Author: Spidermart

Meeting and having beers with locals is always such a great time.  Our stay at the Coloma Hotel & Pub would not have been complete without having a couple beers in the pub part of the hotel.  Dennis and Sue have owned the hotel since the 90s, something of a retirement gift to themselves?  They bought it, completely gutted it and remodeled the entire thing; it took about 5 years to complete.  I’ll share a picture I took with some background info on the hotel.

I’m not sure how it came up, but a factoid I learned from Dennis and Sue that I shall not soon forget is about margarine in Wisconsin.  Did you know that until about the 50s or 60s it was illegal to have margarine in Wisconsin?  They recounted stories of how their families would smuggle in the contraband.

The Coloma Hotel & Pub is a beautiful establishment, more of a B&B feel than a hotel.  I was half expecting it to have a shared bathroom space like a lot of B&Bs do, but that was not the case. We had a single queen room with a mini-fridge, coffee, TV w/satellite (we fell asleep to Harry Potter) and a bathroom all to ourselves.  I think it was $59 a night, which is basically unheard of these days.  Thank you, Dennis & Sue!

Weather was kind to us this morning in that we were able to hike to first 8 miles before the rain started.  We skirted the dark red edges of the first couple storm fronts, allowing us to put more miles in than any other morning before; the missed miles from yesterday were fully hiked by 0930. There was also motivation in knowing that Sunsets & Chicka were bringing us Subway footlongs around 12:30pm.  No matter how bad things got, we would have friends, food and a roof for lunch.

Meeting Sunsets & Chicka, the other couple hiking the IAT that we have been chatting with, was awesome!  They have a few thru-hikes under their belt and knew exactly the things to brighten our day.  The sub and cookie were great, cold soda a bonus, but my favorite part was just getting a chance to talk and connect with them.  Their story is so interesting, hiking the AT and then setting up a hiker hostel with all of their favorite hostel amenities.  I wish we had more time, I think we would be great friends.  Thank you, Sunsets & Chicka! We know how valuable zero day time is and we enjoyed every moment :-).

Our feet were afloat with happiness after lunch.  The rain had stopped during lunch and didn’t begin to fall again for a bit after we parted ways with our new friends.  Rain is your ally, until is not.  Rain kept us cool and the humidity low.  It gave us motivation to break less and walk faster.  Yes, how I love rain… until the clouds get dark and the lightning pops closer and closer.  Until the downpour becomes fierce and the wind whips harder than the umbrella can physically with stand and has to be put away.  Brianna and I have awesome rain gear, zpack rain skirts and vertice rain jackets.  None of that matters when the rain comes in diagonally at your face, we got thumped for the last mile.

One of the amazing parts about putting yourself at the mercy of Mother Nature and her wrath is how it changes what your mind sees in the world around it.  Every tree becomes a potential friend, a potential enemy, something that should not be ignored.  Stay away from roads with fields on both sides, don’t be the tallest object in the area.  Take shelter near trees, not too small, definitely not too large, check above for widow makers.  Always count the distance between lightning and thunder.  Trust your gut.  Trust her gut.  You can make it through this.

We did make it through.  Time for sleep.  Another weather filled day is coming our way tomorrow, yay!

Today was meant to be a zero that turned into a nero, nero being a ‘near zero day’.  Our original plan for a zero day on Tuesday got fast tracked to today after the storms cleaned our clocks all yesterday.  It’s true that more storms were due today, and they did come in severe forms, but it’s a stormy kind of week and running from those is not really an option.  The real reason for our nero day is physical and mental fatigue.  Our home for the night is Adams Inn, a 4 mile march south.

We spent the morning walking through the towns of Adams & Friendship; laundry and resupply was done well before noon. Check-in at our Adams Inn hotel was not until 3pm so we hit a local pub, Jack Pine Saloon, and had a beer while chatting up the locals.  As per usual, there was a lot of confusion around what we are doing and why we are doing it, followed quickly by strong support and well wishes once we had a chance to explain it all.  They were very sad to hear we would not be passing back through after finishing the trail.

Brianna & I also had a chance to plan out the next week or so.  It is becoming quite obvious that if we are going to finish this trail, we are going to need a huge amount of miles in a relatively short period of time.  The best solution we have is to stop using the official connecting roads, make our own more efficient CRs.  If we push hard and get some luck, maybe, just maybe, we can finish this thing without jumping a section in the middle.

