Arrived at Mashipacong Shelter Monday and was surprised to find a copy of the July 2013 issue of Journeys, the magazine of the Appalachian Trail Conservancy incouding this article I wrote on ridgerunning. this made me a minor celebrity on the trail in New Jersey. Text below.
RUNNING JERSEY RIDGES
The summer thunderstorm blew through Delaware Water Gap, up and across the Kittatinny Ridge, its winds whipping the Backpacker Campsite on a steamy August afternoon.
Its
thunder boomed and its lightning crackled. Heavy wind and rain slapped
the tarp against the tent. Braced inside, I pushed back hard to support
straining poles, happy to be dry but knowing that storms earlier in the
summer had snapped a pole, collapsed the tent and sent the tarp
sailing.
The wind died as the storm moved north. A steady rain continued as I slipped outside to check for damage and see how others camped on the mountain had fared. Thankful for having gotten to shelter just ahead of the nasty weather, I knew others had not been as fortunate, and I used my emergency radio to call park police about some very soggy hikers headed their way.
I knew at least a dozen people were scattered along the four miles of Appalachian Trail back to the visitor center at the Delaware River; I was especially worried about one heavy couple I had passed an hour earlier, just before the storm. They were moving slowly, wearing the wrong shoes, and starting to grumble about the long walk back to their car. The four miles up to Sunfish Pond was harder than they had expected. The pond was very nice; what, now they had to hike four miles back?
Stopping to chat, because that’s what ridgerunners do, I did my best to cheer them on with the news that it was only three easy miles to the bottom. Yes, I agreed, walking downhill often hurts more than walking uphill; and yes, hiking is harder than walking.
They trudged on; I moved quickly and eagerly up the trail, heading north, excited to be starting a 75-mile hike across New Jersey.
Again.
Hiking with the trail name “Grasshopper,” I had thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail in 2011 and had fond memories of the five hot days I had spent crossing Jersey. Blessed with the opportunity to return in 2012 as a ridgerunner, I was living the dream – being paid to hike and spending the season with hikers, trail volunteers, work crews, and Trail Angels. I hoped to give back and help them as much as they had helped me on my long walk north.
Hired by the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, the New Jersey Parks Service, and the New York / New Jersey Trail Conference, I was one of 10 ridgerunners working in the Mid-Atlantic States. Three of us were in Jersey. I was AT-3.
We are “boots on the ground” to help folks safely enjoy the AT’s forests and footpaths, to share the gospel of Leave No Trace, and to keep tabs on the trail and those using it. We share directions and advice, remind people to store food in bear boxes, and to pack out their own trash. We explain that the sign saying “No Ground Fires” really does mean that campfires are not allowed (yes, this means you, too) and that “no alcohol” means “no alcohol.” And yes, the leash law applies to your dog, too.
We gathered in May at Scott Farm near Boiling Springs, PA, where ATC’s Bob Sickley and Matt Rosefsky of SOLO Wilderness Medical led us through excellent but exhausting and intense 14-hour days of training in Wilderness First Aid and CPR. We backpacked to the Darlington Shelter and back, role-playing various LNT scenarios and camping nightmares to prepare for the worst that the summer might bring.
Thank God for training.
We were at Backpacker during Jersey orientation when I dropped a heavy rock and ripped a four-inch gash down my ankle. Hal Evans (AT-1) cleaned and bandaged my wound, resisting the urge to snip away the loose flap of skin. A doctor later gave me a Tetanus shot, a heavy course of antibiotics and ordered me off my feet for three days. The cut, she added, could have used a dozen stitches.
I recuperated off-trail at the house that the ridgerunners shared with firefighters and summer interns working at the Lake Wallkill Wildlife Refuge. Getting antsy and healing quickly, I soon headed into the woods for a summer rotation that included either spending five days at Backpacker and Sunfish Pond or patrolling a 35-mile stretch of trail and camping with others near AT wilderness shelters.
