We are currently in Pawling, NY, 7 miles south of Connecticut - another state bites the dust. We are attempting to get the blog up-to-date.
The following happened Memorial Day Weekend in Delaware Water Gap, PA
Susanna and I walked into Delaware Water Gap, PA with the intention of passing through. That's always our intention - we're just gonna do laundry and then move on, we're just gonna eat and then push on, we're just gonna...ah, we've accepted our fate as hikers. We enjoy cold beers, hot food prepared by others and free hostels with showers in churches. DWG (Delaware Water Gap) offered all of those services, also we met a damn cool hiker who goes by "No Falls". His name is awesome, we still use the phrase - if we slip and almost fall we say "no falls!". He works at a bagel shop in North Carolina - he taunted us (mainly me) with the fact that his co-workers were sending bagels at different stops along the way. Seriously, I frickin love those things. Anyways, we had met him earlier in Wind Gap, PA. He was coming out of a beer store that only sells cases. I think I lamented about this before - the beer stores in PA only sell cases, the bars sell 6 packs... So, he was walking out empty handed, head down, defeated. Enter us. It was immediately clear what we had to do. Buy a 24 pack of Bud Light and hang out in our hotel parking lot sucking down some cold ones. We ended up having to pack out about 10 beers, maybe more, but that just meant we could drink 'em at our shelter the next night. Which is what we did, and we were able to give 2 beers to a hiker named "Cap'n Max" - he just turned 78 and was doing big sections of the trail. Great story teller, glad we could give him some sauce.
Ok, so back to DWG, PA. The trail passes right through town, a great little place that is the last stop in PA before Jersey. People bless it, we were so happy to be done with PA that it became a celebratory atmosphere. After dropping our stuff off at the free hiker hostel we headed to a pizza joint, where we ate like crazy. After that, headed to an apple pie joint where we had milkshakes. I really wanted to ask them to make me a vanilla shake with apple pie chunks in it, but for some reason I completely wussed out and ordered a coffee shake. I dunno, still regret that. Yup, I do think about that still, the place was amazing - smelled like awesome. I have a real love for pie, especially apple pie and I never got any. Does that even make sense? Nope.
We had a lot of time to kill and DWG is on the Delaware River so we headed there, to soak our feet and enjoy the nice weather. After relaxing for a bit, we explored more of the town, stumbled into an old timey ice cream shop, got some more food and beverage before finally heading to the Deer Head Inn. This is where we meet Mike and Jimmy.
The Deer Head Inn claims to be the oldest continuously running jazz club in the country, sounds great to us though we really just want some hot food and cold beverages. We walk a porch that leads to the entrance, right past two guys sitting outside, one is wearing a Deer Head Inn shirt, which makes us think he works there. They are clearly drunk, but I think we all had the same thought: Cook on his break or done his shift... Nope. "You guys hikers?", the guy in the Deer Head shirt asked. "Yup", one of us replied and we walked in to get drinks from the bar. They both quickly followed and were fascinated by us being from the trail, so they bought us our drinks. They quickly told us about themselves. Both are from Long Island. Both do not make a ton of money. They were there because Jimmy's Mom just passed away and Mike wanted to get his friend out of Long Island for the weekend, get his mind off things. We thanked 'em for the drinks and headed back outside. They followed, and continued to talk to us but mainly repeated the same questions over and over and over again. You gotta read these next few quotes in your best drunk Long Island accent, you know you have one:
"So wait - you guys are walkin? All the way to Maine?"
"What are your finances like? We got some smart ones here."
Three other hikers come up and sit on the porch - this is awesome because it takes some of the repeated questions off of me, Sus and No Falls.
"These guys are walkers too? All the way to Maine? Hey, you guys are walkin too?"
"I gotta brother who lives in Jacksonville, FL but works in Georgia...I thought he was f**kin nuts!"
"You guys are walkin?"
"These guys are walkers too?"
This went on for a while, added a lot of laughs and we really have not stopped quoting them. This went on for a while, and though Mike did have some colorful things to say about my peoples, we or I let it slide as there was not much I could do and besides, I'm gonna turn down free drinks? There's a joke in there somewhere...
The next day we moved on, got to Jersey, happily. So happy we did the state in four days, mainly because we were meeting up with our good friend Danny Freedman in Greenwood Lake, NY. He was drivin up for the weekend to hike with us. He earned himself a trail name and it was awesome. More on that to come, I swears.