Horsemen ride to Wisconsin this weekend.  Their presence is most welcome! 

This is the stage of the game where the IAT begins to change.  Northern Wisconsin had challenging trails with plentiful camping, towns and resupplies were few and far between.  In the south & east, the trails are more flat and we will walk through at least one town on the daily, but camping options are extremely limited.  We have light packs and tight timelines for our tracks.

I mentioned in yesterday’s post that we will be creating our own more efficient connecting routes, that starts today.  Instead of taking the long roads further west, Brianna and I walked 7.5 miles south on Highway 13.  It was a bit hairy at times, some drivers have a tendency to angle over the white lines as they look at us and wonder, “WTF are these people doing.”  Fortunately for us, there was a big shoulder for us to walk on with flattish grass if we needed to sidestep. From Highway 13, we jumped on 13th ave and continued south on a less busy road for a while.  There are gas stations and other random businesses if we had stayed on the Highway, a trade we were more than willing to make.

If you’ve ever looked at a map of the IAT, you may have noticed that the trail has a big circle loop thing the middle.  This weird thing in the middle is what they call a bifurcation.  Hikers who arrive at the Bifurcation can go west to and through the Wisconsin Dells or go east through some sights related to John Muir’s childhood.  We chose to go west.  I have never seen the Dells before and that seemed like a good enough reason to pick one over the other.

Arriving to the Dells today, a city with this many people, this many stores and restaurants, is both cool and unsettling.  On one hand, we have so many things within walking distance and could Grubhub/DoorDash any food that is not.  On the other hand, there are people everywhere… I feel fortunate to have arrived in on a Monday.

Truth be told, this city is almost exactly like Gatlinburg, TN, and I love Gatlinburg.  Well, I love the memories I have with the people I love in Gatlinburg; hiking, drinking beer, eating trout balls.  Being at the Wisconsin Dells feels like I’m hanging out with a person who looks just like one of my best friends, but isn’t.  It’s like losing your favorite jacket of ten years and buying a new one to replace it.  Gatlinburg and the Wisconsin Dells look so similar, still so different.  Being here one night is not going to help me know the Dells any better either.  The last thing I’m going to do after a long hiking day is check out the local hikes, I promise you that.

Weather reports said the day was to be full of rain.  We got a little drizzle and nothing more.  The real weather worth watching was the sun, and I forgot to put sunscreen on, so now my arms are burnt up.  Feet are doing well, shoes smell like a dog’s butt.  New shoes are on the way and due to arrive on Friday. 650+ miles is far enough for these walking cow patties.  Seriously.  When we are walking and there is no breeze, we can smell our shoes.  It’s bad.

A coyote was trying to convince me it was a dog, casually striding down the trail and closer to me. I knew it wasn’t a dog.  I also knew it wanted to rip my flesh into pieces and have me for dinner.  The coyote’s muscles tensed as the beast lowered its head and leaped forward. My grip, already tight around the hilt of my side sword, pulled hard into a side slice that cut through flesh and bone without pause.

I didn’t know what the dream meant at the time, but as it turns out, coyotes in the dream world represent “tricky and unexpected elements in life.”  Today was full of tricky and unexpected elements.

My morning started out with a weather update text from Mel. Weather looked hot and clear of storms when we went to sleep last night.  By 0500, the maniacal weather people were predicting massive storms with high winds and a potential for tornadoes.  

With storms due to arrive by 5pm, I decided to sneak out to Dunkin’ and get Brianna a proper coffee and doughnut.  Fail.  Half a dozen cop cars surrounded the Dunkin’ building, the entrance fully coned off.  I’m not sure if the place had been robbed or if it was just vandalism, but the glass front door had been shattered into bits.

Today was HOT. We pushed through as many hiking miles as we could before the heat of the day was on us in full.  The heat punished us as we headed towards a planned lunch at the Subway in Baraboo.  