The trails and back roads of Jersey soon became second nature and ridgerunners were wonderfully supported and shuttled by the good folks who work in and manage the state’s four public forests, especially Rebecca Fitzgerald at High Point and Ernie Kabert at Worthington.
By August, hikes that had taken four hours were now taking three. While I was not exactly running the ridges, I was certainly moving quicker. Including my thru-hike, I had hiked more than 2500 miles and had lived in the woods for nearly 11 months. Now I was taking the opportunity to thru-hike Jersey from south to north.
I had been camped at Backpacker for five days, hiking nearby trails and keeping tabs on Sunfish Pond, a gorgeous glacial lake that attracts hundreds of hikers and tempts many to ignore the ban against camping and swimming.
I had gathered trash from near the pond and in the bear boxes and I was making my rounds when I encountered an Outward Bound group headed north. We had met the night before and they happily gathered again to hear me “talk trash.” Holding my bag aloft, I said, “I know this isn’t your trash, but this is what others have left. This is why we … Leave No Trace!”
“Leave No Trace!” they shouted. “Thank you, Grasshopper,” they said in chorus as my lesson ended, and they moved on.
My shift at Backpacker was ending but I was staying in the woods, working my way north from the Delaware Water Gap in Pennsylvania to the New York border.
I moved north, hoping to see a bear. The other Jersey ridgerunners have seen 40 bears between them and I am miffed at not having seen a single one this summer – or on my hike through here last year. My dismay was fueled by the glee of other hikers who delighted in sharing their daily sightings – “I saw a Mama Bear and three cubs this morning. Awesome.”
The Trail crosses the state line at the Delaware River and gently climbs to 1500 feet and follows the Kittatinnies, a panorama of lakes and farmlands unfolding across Pennsylvania to the west and Jersey to the east. Crossing Raccoon Ridge and Rattlesnake Mountain, the trail is rocky, but it gradually smoothes and then flattens as it moves north.
An old man with a face filled with bushy white whiskers was standing in the middle of the trail watching me approach from the south. “Howdy, Pilgrim,” I shout! “With that beard, I am guessing you are a thru-hiker.”
“I’m Birdman. Who are you,” came the reply in a drawl so slow I thought I was back home in South Carolina instead of New Jersey.
“I’m Grasshopper. I am a ridgerunner.”
“What’s that?”
Birdman, from Tennessee, retired from a lifetime of quarry work and was thru-hiking to Maine. At 65, he’s four years older than me. We stopped for lunch at Mohican Outdoor Center and I explained myself, making a new friend and gaining a hiking partner for the week. We walked on together and I kept going when he took a mid-afternoon break; I figured we would see each other up the trail.
Birdman rolled in late, joining me at a primitive campsite just north of a pond near Millbrook-Blairstown Road. The next day we covered 11 miles and stayed the night at Brink Road Shelter with three camp groups, six northbound thru-hikers and four hikers headed to Georgia.
I make my rounds, checking in with the counselors and scanning the wide-eyed stares of youngsters who are facing woodlands isolation, perhaps for the first time.
Ever the trail ambassador, I prepare hikers for the perils ahead, including Joe to Go in Branchville, where the trail crosses Highway 206 at Culver Gap. This is both a prime spot for breakfast and a source of angst to outdoor types who slip from woodland solitude unprepared for the urban crankiness of a man said to be unfriendly to hikers.
“He’s a nice guy, but he does things his way. Just order your food and keep it simple,” I advise. “It’s cash only and don’t even think about asking to charge your phone or to use the bathroom.”
A camper who passed by Gren Anderson Shelter is telling others to leave their trash in the bear box, a weird twist on Leave No Trace, and I only grouse a little before packing out someone’s leftovers. A northbounder is packing a six-pack and he finishes two at the shelter, smashing his empties and then packing them away. I caution him about alcohol on the trail; he smiles, shrugs, and hikes on, opening a can as he goes.
A woman in sandals struggles up Sunrise Mountain with a large pack. With a thick Eastern European accent, Mary says she is on the second day of a hike across New Jersey. She complains that her feet hurt after 24 miles the day before. “Why so far?” I ask. “I only have four days,” she replies.
