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New Jersey surprised me with its diverse landscapes and views. After hiking almost the entire portion of the AT there (I have a mile or two left just south of the NY border because that's where I was picked up to come home for a few zero days), I feel like I can now appreciate what remote North Jersey has to offer. Rocky, exposed summits; tall groves of pine trees; scrubby ridgelines studded with wild blueberry bushes; cool, rocky gaps; steep mountainsides covered in boulders; and sweeping pastureland made up my 6 days hiking the state.
Jersey was just as, if not more, scenic than Pennsylvania. The views and towns are packed closer together than they are in PA, but the trail itself still has plenty of variety in the much shorter 73(ish) miles it spans.
On my first day out, I drove myself to a trailhead in Delaware Water Gap, PA, planning to hike north to Wawayanda State Park where I would get an Uber back to my car. For the first 30 minutes, I walked excitedly in the direction I thought was north (as the AT goes, which isn't exactly north according to a compass). Soon enough, I started climbing what seemed to be too steep of an incline to be heading down to the Delaware River where I knew the trail crosses to enter New Jersey. Rhododendron grew profusely on both sides of the narrow path. I checked my phone and saw myself heading toward Mount Minsi, which is in PA, whereas I should have been heading toward New Jersey's Mount Tammany. So, the first mile of my trip was completed walking in the wrong direction, in the wrong state, uphill. I laughed it off and turned around.
That night, after hiking a few miles to a campsite where I hoped I would meet some fellow thru-hikers/section hikers, I set up my tent in one of the most beautiful sites I've ever seen. Long, silky grass waved in the breeze and tall deciduous trees towered above. The sun was setting; it was golden hour. Thick patches of ferns glowed fluorescent green in the last light. I walked over to where a few other hikers were watching the sunset from a small overlook. Casual conversation comforted me as I still worked off some of the nerves I was feeling at this point, having just gotten back on trail after a rocky (literally and figuratively) start one week prior.
The next morning, I woke up to a view that was a reminder of just how beautiful it can be to walk and sleep and live outside. Harshness and discomfort will always come, too, but in that moment I took in what surrounded me. A reminder of the give and take of being vulnerable to whatever nature has in store, and of the ebb and flow of my own emotions. A reminder about balance.
Still coming to terms with my experience from the first few days I spent on trail in Pennsylvania (is this attempt going to end the same way, in a matter of days? am I still just fooling myself? am I okay with the sacrifices I've made to be here?) and heavy with anxiety leftover from saying goodbye, albeit for a shorter time, to my partner and dog, I decided to try to match the tone of the day that presented itself to me. Light heart. Contented mind. No rush.
I would see several snakes that day--almost stepping on a sizable rattlesnake that shook its tail at me in warning while skirting off to the side--as I passed a lake, several exposed summits with awesome views, and a hiker named Schlep who gave me one of many bags of 7-layer bars her mom had made and sent to her. I would be eagerly offered snacks, drinks, weed, and mushrooms (yes, those kinds of mushrooms) by a guy doing his own sort of trail magic. I would pass other thru-hikers, fit and with leg muscles that looked like they'd been chiseled from granite (they kind of were, if you think about it...), who introduced themselves with names like Well Done, Somewhere, and Goldilocks. Tired of telling others my real name and having not gotten a trail name yet, I started introducing myself as Half Pint. Few people got the reference from Laura Ingalls in Little House on the Prairie, but some did. I always related to Laura, as much for her stubborn and impulsive nature as for her love of storytelling and keen interest in the world around her. She, like me, was small but mighty.
The third day, I got a visit from a good friend of mine from college. She drove 2 hours to meet me in Branchville, NJ, where we stopped for lunch at Sandwich Lobby and got subs that were 2x bigger than expected. We stuffed our faces and caught up on life while thru-hikers sporadically came in and out from the deli, chewing the last bites of their subs or stuffing them, all wrapped up, into their packs to eat for dinner later that day. That afternoon, we found ourselves under a pavilion on Sunrise Mountain, looking across the view of the valley in front of us and listening to the chatter of day hikers to our left. I showed my friend the watercolor set I had and asked if she wanted to paint. We spent the next hour painting, me with the sawed-off brush I had in my kit, my friend with the end of a woody flower stem. It was the kind of slow, mindful way to pass the time that we both were craving, I think. My friend said goodbye soon after, and I trekked back into the woods, still hiking north and toward the Gren Anderson shelter, my stopping point that night.
At Gren Anderson shelter, I met more thru-hikers and a boy scout troop (I didn't actually meet the boy scouts because they were kind of aloof and shy, which is how I prefer it anyway...). I introduced myself and tried to be sociable, but not too sociable, as I'm starting to learn how reserved thru-hikers can be at the end of a long or particularly tough day, or, sometimes, just in general. Also, as a hiker who just started weeks before compared to the NOBO (northbound) hikers who've been on trail for entire months, I can quickly sense the contrast between my eager-to-make-friends, fresh-off-the-town kind of vibe and the other hikers' tough, this-is-my-100th-day-out-here kind of vibe. This is where the hiker small talk I've picked up on comes in handy.