I was simultaneously too hot to eat and too hungry to keep walking.  My mind was bouncing back and forth between these two thoughts as I began walking the final  crosswalk that would lead us to the Subway parking lot.  That was precisely when an older gentleman driving a white SUV decided to do a no look left onto the street I was attempting to cross, he had no idea I was even there.  If I hadn’t seen it out of the corner of my eye and leaped back, I would have gotten hit very hard.  His SUV had fully passed the crosswalk by the time he hit the breaks and he only did so because I yelled, “Whoa!”  My brain was too fried to register any other response, I’m not even sure how I reacted quick enough to save myself.

Cold Gatorades and an air conditioned Subway helped to perk us back up for a bit, helped us recover from my near accident.  The thing about crushing heat indexes is that it only takes 5-10 minutes before you’re mentally defunct once again.  We walked as far as we could as often as we could but it wasn’t good enough; dark thunderous clouds were ahead of schedule and rolling in our direction.  2 miles away from camp for the night and the speed of slow is all we could muster.

Enter our newest trail angel, Ron.  Brianna had been on the phone for 15-20 minutes trying to sort out a ride when a black and white collie appeared out of nowhere, jumping into the nearby river and scattering geese like bowling pins into the water.  We were taking shelter in a large brick pavilion area when Ron asked if we needed a ride and agreed to drive us the final 2 off trail miles.  Thank you, Ron!!

A very interesting day.  What dreams may come?

It was another hot day, and by the end of it, I’d be carrying two backpacks and will have lost my phone to the bottom of Lake Wisconsin.

Devils Lake State Park is as treacherous as it is beautiful, and beauty is the reason it ranks #1 in Wisconsin for visitors each year.  In some parts, rocks are cemented into winding staircases that go up and up and up.  In other parts, jagged rocks have been worn into footpaths where we, and the others before us, had to step/climb our way up.  It was a challenging day, though far from the most challenging day we have had so far.

The Devil’s lake hike has three major climbs in about a 5 mile span.  We got through the first climb without much trouble, stopped to enjoy the lake views and even made a funny video as we went.  Somewhere during the second climb, Brianna noticed a familiar pain in her back that seemed to get worse as we went along.  We did our best to stop more frequently so she could stretch, take some Advil, even moved some of her equipment to my bag to lighten her load, nothing seemed to help.  Our bags have been as light as they have ever been, so I was even able to carry her entire bag strapped around the front of me for a couple miles to see if a walk without weight might help loosen the muscles.  No luck.

In addition to Brianna’s worrisome pains, we were also trying to outrun another storm with tornado potential.  The goal was to make it to a pub just before the Merrimac Ferry, and we did make it just before 3pm.  We would wait out the storm at the pub and plan out what the rest of the day might look like, try to figure out how we might get Brianna to a bed and be more comfortable, how to get out of the sweltering heat.  Our hotel for the night was still a solid 10 miles away and Uber options didn’t seem to exist.

Brianna & I were sitting at a picnic table waiting for our pub food to arrive when a woman and her daughter, Jess & Bella, sat next to us and struck up a conversation.  Jess asked about our hiking and offered us her basement as a spot to crash for the night if we were interested.  I’m not sure how these people keep finding us in our hours of need, but Jess is another solid new Wisconsin friend.  We ate our pub meals and piled into her car for another chance night at a random kindly stranger’s house.

Of all the people we have met on this trip, Jess is probably the one we have gotten to know the best in the short time we had together.  Her husband passed away about five years ago, shortly after they moved to Merrimac, and they have been there ever since.  Instead of going back to her house to crash, she called her friend Dave and got us a boat ride on and a proper tour of Lake Wisconsin.  Brianna’s back was feeling modestly better by this point, or at least not worse, so we went on a boat ride!

A moment of honesty here.  Before today, I had no idea Lake Wisconsin existed.  Turns out that it does exist and it’s more of a dammed river than it is a lake, with hidden stumps and sand bars, all sorts of danger to water-crafts with uninformed captains.  We floated around for a bit, got some dam pictures, shot the shit about life.

Both Dave and Jess have history in Michigan and the surrounding area.  At first I thought it was weird, such a coincidence that we have been to the same places and experienced some of the same things, but now I don’t think it’s a coincidence at all.  Brianna & I have had a lot in common with many of the people we’ve met along the trail and it doesn’t even have anything to do with the trail itself.  I’m only now, at the age of 39, coming to the realization that the more you do, the more things you experience, the more people you will be able to relate to.  If all you do is play video games and work, ride 4-wheelers and farm, then your relatable world stays within those boundaries.  If you continuously put yourself out there, travel and try new things like video games with a stranger one day and 4-wheeling on a farm the next day, your world expands dramatically in just a small window of time.

