Hangin’ at the Gap

May 16-18, 2025

Delaware Water Gap, PA

The first day has been all about errands. Zero days tend to get swallowed up by necessary tasks like post office visits, laundry sessions, and resupply. There are folks who are super efficient about this—they can make a stop for a shower, a load of laundry, a resupply, and keep moving forward with miles to spare—but I’m not one of them. Not yet, at least.

Between the errands, my aching legs, the ongoing rain through Saturday, and the chance to reconnect with some of the hikers in town, I elected to take an extra day at the hotel and head north on Sunday morning. Sunday was predicted to be the start of a nice clear spell in the weather, and we haven’t had too many of those since I started. It would also give me one day for errands and one day for just plain rest. Like a lot of the decisions I’ve made recently, it feels decadent, but I can’t bring myself to regret it.

The hotel, caught in a rare non-rainy moment as I waited to make the pack cover handoff

I ran into Hotspot and Tolkien to my great surprise last night–these were the two ladies I’d met on my way out of the Lookout. Hotspot is thru-hiking, and Tolkien has been joining her for a section. Had a lovely breakfast with Hotspot early this morning before they headed out to keep going. Moon and TyeDye were coming into the Gap to pick up a hiker for shuttle, so I arranged a handoff for the pack cover they so generously lent me yesterday. When I was researching gear, I’d heard mixed opinions about pack covers–their detractors deplored the extra weight for an item not used every day and warned that they could even end up being counter productive if water got inside to pool at the bottom, etc. I ended up going without, since everything in my pack is in either a liner or a dry bag, but I did end up liking the pack cover I’d borrowed from Moon and TyeDye. Having my pack not soaked in water actually made it lighter over the long haul, and saved me the time of drying. I won’t go out of my way to grab one now, but I’ll keep a pack cover in mind for my next trip. 

Even with a drier pack, though, everything just smelled…bad. I’ve done laundry more than most, and I grab a shower every chance I get, but there’s no escaping hiker funk, it seems. I was reminded every time I left the hotel room and came back–the smell was like an additional guest in the room, and I spent a fair bit of time trying to figure out what I could do about it, both for the sake of the room, and for me going forward. A big part of it was the shoes, it turned out. I exiled them to the closet, opened up a window to the best of my ability, and tried to convince myself I’d solved the problem. 

In the meantime, Trash Tye was indeed at the hotel with her SO who had come to visit for the weekend, and Fairchild rolled into town mid-morning. It was great to see them again—I hadn’t spent considerable time with either of them, but the time I have spent was quality, and the both of them are immensely simpatico. All three of us are headed out on Sunday morning. I’m not sure we’ll end up together at the shelters, but it would be nice to see them again here and there, at the very least. 

We went together to a Walmart just outside of town for a resupply. It’s not like I haven’t been to Walmart recently, but I keep getting struck by how incredibly big these stores are, how much more they are than anyone needs. Last time I resupplied at a Walmart, I ended up buying way too much; this time, it was cool to split supplies with fellow hikers and talk each other down from overbuying. 

Through Trash Tye and Fairchild, I heard about a number of others. Hiker gossip is a powerful thing. My favorite piece of gossip this weekend was about Ezra, who I’d last seen in Port Clinton. He’s from the Hershey area, and on the day we first met, he offered me a Hershey’s Miniature from a huge bag as a souvenir from back home. Word is that he’s kept this up, and it’s resulted in his trail name: Wonka. 

Fairchild and I went to a local restaurant for dinner, and ran into Frankenstein again on our way back. He had shuttled forward today to slackpack back here–this is the way he likes to hike, hiking forward to a hostel, then shuttling ahead and hiking back. I asked him about the trail ahead, and he actually grimaced. Apparently the first stretch of trail we’ll meet going north from here is a little rough, much like what we’ve been dealing with so far. No specifically heinous rock scrambles, though. I’m hoping that dry weather will make things a bit better, regardless.