Mary limped in to High Point park office late the next day. Injured, she needed a ride to the train in Port Jervis. My truck was nearby and I considered giving her a lift but decided instead to help her call a cab.
At 1700-feet, High Point is the highest spot in New Jersey and the trail drops to the valley and cuts southeast along the New York border, across farms and through fields and forests, board walks, pasturelands and along country roads. I covered seven miles in a steady rain, took a late morning break to dry off at Jim Murray’s shelter and then stopped for lunch in Unionville at Horler’s Store.
The trail passes near ridgerunner housing, so I stopped for a hot shower and a night’s respite from the rain. Up and over Pochuck Mountain the next morning, I took a mandatory ice cream break at Heaven Hill Farms and then climbed 900 feet up the Stairway to Heaven and crossed Wawayanda Mountain, camping near the shelter as my hike across Jersey wound down.
New York is four miles north and I planned to flip at the border and hike back to Wawayanda for a shuttle to my truck, but at the state line I met Fred Schneider, a volunteer trail maintainer, and decided to hike down the State Line Trail with him.
Lost in my reverie and feeling sassy about my walk across Jersey, I stumbled, slipped and landed hard, snapping a trekking pole, bruising my bottom, blackening an eye, and spraining my hand.
The pain and indignity faded as we made it down the mountain. Fred ferried me toward Warwick and we stopped at The Creamery, a trail oasis where the AT crosses US 17A. Thank you, Fred. The chocolate milkshake was a taste of heaven.
Limping but refreshed, I caught a ride to a hiker hostel in Vernon where a Wawayanda park worker gave me a lift to High Point and my truck. I met Birdman and three other northbounders for breakfast the next morning, picking up the tab as Trail Magic, and then shuttled them back to the trail and the steep hike up Wawayanda Mountain that would start their day.
August melted into September, and Labor Day ended my ridgerunner summer. I camped near the High Point Shelter my last night out and then hiked 12 miles back to the house at the wildlife refuge to pack up for the long drive south. I was barely a half mile down the trail when I saw a bear cub scamper ahead and disappear into the trees. My ridgerunning ended with my summer’s only bear.
Birdman and I are planning to hike together to Trail Days in Damascus, VA in the spring and then he’s going to New Hampshire to finish his hike to Katahdin. Me? I’m hoping for a return to Jersey and for more ridges to run.
-30-
The wind died as the storm moved north. A steady rain continued as I slipped outside to check for damage and see how others camped on the mountain had fared. Thankful for having gotten to shelter just ahead of the nasty weather, I knew others had not been as fortunate, and I used my emergency radio to call park police about some very soggy hikers headed their way.
I knew at least a dozen people were scattered along the four miles of Appalachian Trail back to the visitor center at the Delaware River; I was especially worried about one heavy couple I had passed an hour earlier, just before the storm. They were moving slowly, wearing the wrong shoes, and starting to grumble about the long walk back to their car. The four miles up to Sunfish Pond was harder than they had expected. The pond was very nice; what, now they had to hike four miles back?
Stopping to chat, because that’s what ridgerunners do, I did my best to cheer them on with the news that it was only three easy miles to the bottom. Yes, I agreed, walking downhill often hurts more than walking uphill; and yes, hiking is harder than walking.
They trudged on; I moved quickly and eagerly up the trail, heading north, excited to be starting a 75-mile hike across New Jersey.
Again.
Hiking with the trail name “Grasshopper,” I had thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail in 2011 and had fond memories of the five hot days I had spent crossing Jersey. Blessed with the opportunity to return in 2012 as a ridgerunner, I was living the dream – being paid to hike and spending the season with hikers, trail volunteers, work crews, and Trail Angels. I hoped to give back and help them as much as they had helped me on my long walk north.
Hired by the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, the New Jersey Parks Service, and the New York / New Jersey Trail Conference, I was one of 10 ridgerunners working in the Mid-Atlantic States. Three of us were in Jersey. I was AT-3.