The boating trip was amazingly fun, right up til the end.  To disembark the boat, we had to slide off the front end and into the water.  I have a hiking habit of putting my phone into the right pocket of my shorts, where it sticks out halfway because my pocket isn’t deep enough to fit the entire thing.  When I slid off the front of the boat, I slide right side first, popping the phone up out of my pocket and into the murky waist deep waters of Lake Wisconsin.  We all searched the lake floor with our feet, no luck.  Brianna tried calling it to see if the screen would light up and be visible, we saw nothing.  It was gone, forever.

I want to say today was a good day.  The best I can say is that it was a day that could have been worse than it was and I’m glad that it wasn’t.  Jess and Bella are awesome new friends, we’ve got that much!

🎶

I tremble

They’re gone eat me alive, if I stumble

They’re gonna eat me alive

Can you hear my heart beating like a hammer

Help, I’m alive, my heart keeps beating like a hammer

🎶 (Help I’m Alive, by Metric)

The words you never want to hear on a thru-hike, “I don’t think I can hike.  I think I’m done.”  That’s a paraphrase, it was around 0500 and emotionally blurry.  Brianna’s back had tightened up overnight in a painful and familiar way.  I squeezed her hand. There is no appropriate response, nothing that will do.  Thoughts spiral and shoot from this hike and on into the future, if you let them.

I’ve always had it in my mind that one of us would eventually go down with a back related injury.  Expecting and experiencing are two very different things.  Back problems are part of who we are, and not by choice.  These situations challenge the best in all of us.  Do we bow to the devil’s staircase or do we keep looking for a way push up and over? 

Conversation quickly moved to how she could still help me finish the hike, we didn’t have to both be done.  Now it was my turn for internal strife.  Do I want to finish this hike alone?  Do we Romeo and Juliet the adventure right here and draw curtains to a close?  Too much.  I tabled my doubts for future discussions. We were at our new friend Jess’s house (who we didn’t want to worry because she would have dropped everything to help us) and I had no phone to help with our logistical problems. If I am going to continue hiking, we needed to quickly find Brianna a ride to Lodi and somewhere to haven while I walk into town.

One of the many amazing things about Brianna is how effective she becomes when angry, and she was furious at the situation.  She had a ride lined up with the local IAT coordinator, Carla, on the other side of the Merrimac Ferry by 0630.  Brianna would hang with Carla at her wellness center while I hiked and we would figure out what to do next afterwards.  Things like getting me a phone would have to wait, so I took Brianna’s and did my best to push through the miles and reunite with her again quickly.

I made the 10-12 miles into Lodi, WI in good time, was in town and stuffing my face with the fresh fruit Carla had left me by 1pm.  Verizon does not have much coverage in Lodi, which made planning more speculative than specific. We knew that the city of Middleton wasn’t more than a 20 minute drive and had hotels next to a Verizon store, so that became the day’s next goal.  Brianna had seen a chiropractor for the first time in her life while I was hiking and was feeling better, but still very sore, walking for her would be kept to a minimum.

After listening to our plan, such as it was, Carla introduced us to Crystal, an amazing lady who would hook us up with a ride into Middleton.  If I had to guess, Crystal is around my age and has had a life full of adventure as well.  On the drive over to Middleton, she recounted stories of Peace Corps in Africa, camp counseling troubled youths in the Uintas of Utah, a life of service that was also self-serving to an adventurer’s heart.  Our time with her was short and impactful, a person worth mentioning and remembering, a starchild to be met again.

I was able to acquire a new phone and book a nearby hotel rather quickly after Crystal dropped us off in Middleton.  The Horsemen were in Illinois playing arcade games when I alerted them to our new and complicated situation.  In classic horsemen style, they have booked a room in our hotel and are riding into assist a day earlier than originally planned.

This adventure may yet be saved.

The Horsemen friends rode into town last night.  They gave up a full night of arcade gaming to arrive to our hotel early, ensuring they would be here in the morning to help me get back on the trail where I left off back in the town of Lodi and help Brianna with whatever she needed in my absence.  Their energy and enthusiasm to help invigorated me for a big day, with over 30 miles hiked, it was my biggest ever.  I emptied my pack of all unnecessary weight, let them take care of Brianna and help plan out what the next few days of supported hiking might look like.

