New Jersey

So far I have enjoyed NJ. Yes, it has rocks, but not to the same extent as PA. I may be biased though for a couple of reasons. One, I grew up in NJ and have the classic NJ chip on my shoulder. I love my state and have definitely been looking past it's rocky flaws. The other reason is that so far in NJ, my girlfriend, Sarah, as well as my mom and two sisters have come out and backpacked with me.

Sarah and I knocked out almost 20 miles in our day and a half together. Our first night, we camped atop Mt. Kittatiny and caught an amazing sunset. I also ruined poor Sarah's Mac and cheese dinner with wayyyy too much butter flavoring, but she found it in her heart to forgive me.

On our second day we hiked past rattlesnake swamp and surprise- we saw a rattlesnake. A pretty big one too. Prob 4-5 ft i would estimate. Earlier in the day Sarah had read up on her venomous snakes in the lodge of the Mohican Outdoor Center and she suggested I walk first. As we were strolling down the trail I came about 2 steps from stepping on the fat rattler as he (or she) sunned in the middle of the trail. I instantly jumped back as I realized what was ahead of me and immediately the serpent coiled up in a strike position and shook the big rattle on his tail. He wanted space and we gave it to him. Sarah remembered that we needed to give the snake at least 5 feet of space at all times an we did just that. After a couple minutes the snake slithered off to the west side of the trail, but only about 4-5 feet in. We tried to sneak past and as we did, he rang that rattle loud at us again. So our sneak changed to a run and we were safe from any need for anti-venom.

After our snake encounter we met up with my parents and sisters (Lisa and Amy) and got a bite to eat. Sarah would be going back to NYC and my sisters and mom would continue hiking with me.

The four of us set out around 6pm and I figured we had about 1-2 hrs of hiking before setting up camp. Sure enough, as soon as we walked into the woods, there read a sign- no camping for the next 3.5 miles. This made me a little nervous as I did not know the terrain ahead and 3.5 miles could very well take us past dark- a problem since I was the only one with a headlamp.

We walked the trail and even had to do some light rock climbing at points. Once on a cliff, I noticed a storm off to the west. The combination of an approaching storm and darkness had me in full campsite search mode. Fortunately we found one not too long after and literally just as we had camp setup, the rain began to fall. Talk about good timing!

The four of us crammed into my two person tent and played rummy while the cool rain made pitter patters on the fly (tarp) surrounding us.

The next day we all hiked in some intense heat, but everyone performed quite admirably. I tried giving out trail names but no one really liked theirs. Go figure, my mom didn't want to be called Gandolf.

All in all, had a great time with my backpacking visitors for the weekend and welcome the chance to hike with any other friends who would like to give this crazy trail a try.

-mojo