Love,
El Bear Jew
The following happened Memorial Day Weekend in Delaware Water Gap, PA
Susanna and I walked into Delaware Water Gap, PA with the intention of passing through. That's always our intention - we're just gonna do laundry and then move on, we're just gonna eat and then push on, we're just gonna...ah, we've accepted our fate as hikers. We enjoy cold beers, hot food prepared by others and free hostels with showers in churches. DWG (Delaware Water Gap) offered all of those services, also we met a damn cool hiker who goes by "No Falls". His name is awesome, we still use the phrase - if we slip and almost fall we say "no falls!". He works at a bagel shop in North Carolina - he taunted us (mainly me) with the fact that his co-workers were sending bagels at different stops along the way. Seriously, I frickin love those things. Anyways, we had met him earlier in Wind Gap, PA. He was coming out of a beer store that only sells cases. I think I lamented about this before - the beer stores in PA only sell cases, the bars sell 6 packs... So, he was walking out empty handed, head down, defeated. Enter us. It was immediately clear what we had to do. Buy a 24 pack of Bud Light and hang out in our hotel parking lot sucking down some cold ones. We ended up having to pack out about 10 beers, maybe more, but that just meant we could drink 'em at our shelter the next night. Which is what we did, and we were able to give 2 beers to a hiker named "Cap'n Max" - he just turned 78 and was doing big sections of the trail. Great story teller, glad we could give him some sauce.
Ok, so back to DWG, PA. The trail passes right through town, a great little place that is the last stop in PA before Jersey. People bless it, we were so happy to be done with PA that it became a celebratory atmosphere. After dropping our stuff off at the free hiker hostel we headed to a pizza joint, where we ate like crazy. After that, headed to an apple pie joint where we had milkshakes. I really wanted to ask them to make me a vanilla shake with apple pie chunks in it, but for some reason I completely wussed out and ordered a coffee shake. I dunno, still regret that. Yup, I do think about that still, the place was amazing - smelled like awesome. I have a real love for pie, especially apple pie and I never got any. Does that even make sense? Nope.
We had a lot of time to kill and DWG is on the Delaware River so we headed there, to soak our feet and enjoy the nice weather. After relaxing for a bit, we explored more of the town, stumbled into an old timey ice cream shop, got some more food and beverage before finally heading to the Deer Head Inn. This is where we meet Mike and Jimmy.
The Deer Head Inn claims to be the oldest continuously running jazz club in the country, sounds great to us though we really just want some hot food and cold beverages. We walk a porch that leads to the entrance, right past two guys sitting outside, one is wearing a Deer Head Inn shirt, which makes us think he works there. They are clearly drunk, but I think we all had the same thought: Cook on his break or done his shift... Nope. "You guys hikers?", the guy in the Deer Head shirt asked. "Yup", one of us replied and we walked in to get drinks from the bar. They both quickly followed and were fascinated by us being from the trail, so they bought us our drinks. They quickly told us about themselves. Both are from Long Island. Both do not make a ton of money. They were there because Jimmy's Mom just passed away and Mike wanted to get his friend out of Long Island for the weekend, get his mind off things. We thanked 'em for the drinks and headed back outside. They followed, and continued to talk to us but mainly repeated the same questions over and over and over again. You gotta read these next few quotes in your best drunk Long Island accent, you know you have one:
"So wait - you guys are walkin? All the way to Maine?"
"What are your finances like? We got some smart ones here."
Three other hikers come up and sit on the porch - this is awesome because it takes some of the repeated questions off of me, Sus and No Falls.
"These guys are walkers too? All the way to Maine? Hey, you guys are walkin too?"
"I gotta brother who lives in Jacksonville, FL but works in Georgia...I thought he was f**kin nuts!"
"You guys are walkin?"
"These guys are walkers too?"
This went on for a while, added a lot of laughs and we really have not stopped quoting them. This went on for a while, and though Mike did have some colorful things to say about my peoples, we or I let it slide as there was not much I could do and besides, I'm gonna turn down free drinks? There's a joke in there somewhere...
The next day we moved on, got to Jersey, happily. So happy we did the state in four days, mainly because we were meeting up with our good friend Danny Freedman in Greenwood Lake, NY. He was drivin up for the weekend to hike with us. He earned himself a trail name and it was awesome. More on that to come, I swears.
Love,
El Bear Jew