Hiking alone is not nearly as much fun as hiking with Brianna.  Alone time was fun for the first few hours, the Lodi Marsh, Springfield Hill & Indian Lake trail segments were all very well maintained and full of easy trails with rare overlooks of the small towns and prairies.  It’s easy to stay distracted when surrounded by beauty, it was the road miles that broke down my protective mental walls, blistered my brain with needless doubts.

How did I hike 30 miles in just under 12 hours?  My pack was light.  I ran down hills, I ran up hills, I ran to reunite with Brianna & friends.  My new shoes hugged my feet tightly, more hindrance than helpful, but there was nothing to be done save loosen the laces and run on.  I streamed so much music and played on my phone so often that I burned through an entire Anker battery pack.

Brianna & Horsemen made a point to brighten my day with surprise trail magic on the far side of the Indian Lake segment, just before I was to start a 5 mile stretch of road walk.  I drank a cold Mountain Dew and ate candy while we all joked around and chatted, quoted random movies, made fun of each other.  Reuniting with old friends is a rare and amazing thing at any time, especially as we get older and life, this visit is something even more than that.  How fortuitous their visit has ended up being.  Planned for a fun visit with a side of help, received a rescue with a side of “we’d be screwed without them.”

Guess what I did after our 15-20 minutes of trail magic ended?  I ran some more.  My Mountain Dew sugar rush of enthusiasm lasted right up to the last 3 miles of the day.  

I arrived at the Cross Plains trail segment and was immediately greeted with a series of steep hills.  With my energy zapped and only cheese crackers left for fuel, I sat on a bench at the foot of the hill and lamented on the day and my situation as a whole.  People often say “misery loves company” as one of life’s negative truths.  In my hiking world, not having Brianna there to share my pains with, makes it all seem so very pointless.  These hills, both the metaphorical and the very real one in front of me, had to be climbed.  An hour and a half later and thirty minutes tarty of when I told everyone I would finish, I walked past the IATA HQ building and collapsed onto the closest bench I could find.

The night ended as I would have expected, Friday night fish fry at a local diner with a couple Spotted Cow beers for good measure.

My feet hurt and I’ve got new blisters but I’m going to try for another 30 miler tomorrow.  Bob is planning to walk 10 miles with me towards the end, we’ll see how far I can get.  Brianna is feeling better, still a ways to go before jumping back in the trail again.

This morning started early.  I had my eyes set on another 30ish mile day, my feet and I had a long conversation last night and it was unanimously decided that running would not be an option today.  If running was out, I’d have to keep a consistent pace throughout the day with shorter breaks as needed.  Brian was more than happy to get up before sunrise and cart me back to the IATA HQ building for starting my day.

Walking all these road miles has given me the opportunity to see how this area of Wisconsin has changed and is changing.  There are old country roads with old farm houses on one side of the road and huge boxy shaped modern houses on the other side.  We saw a lot of these different architectures at Lake Wisconsin, which is kind of expected on waterfront property, right?  Seeing large amounts of money go into property development in the farm area from people not farming has been an odd thing to see.

Weather since Brianna’s injury day has been the best hiking weather we have seen in over a week.  Ironic, annoying or lucky?  Highs in the low 80s with zero chance of rain have really helped me put on the big miles.  Even so, today’s Valley View trails & road walks left me exposed to large amounts of sun all morning.  I spent most of the day with the sunbrella out and made sure Bob brought one out for his afternoon hike with me.  This is my first hike with a sunbrella and I wouldn’t go on another without it.  Too much sun ruins a good day, ruins a good body.

Today’s approach to the miles was a little different than normal.  Instead of starting at point A and hiking to point B, we did a sort of ‘flip-flop’.  I hiked from IATA HQ and into the city where our hotel is, Verona, and had Brian pick me up.  From there, Brian drove Bob and I to the south end of the hike and dropped us off so we could hike back into the city.  A day hike like this was a convenient way to hook up with Bob and not make Brian drive 20-30 minutes to pick us up at the end of the day.  Also, Bob only wanted to hike 10 miles and this approach let me map out what that would look like a little easier, have fewer road miles.