Me: Hey, I'm Half Pint. What's your trail name?
Thru-hiker: *says cool, witty trail name*
Me, overly eager: Ooooh, I love it. You a NOBO?
Thru-hiker: Yeah. How about you?
Me, slightly ashamed in comparison: Flip-flopper.
Thru-hiker: where'd you start?
Me: Pennsylvania.
Thru-hiker: Ohhhhhh.....f*ck Rocksylvania, man.
Me: Yeah, well, I grew up there, soo...
Me, trying to get the topic off of how much they hated PA: How far you heading tomorrow?
Thru-hiker: 25 miles to the such-and-such shelter. You?
Me: 11 miles.
And so it goes, more or less, with every thru-hiker. I learn to stop asking how far others are going and definitely to stop trying to keep up with them. Granite-chiseled leg muscles, remember?
But then there is a conversation that takes me by surprise, breaking the script. I decide to open up a little more to a NOBO hiker. She is tall, thin but muscular, and has deep-set eyes. I trust her without knowing exactly why.
I share with her the truth about how my hike started. I tell her about the loneliness, the homesickness, the imposter syndrome, the doubt. What she said back surprised me. She told me about crying every day the first week of her trip and about taking a zero day (no hiking) on her 5th day out. She told me about going back home to western PA for a while after suffering through a few really tough days in Pennsylvania. “It happens to all of us," she said. "It’s brutal out here.”
The next morning takes my breath away, again. I am comforted to finally meet another thru-hiker going the same distance that day as me. After leaving the shelter, the mist from last night's rain catches the early light and I stop mid-stride. I have to watch. I have to take it in.
It's one of the most beautiful days yet. I’m starting to have the time of my life out here, enjoying all the gifts--trail magic, a visit from a friend, a cool and rainy night that makes for good sleeping weather, genuinely relating to another hiker’s experience, and the sights that silently unfold without my asking or seeking them. I am worrying less about what others think of me when I first meet them and doing everything with more confidence. I smell bad and stop caring. I already start to think of ways to fine-tune my gear and daily routines.
I find myself getting into a rhythm: wake up, eat, walk, filter water, eat, paint with watercolors, filter water, walk, eat, chat with whoever's camping nearby that night, sleep. What I've heard is true: life really is simple when you're long-distance backpacking. Simple, but not necessarily easy. There is little to worry about other than basic needs and enjoying what's around.
Especially given the fact that I don't have my trail legs yet, and trying to fit in big miles will make me more prone to injury early on, I limit myself to 10-14 miles a day. I end up finishing my miles around midafternoon because I like getting into a comfortable pace and keeping that pace for as long as I want rather than deliberately walking slowly to stretch the miles.
Still, I stop often. Sometimes to dip my feet into a lake, take a long lunch, paint a view, check in with family and friends (battery and service permitting), take a side trail to a town or view or landmark, or just to rest. I think about the loved ones I've left behind, going on with their usual lives, and about all the time I have left to be out here.
I get distracted by a bug crawling down my arm.
My last night in New Jersey, I tented out because sleeping in a shelter with other hikers proves to be hit-or-miss for me. A few days ago, I told one hiker that I thought he should change his trail name to Rotisserie because he wouldn't stop tossing and turning through the night, the squeaking of his sleeping pad keeping me up until midnight, when I finally left and set up my tent under the light of the moon.
Tenting the last night in Jersey had its consequences, too, though. The early evening on top of Pochuck Mountain was breezy and warm, but by 8:00, thunder rumbled in the distance and far-off lightning flickered impatiently. I checked my phone. There was a severe thunderstorm warning for 9:00 that night where I was camped. Doc, another thru-hiker I'd been on-pace with for the past few days, was camped a couple dozen yards away. I heard nothing from him as rain started pelting my tent, lightning flashing every few seconds, and thunder cracking overhead. It was actually a pretty scary storm. I simultaneously relished and feared being shielded from the conditions outside by nothing more than a few layers of nylon and mesh. The worst passed quickly, though, sailing off toward the northeast as quickly as it had approached from the southwest.
The next morning, Doc told me it was the worst storm he's seen since starting his hike on February 26th, almost 4 months ago.
The last day in Jersey, day 6, I had a 13-mile hike to Wawayanda State Park where I would get an Uber back to my car in Delaware Water Gap. The hike was pretty grueling, up and back down Wawayanda Mountain and a few other smaller climbs in steady rain. Partway through, as I neared the end of a marshy clearing lined with boardwalks and the start of another wooded section, I spotted a black mass stepping soundlessly out of the woods and onto the trail ahead. It padded effortlessly onto the planks of wood, peeked past a long, gray nose to look at me for a second, and then, without concern, ambled back into the woods on the other side of the trail. The moment lasted all of a few seconds. I had no time to take a picture of the bear, and I kind of liked it that way.
Here's to the next states I'll hike (New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Vermont) before getting off trail for a wedding at the end of July, and all the adventures that will come from them.
Until then, happy trails from your newly self-dubbed hiker.
-Half Pint
Scroll through the photos below, and check out a couple of videos I was able to upload beneath those. I'm too lazy to add captions to everything, so use your imagination.
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