We were up and on trail by 7AM with just a protein bar in our bellies. My hunger from the night before had caught up with me and I was moving at a snails pace. What kept me moving was the thought of a real breakfast in Piseco. But as we hiked I kept thinking about how many days and miles we had left. At this rate we would not be back to our car in Lake Placid by Monday which needed to happen so we could get back to work. We weren’t going to be able to put in the 17 mile days with the trail food we had brought, Joe had a wound that looked very painful and we were heading into a stretch after Piseco that would leave us without any options for getting off the trail for tens of miles. I remembered how scared and vulnerable I felt that first night when Joe started to shake and we were 15 miles from anywhere. These were my thoughts that I kept to myself.
Suddenly Joe says he doesn’t think he can make it with his heel. It was killing him with every step. So I admitted out loud that I didn’t think I could do the number of miles I needed to do every day to get us to the end of the trail in the time we had left. We both knew Piseco was our last chance to get off for days. So right then we decided to call it quits at Piseco.
But we still had to get out, so on we hiked. 3.8 miles to Route 8 in Piseco. We knew the general store was there at the point where we crossed Route 8 but the map had a fork and knife on Piseco which was a 2.5 mile road walk from Route 8 and we had dreams of eggs and orange juice and thought we would have better luck finding a way to Lake Placid from Piseco. So we walked right past Casey’s Corner Store and headed into town. We talked about how we’d get back to our car in Lake Placid, 116 miles away by road. Take a bus, hitch a ride or when we walked past the Piseco Airport we talked about hiring some richie rich to fly our smelly selves in their private plane into Placid in style.
A woman was walking her dog down the street in the opposite direction and I asked her if the Greyhound bus went through town. She laughed a No. Not promising. We passed some other folks out chit chatting on the street and said hello. We asked another woman about the Irondequoit Hotel and if they were still serving breakfast. She didn’t think they served food. Thinking about Hubey who was going to the Irondequoit for a meal with a friend and the fork and knife on the map we plowed ahead on the 2.5 mile grueling road walk. At one point my cell phone started beeping and I had service. A bit down the road that service was gone and I never found service again in Piseco.
We arrived at the Irondequoit and left our packs outside. Its a pretty hotel on the beach. We walked in and talked to the gentleman behind the counter and he said they stopped serving breakfast at 10AM. I looked at my watch, it was 10:05AM. I stared at him. I asked when they would open the restaurant again. He said tomorrow. He thought the Oxbow Motel and Restaurant on Route 8 might be open. Joe and I looked at each other. I explained that we had hiked in and it was 2.5 mile walk back to Route 8. He stared at me. I asked if he had Wifi I could use. He said his modem was broken and Frontier was coming that day to replace it. I asked if he had tried rebooting it? Yes. I already had his SSID pulled up on my phone with the password screen open. We left. So folks, the Irondequoit Hotel is not hiker friendly.
We sat on the steps and ate another Clifbar and drank some water so we could make the 2.5 mile walk back to Route 8 with our beastly packs. We get our packs back on and start hiking again. I realize I don’t have mine adjusted properly and its pulling on my shoulders painfully but I refuse to stop and fix it. Now we are coming from the other direction and look like southbound hikers. A woman is walking the other direction and cheers us on. “You are almost done and look at you walking so fast!” We explain that we are actually north bounders having issues and getting off the trail and looking for food and shelter. She is alarmed and offers to go get her car and give us a ride to Casey’s. We thank her but say we’ll be fine. I tear up a bit at the kindness after the lack of it from the guy at the Irondequoit.
Onward we walk with me lagging behind and Joe stopping for me to catch up now and then. We meet another woman and ask her about the Oxbow. She says she’s pretty sure its closed as well as Casey’s Corner Store. Really? When we walked past Casey’s an hour or so ago the parking lot was filled with cars. On we go. Then a pickup truck with Oxbow Motel and Restaurant pulls into Airport Road which we just walked past again. The woman yells and points this out to us so we truck on down Airport Road to try and talk to the lady in the pickup. By the time we get there she is no where to be found and the hanger is locked so the dream of a plane ride to Placid dies completely for me. It never really existed for Joe. We leave the airport without talking to her and start walking back toward Casey’s. I’m dragging and barely moving it feels like when a guy in a pickup truck stops and says hop in and I’ll give you a ride to Casey’s. He opens the tailgate and I crawl in with my pack still on thanking him profusely. Joe has the presence of mind to take his off and then gets in so I’m still crawling in on all fours when he is all settled. Our savior says he’ll give us a ride back to the trailhead when we’ve eaten too. We say thanks but we are getting off the trail. I tell him if he knows of anyone going to Lake Placid let us know, we need a ride. His head dips.
We roll out of the truck at Casey’s drop our packs and go in and order subs and buy Fritos and drinks and wait patiently for our food. Casey’s is hiker friendly and has tables in the store where you can sit down and eat like real people. We sit at the one in the middle of the store and talk about getting a room at the Oxbow for the night and figuring out what to do. I say I’m going to buy a piece of paper and Sharpie and write Lake Placid on it and stand by the road. That’s my plan and I’m serious. Isn’t hitch hiking part of the thru hiker experience? And we’re not interested in asking anyone to take time off work to pickup our sorry asses. Joe thinks maybe we spend the week at the Oxbow and get ride from someone on Friday.
Its Taco Tuesday at Casey’s and we’ve arrived at lunch. Soon we are joined by some locals including our savior. We are chatting with them and talking about our situation. It seems they all saw us out there walking up and down that road to Piseco. One of the guys gives me the name of a Russian cabbie that transports hikers from Lake Placid to Northville for $200. I put the info into my phone for safekeeping and ask if he wants to take us for $150. He says no. More locals arrive and everyone’s chatting and I’m not paying much attention. We’ve got the local game warden and a retired NYC cop poking at each other and few other random locals. Our savior says, maybe Cindy will take them to no one in particular. Then he goes and asks to use the store phone. He comes back and says his wife Cindy will take us to Lake Place for $150! I ask if he’s told her we are dirty and stink? He says “she puts up with me”.
After he finishes eating he tells us he’s going home and they will be back to pick us up in 15 minutes. We wait outside. When they arrive in a Mazda Tribute out pops the lady we met on the road that offered to go get her car for us. Turns out Bob and Cindy (Cynthia she introduced herself as) like the thru hikers and seem excited to be helping us. Or maybe they just are nice. And Bob we find out after they drop us off is happy to take his wife on a date in Lake Placid for the day. We chat most of the way there and learn that Bob has bought the property adjacent to the trailhead in Piseco and hopes to put up a leanto and/or cabin for the hikers. They both seem semi-retired and outdoorsy. Cindy used to live not far from where I grew up and we chat about things in common. I wanted to ask for their last names and for a picture when they dropped us off at our car but didn’t want to make them uncomfortable. Instead I told Bob he and his wife were our Trail Angels and that we were so grateful to them. Now I’ll put my research skills to the test and try and get a thank you note to them and attempt to stay in touch. And I’ll probably ask National Geographic to move that fork/knife/bed on their map to the corner of Route 8 where Casey’s Corner Store and the Oxbow Motel are.
We’ll finish up this last 80 miles in a year or two, as soon as we can work it into our vacation schedule. We’ll start in Lake Placid. We’ll end in Piseco, just like this time but under better circumstances and maybe with a few local friends to reconnect with.
Words of Wanderers 