Graymoor Monastery to Fahnestock SP; Distance = 11 Miles; People Met = 25
I never thought we would be meeting 25 people in one day on this last stretch of the journey. Some of them were AT section hikers. Pete or “Seeks It” was doing the AT in a novel way, parking his van at roads and hiking to a point and back. In essence he is hiking the AT twice, once in each direction. Mike had intended to hike the whole trail, but brain cancer in the family disrupted his original plans and he was piecing together what he could.
Pete ("Seeks It")
Mike
We hiked for a stretch on roads, which is where we met Ted and his son Matthew cleaning up their yard. Matthew was quite the helper, eager with helping his Dad and with running to the house to get both maps and water on our behalf. We had a nice chat about the impact of storms over this past year.
Ted and helpful son Matthew
Most of the people we met were at the campground where we stayed in Fahnestock State Park. We spent some time with James and Sara, who were frequent travelers and met in Barcelona. Mostly we hooked on the birthday party going on across from our own campsite. Nikki approached us first bearing water for us, as her boyfriend is an AT section hiker currently out on the trail.
Jim and Sara entertained us (I forgot the gentle Rottweiler's name)
Back: Lara, Birthday Sara, Sara, Justin, Nicolette; Front: Joanie, Blair, Nikki
Justin enthusiastically approached us about his bathroom t-shirt project. He saw a parallel in our journey of kindness and shirts he designed and leaves in bathrooms for strangers to take and wear. This is his means of providing a needed icebreaker for our society to become more social. See details below.
Shirt instructions.
Birthday Sara and crew had us over for supper, birthday celebration and breakfast the next morning. They are all from Connecticut, not far from us, but I failed to get the addresses from any of them. If any of you are reading this now, please leave a comment. Thanks for your kindness.
Other Photos
Randy helped us get back on the AT
Craig read about us in the Poughkeepsie Journal
If you see this shirt in a bathroom somewhere, go ahead and take it!
Hi Kirk,
I learned of your website after reading PJ Wetzel’s blog. Been following him since December on his amazing Double Thru-Hike journey. Thank you for your kindness to those you meet and the joy you share as you exchange smiles and photos. Thank you for your hand extended to others … when they are so far from home.
Smiles!!!
Greetings Kristal,
Thanks for those kind words and for dropping by. Welcome.
Kirk
Kirk,
You can shoot us an e-mail or just go to the facebook page to find us. Hope the rest of your journey went well and you are enjoying being home.
Greetings Justin,
Thanks for dropping by, and thanks for that enjoyable evening at Fahnestock. For some reason I could not find your fb page when I first looked for it. Found it this time, though.
Kirk
Thanks for posting about the BR t-shirt, Kirk. What an interesting project. You just picked up all sorts of ideas throughout your journey and it’s most interesting to read how other people are displaying their acts of kindness, too. Thanks again for helping us to focus better and more often on those RAK!
Thanks for checking it out, Christy. Hope all goes well in Grand Pass.