We are “boots on the ground” to help folks safely enjoy the AT’s forests and footpaths, to share the gospel of Leave No Trace, and to keep tabs on the trail and those using it. We share directions and advice, remind people to store food in bear boxes, and to pack out their own trash. We explain that the sign saying “No Ground Fires” really does mean that campfires are not allowed (yes, this means you, too) and that “no alcohol” means “no alcohol.” And yes, the leash law applies to your dog, too.
We gathered in May at Scott Farm near Boiling Springs, PA, where ATC’s Bob Sickley and Matt Rosefsky of SOLO Wilderness Medical led us through excellent but exhausting and intense 14-hour days of training in Wilderness First Aid and CPR. We backpacked to the Darlington Shelter and back, role-playing various LNT scenarios and camping nightmares to prepare for the worst that the summer might bring.
Thank God for training.
We were at Backpacker during Jersey orientation when I dropped a heavy rock and ripped a four-inch gash down my ankle. Hal Evans (AT-1) cleaned and bandaged my wound, resisting the urge to snip away the loose flap of skin. A doctor later gave me a Tetanus shot, a heavy course of antibiotics and ordered me off my feet for three days. The cut, she added, could have used a dozen stitches.
I recuperated off-trail at the house that the ridgerunners shared with firefighters and summer interns working at the Lake Wallkill Wildlife Refuge. Getting antsy and healing quickly, I soon headed into the woods for a summer rotation that included either spending five days at Backpacker and Sunfish Pond or patrolling a 35-mile stretch of trail and camping with others near AT wilderness shelters.
The trails and back roads of Jersey soon became second nature and ridgerunners were wonderfully supported and shuttled by the good folks who work in and manage the state’s four public forests, especially Rebecca Fitzgerald at High Point and Ernie Kabert at Worthington.
By August, hikes that had taken four hours were now taking three. While I was not exactly running the ridges, I was certainly moving quicker. Including my thru-hike, I had hiked more than 2500 miles and had lived in the woods for nearly 11 months. Now I was taking the opportunity to thru-hike Jersey from south to north.
I had been camped at Backpacker for five days, hiking nearby trails and keeping tabs on Sunfish Pond, a gorgeous glacial lake that attracts hundreds of hikers and tempts many to ignore the ban against camping and swimming.
I had gathered trash from near the pond and in the bear boxes and I was making my rounds when I encountered an Outward Bound group headed north. We had met the night before and they happily gathered again to hear me “talk trash.” Holding my bag aloft, I said, “I know this isn’t your trash, but this is what others have left. This is why we … Leave No Trace!”
“Leave No Trace!” they shouted. “Thank you, Grasshopper,” they said in chorus as my lesson ended, and they moved on.
My shift at Backpacker was ending but I was staying in the woods, working my way north from the Delaware Water Gap in Pennsylvania to the New York border.
I moved north, hoping to see a bear. The other Jersey ridgerunners have seen 40 bears between them and I am miffed at not having seen a single one this summer – or on my hike through here last year. My dismay was fueled by the glee of other hikers who delighted in sharing their daily sightings – “I saw a Mama Bear and three cubs this morning. Awesome.”
The Trail crosses the state line at the Delaware River and gently climbs to 1500 feet and follows the Kittatinnies, a panorama of lakes and farmlands unfolding across Pennsylvania to the west and Jersey to the east. Crossing Raccoon Ridge and Rattlesnake Mountain, the trail is rocky, but it gradually smoothes and then flattens as it moves north.
An old man with a face filled with bushy white whiskers was standing in the middle of the trail watching me approach from the south. “Howdy, Pilgrim,” I shout! “With that beard, I am guessing you are a thru-hiker.”
“I’m Birdman. Who are you,” came the reply in a drawl so slow I thought I was back home in South Carolina instead of New Jersey.
“I’m Grasshopper. I am a ridgerunner.”
“What’s that?”
