What a day. The defining day of pennsylvania for sure. The first mile of the day was downhill from the shelter to Lehigh Gap where the trail crosses a few roads and another river. Things got interesting really quickly after that. The guidebook warns of a rocky and steep trail and just a couple steps down someone grafittied on a rock, “Stop, Turn Back Now!” By the time the climb was over though we all agreed it was one of the best parts of the whole trail so far.
This section wasn’t just rocky, it was only rocks, and in this case rocks means large boulders. Large boulders the whole way up the side of a mountain, and while we were climbing a steady drizzle that had begun the night before continued falling. Every step was a big one, often times hands were required as well – I was really glad I wasn’t carrying my trekking poles at the time. As we got higher and higher the view behind us got better and better. We were looking back at the valley below, the river, and the ridge on the other side that we had been on yesterday. By this point on the trail a climb like this was actually pretty easy – slippery rocks slow you down enough that you can’t really get out of breath or tired.
We got up on the ridge and enjoyed some nice trails for a while. There was a nice break from any kind of rocks, and even some raspberry and blackberry bushes. Soon the regular kind of rocky trails were back though, the kind with pointy rocks sticking up out of the mud. We stopped for lunch shortly after it stopped raining but most everything was still wet and while not walking I felt cooler than I’ve felt anytime in months, and it was around noon in early august.
It took quite a while, but we eventually made it into Wind Gap, PA. We set up camp in a fenced in lawn area attached to a local restaurant, The Beerstein. They let hikers camp for free and of course we went there to have dinner. It was pretty nice being able to walk back and forth between a restaurant table and “home” in less than 20 seconds. As usual we ate disgusting amounts of food and had an awesome time.