Bob & I’s 10 mile hike through the Brooklyn Wild Life Area & Montrose segment was mostly flat and enjoyable terrain that ended with a 3 mile ATV/bike path.  The journey took us around 5 hours as we walked and talked the whole way.  We cherish alone time together and are never short on topics, particularly those related to family life and adventuring.  It was precisely this kind of Bob & Marty conversation that got us joining the Air Force together 23ish years ago.

A Horsemen visit wouldn’t be complete without some kind of video game experience, particularly when my predicament robbed my friends of some planned arcading, so the boys took a drive to the I/O arcade bar in Madison.  My feet hurt and it was hard to stand, neither of which prevented me from having a beer and getting down on some Dig Dug, Frogger, Guitar Hero, Mortal Combat and NBA Jams.  It was past 11pm by the time I got to bed.  No regrets!

The IAT trail miles are about to get confusing and there are a few reasons for it.  

If you are paying attention to the IAT miles in my subject lines, you will have noticed that we jumped from starting at mile 743 to 769.  This jump is for logistical reasons.  We will be going back to hike those miles after Penny gets into town and hands Brianna’s car off.  The horsemen left for Michigan this morning and the only lodging we could reserve for tonight is in Janesville, WI, a 50+ mile hike if we didn’t make a temporary jump like this.

Another mile mystery you might have noticed is how it looks like I hiked a 40 mile day today.  I may be capable of such a feat, but that is not what happened today.  The official IAT connecting route through this area goes wide north and is 33.7 miles long.  Since the IAT allows you to make your own connecting routes (road walks) and the logic behind their official route made no sense to us, we cut through on a back road, reducing the connecting route miles to about 17.  My actual mileage for the day was around 25-26 miles.

Even with the reduced mileage via our hack, my day still started out with a long 17 mile road walk.  I wanted more than anything to have Brian drop me off on the other side, on actual trail, but I couldn’t get the words out of my mouth.  Hacking off miles seemed like more fun than cheating them, I guess.  My decision was rewarded about halfway through the road walk when an older gentleman in a boon hat walked by me from the opposite direction and stopped to ask if he could turn around and walk with me for a while. More than happy for the company, I replied, “yes, please do!”

I can’t for the life of me remember the gentleman’s name, but we talked about life and adventures for a solid couple miles.  He was a GM retiree and was able to directly relate to my modest Michigan origins.  He also recounted a tale from when he was in his 20s.  He didn’t explain why he did it, but he hitchhiked from Wisconsin all the way down to the Florida Keys.  He agreed with my assessment of Wisconsinites being a generally good and helpful folk.  He was also a firm believer that most people in the US are good and wanting to help others, it’s the bad people that get all the attention.

The rest of my road walk, after parting ways with my newest friend, was filled with sun and exhausting to the core of my soul.  Hiding in ditches alone is just not as fun as it is with Brianna.  The last 3 miles were on a busy road with nearly no shoulder space.  It’s takes a long time to make 3 miles when you have to jump into the weeds every few minutes to avoid getting hit by trucks.  I also had my sunbrella out, which would get taken by the wind of passing by vehicles, wanting to suck me into traffic if I didn’t react and retract quickly enough.

I was able to complete the road miles and make it to actual trail on the Janesville segment by around 2pm.  A long 7 miles separated me from Brianna and I was out of both food and water as I carefully stepped my way through the Devil’s Staircase, which was beautiful and definitely worth seeing.  Reaching the end of the Devil’s Staircase was especially cruel, but not for the reasons I would have expected.

If there is a hiker heaven, it would include fresh food, ice cream, pop, water, the works.  Today found me stepping down from trail and into the Riverside Park Music Festival.  There was a live cover band with people sitting around the stage in camping chairs.  Lions Club was roasting big chicken legs and selling everything I could have wanted.  There was however, just one problem, it was cash only and Brianna carries the cash.  I’m not sure what the people were thinking as I, a homeless looking dude, descended the stairs and made my way through the crowds.  What I do know is that no one offered me any food or drinks.  Not that anyone should have, I just wanted to be clear in that they did not!

