Day 16. Wow. Just wow.

I know what you're saying. You did 14 miles yesterday in the heat, with new shoes and a whole passel of blisters. XL take it easy today. I heard you in the back of my mind all day. But alas, it was not to be, despite my intentions. 

Had a good night's sleep, not getting eaten by a bear, and we broke camp fairly early. We were on the trail by 8am, and our plan was to hit the next shelter in line, which was about 8 miles away. About half the distance we did yesterday. My legs were still cooked and the trail was fairly rocky (PA is known for that) but we still made good time. 

We ran into this guy on the way-

And some of the trail was like this-

We arrived at the shelter just after 1pm. We ate and I camped out on one of the bunks (yes, some of them have bunks!) and promptly fell asleep for a few hours. 

During my nap, a woman arrived at the shelter and started talking to Coin. She was obviously mentally ill, and kind of babbling about people chasing her all over the trail. She showed him a fairly large buck knife and said she would protect herself from anyone trying to get her. She wandered off a short while later and we figured we were safe. 

A few hours later, she showed up again and let us know she was staying at the shelter tonight. We quickly decided we'd do another 4 miles into Duncannon rather than putting ourselves in any kind of situation. 

We strapped our stuff on and went on to town, which was a hellish experience. We had to descend about 1200 feet of steep rock steps, which is exhausting. But we made it to the famous (or infamous) Doyle Hotel. I'll tell you more about the Doyle tomorrow.  Suffice to say, we're relieved to be someplace safe for the night. 

-XL