Movin' On Up

First of all - happy late July 4th! I hope everyone was very patriotic and gorged themselves on hotdogs and apple pie before blowing something up in their backyard. I did my part by hitching into town for a great lunch at Colonel Sanders' and then later lighting an obscene amount of sparklers at the shelter. My reward was waking up the next morning with my face covered in huge, oozing, awful bug bites. Or it could be some kind of rash. All I know is, it gross and it happened over night. Thanks America.

Secondly, I am now officially in "the North". Enemy territory. Yankee country. Although, if it weren't for the license plates you probably would never know it. Most of the people I've witnessed reek of "redneck" and the trail passes through so many historic areas, I haven't learned so much about the Civil War since I was in 5th grade. In fact, the hostel I'm staying at right now was part of the Underground Railroad. And I got to go down into the secret rooms!

And finally.....I'm really truly actually halfway to Maine! 1088.1 miles down, 1088.1 to go. Honestly, hitting halfway was pretty anti-climactic. I was by myself at the time, and there wasn't even any kind of marker to indicate it. I guess I'll just have to settle for the old marker with the wrong mileage. But to celebrate I'm spending the night here at Pine Grove Furnace State Park in Pennsylvania, only a few miles past the half, and home of the famous "Half-Gallon Challenge", where hikers try to down a whole half gallon of ice cream as fast as they can and then never eat ice cream again. However, since I enjoy ice cream so much, I opted for a pint instead, plus two cheesburgers and two orders of fries.

So now it's onward and upward...or northward. Only one more half to go!