May 7th, 2015

Today's miles = 19.7
Total ADK miles 41.7

I went to bed with my hip absolutely killing me. I woke up with it hurting even more. I refused to get out of my tent and instead rolled over and made my oatmeal and coffee. It was an hour or so later that I stood up for the first time today and almost fell over because my hip gave way. My hip? Seriously? Have I come to this? I also noticed that my big toenail was a little loose last night. That sucker is definitely not going to make it through this trip.

I made friends with a baby pine sapling this morning. I slept on it all night and when I woke up so did it; as perky and happy as ever. That made my morning.

Today was an all road walk day again. It sounds nice at first but after about 5 miles or so it really starts to take a toll on your feet, or in my case, my hip and big toenail. The road this morning was along more pine forrests with almost no houses or signs of human life except, of course, for the asphalt pounding underneath my feet. I much perfere roads like that than what the road turned into later in the day. The miles before I took my first break followed the river north of Chazy Lake. I passed some really cool country homes at this point. 5.7 miles in I found a nice little shaded area by some water and ate my break snack. The shade was absoutely welcomed by this time because my legs had become completely sunburned. I spent the rest of the day trying desperately to keep my legs out of the sun but finally broke down and put my pants on. I tried to keep up with drinking water and I did okay until the noon sun came out in full force. When it's really hot I find I don't want to drink water for three reasons. 1) the water is all warm. 2) you have to stop in the sun to drink it. 3) it makes me nauseous. So? By 3 or 4pm I was feeling pretty run down. My hip continued to get worse and by the end of the day there was nowhere really to stop because it had become rather populated with homes. I kept hiking along for what seemed like forever before I found a little brook (all water sources today were broooks) and a hill that I climbed that was across the road from someones house where I set up the tent. I have what appears to be sun poisoning on my legs, chaffing in deep dark places that I often forget exsist, and a hunger I have also long missed. Tomorrow I have about 6-8 miles of road walking before the cross country uphill bushwacking begins. I wish my toenail would just fall off already. I'm not sure why it's so determind to hang in there.

Time for bed. I'm sure I'll shiver all night because of the terrible bubbly sunburn.

Oh, I saw a snapping turtel today trying to cross the street. He got excessivly hostile rather quickly in my oppion when I approached him. I got hissed and snaped at. I took his picture and left him in peace to cross his road. We did not become friends.

Goodnight.