Birdman, from Tennessee, retired from a lifetime of quarry work and was thru-hiking to Maine. At 65, he’s four years older than me. We stopped for lunch at Mohican Outdoor Center and I explained myself, making a new friend and gaining a hiking partner for the week. We walked on together and I kept going when he took a mid-afternoon break; I figured we would see each other up the trail.
Birdman rolled in late, joining me at a primitive campsite just north of a pond near Millbrook-Blairstown Road. The next day we covered 11 miles and stayed the night at Brink Road Shelter with three camp groups, six northbound thru-hikers and four hikers headed to Georgia.
I make my rounds, checking in with the counselors and scanning the wide-eyed stares of youngsters who are facing woodlands isolation, perhaps for the first time.
Ever the trail ambassador, I prepare hikers for the perils ahead, including Joe to Go in Branchville, where the trail crosses Highway 206 at Culver Gap. This is both a prime spot for breakfast and a source of angst to outdoor types who slip from woodland solitude unprepared for the urban crankiness of a man said to be unfriendly to hikers.
“He’s a nice guy, but he does things his way. Just order your food and keep it simple,” I advise. “It’s cash only and don’t even think about asking to charge your phone or to use the bathroom.”
A camper who passed by Gren Anderson Shelter is telling others to leave their trash in the bear box, a weird twist on Leave No Trace, and I only grouse a little before packing out someone’s leftovers. A northbounder is packing a six-pack and he finishes two at the shelter, smashing his empties and then packing them away. I caution him about alcohol on the trail; he smiles, shrugs, and hikes on, opening a can as he goes.
A woman in sandals struggles up Sunrise Mountain with a large pack. With a thick Eastern European accent, Mary says she is on the second day of a hike across New Jersey. She complains that her feet hurt after 24 miles the day before. “Why so far?” I ask. “I only have four days,” she replies.
Mary limped in to High Point park office late the next day. Injured, she needed a ride to the train in Port Jervis. My truck was nearby and I considered giving her a lift but decided instead to help her call a cab.
At 1700-feet, High Point is the highest spot in New Jersey and the trail drops to the valley and cuts southeast along the New York border, across farms and through fields and forests, board walks, pasturelands and along country roads. I covered seven miles in a steady rain, took a late morning break to dry off at Jim Murray’s shelter and then stopped for lunch in Unionville at Horler’s Store.
The trail passes near ridgerunner housing, so I stopped for a hot shower and a night’s respite from the rain. Up and over Pochuck Mountain the next morning, I took a mandatory ice cream break at Heaven Hill Farms and then climbed 900 feet up the Stairway to Heaven and crossed Wawayanda Mountain, camping near the shelter as my hike across Jersey wound down.
New York is four miles north and I planned to flip at the border and hike back to Wawayanda for a shuttle to my truck, but at the state line I met Fred Schneider, a volunteer trail maintainer, and decided to hike down the State Line Trail with him.
Lost in my reverie and feeling sassy about my walk across Jersey, I stumbled, slipped and landed hard, snapping a trekking pole, bruising my bottom, blackening an eye, and spraining my hand.
The pain and indignity faded as we made it down the mountain. Fred ferried me toward Warwick and we stopped at The Creamery, a trail oasis where the AT crosses US 17A. Thank you, Fred. The chocolate milkshake was a taste of heaven.
Limping but refreshed, I caught a ride to a hiker hostel in Vernon where a Wawayanda park worker gave me a lift to High Point and my truck. I met Birdman and three other northbounders for breakfast the next morning, picking up the tab as Trail Magic, and then shuttled them back to the trail and the steep hike up Wawayanda Mountain that would start their day.
August melted into September, and Labor Day ended my ridgerunner summer. I camped near the High Point Shelter my last night out and then hiked 12 miles back to the house at the wildlife refuge to pack up for the long drive south. I was barely a half mile down the trail when I saw a bear cub scamper ahead and disappear into the trees. My ridgerunning ended with my summer’s only bear.
Birdman and I are planning to hike together to Trail Days in Damascus, VA in the spring and then he’s going to New Hampshire to finish his hike to Katahdin. Me? I’m hoping for a return to Jersey and for more ridges to run.
-30-
