese ( a third of which I spilled on the ground while trying to strain the water), Ritz crackers and spray cheese and some hot tea.  One tea bag in my large cup is not enough.

   We stood around the fire for hours in an attempt to keep warm.  Only problem was that the wind was so strong you could hardly feel the heat, and if you stood on the downwind side you got smoked out.  So there we stood in wind chill down near 15ºF trying to keep warm but failing miserably due to the strong wind—of course, it was nice to have a fire anyhow.

   11:00pm 29ºF Bed time.  Todd and I slept in my huge 4 man dome tent and Tim and Kev slept in Kev’s 2-man dome.  I crawled in the tent and opened my sleeping bag—WOW!  That things is freezing inside.  I just rubbed the inside of my sleeping bag to warm it up then climbed in, took my socks off and wrapped my feet inside of my fleece shirt.  Brrr…

Miles Today: 5.3 miles

Trip Total: 5.3 miles