I am a firm believer that not having Brianna here, my shield, dramatically reduces my approachability.  That said, today has proven that I am not completely unapproachable, homeless as I may look.  Soon after finding a drinking fountain at the park to fill my water bottle at (no cash needed), a shirtless and muscle bound dude, Timothy, called me over to his grill and insisted I try one of his world famous chicken wings.  He explained that his technique was learned in prison back when he was a bad guy, but he is a good guy now and I look like the road has been long and rough.  The chicken wing was delicious, thank you, Timothy!

The rest of today’s hike hugged close to Lake Koshkonong outflow river, leading me into town and to exactly where Brianna was waiting for me.  The horsemen were kind enough to drop her to our hotel on their way to the ferry over Lake Michigan.  Brianna had to wait from 10am until 3pm to check in, her own set of challenges and adventures that were probably as frustrating as a 17ish mile road walk.

Since we have no vehicle and Brianna is not yet ready to hike again, our plan for tomorrow will likely be for me to catch an Uber 27 miles northeast of our hotel and hike back into town.  We push on!

With the 20 mile Albany & Monticello segments temporarily jumped yesterday, today is the day I actually hit 800 miles hiked.  It sounds like I will be making up the missed miles tomorrow for a shorter day, which will leave a poultry 300 miles of total trail left.  This whole thing could be finished in 12 more days if I’m able to push hard enough.

Starting my day out with an Uber was weird.  My brain has trained itself to walk through towns and expect to never see them again and these past few days have been so much the opposite; options limited such as they are.  I had to get an Uber to the middle of nowhere from Janesville because of how Uber geofencing for rides works.  Simply put – the Uber app has no problem finding me a driver from a big city to a small city but once you are in the small city, you lose access to all of the drivers in the big city, even if that is your destination and mileage is the same.

It took a few tries but I was eventually able to land a pretty cool driver, Brad.  Brad runs his own transportation business and hands cards out to people he picks up on Uber.  Pretty genius, right?  His business is really designed to help solve the problem I described above, which may come in handy for me if I am to make up our skipped miles.  He also recommended an Uber hack that I think is pretty sly:

If you are ever in a town that shows no drivers available, just lie about your location until a driver is found.  Once a driver is found, you can call or message the driver directly and explain the situation, offer cash for assistance.  It’s a shot in the dark, but the first step in asking for help us finding a person to ask.  Trail truth < – > Life truth.

I have been trying to decide if pushing for big mile days and taking time to enjoy the hike are conflicting approaches.  I pushed really hard today and still found time to break next to streams and relax.  There was actually about a 1 mile stretch today where a doe was within arms reach of me.  We chatted and walked together for until she jumped off into the woods and I sat down next to a stream.  She was back and hanging out on the opposite side of the water within 5 minutes, this time with a fawn that was taking turns between feeding on mom’s milk and eating plants.

Walking slow sounds nice and probably is the best way to go for most people.  My body is 42 days into the trail with muscles built for hiking.  Speed, for me, is more relative to terrain and pack weight, weather and distance.

At this point, you may be thinking, “hiking fast is probably how you got yourself into this solo hiking predicament in the first place.”  If so, I can see where you’re coming from, though I do not think that’s true.  The climb where Brianna’s back injury began, up Devil’s Lake State Park, was about 2-3 miles into our day and our packs were light as they had ever been, each with only a day worth of food.  The night before her injury was spent at Willowwood Inn on a soft bed where each of us had a good night’s rest.  No, I think this injury is a reminder that shit happens, particularly to those of us with pre-existing injuries.  We will do more to reduce the likelihood of injury, like daily stretching, pack weight distribution, massages on trail and all that, but our risk factor will always be high.

Today’s hike through the town of Milton and back into Janesville was enjoyable.  This area is rich with parks and paved walkways for the city people to get out and enjoy.  Aside from the road walk at the beginning, I was in the woods but still walking on cement for most of the day.  Cement is easier than walking through knee high grass and bogs, to be sure, it is also harder on the knees and feet.  My speed on cement is always slower these days.  The best thing you can do is take the same approach long distance runners do – take shorter strides to reduce impact up the feet and into the knees.  It’s a common misconception that larger strides are better because it takes fewer to get you where you are going.

Penny and Athena are arriving tomorrow with Brianna’s car and will be hanging out for a week!  With Brianna in good hands, we’ll see what these hiker muscles can really do.