In the morning, we were asked what we'd like Mr. and Mrs. Shaw to make us for breakfast. I don't remember the exact details of my meal, but I know it had pancakes, eggs, bacon, OJ and coffee. Their son, Keith, was serving the table and taking care of questions while the old folks cooked up a storm in the kitchen. Certainly, it was a far cry from the cup of cold oatmeal I'd grown used to - I was not left wanting.

    After being stuffed, we slowly got our gear packed up and relaxed, watching Ocean's Eleven (someone had rented a few movies for us) until my parents arrived. My original plan had been to continue to the next town with Joe, but after my ankle issue had cropped up, I wanted to take 2-3 days to relax so it wouldn't keep giving out on me. However, getting to the next town would have only take 2-3 days, so I would've spent the amount of time I had planned out here doing...nothing. Because of that, I had called my parents the previous day and told them I would probably be leaving the trail on July 5th. I had barely started to talk about where I might be able to find a bus stop when my mom volunteered to drive up to Maine and bring me back. Partly due to his knees acting up on the steep downhill sections, Joe also decided to cut out at this point. He, too, was trying to find a bus stop or what-not, but my parents volunteered to take him back as well.

    An aside that should be mentioned at this point is that while clearing out some foliage on the south side of our property back home (in preparation for a 4th of July BBQ), my dad had come in contact with poison ivy. A lot of it. It had grown all around our neighbor's trees, and he didn't immediately recognize the leaves that had blended in when trimming down the sections that had grown over into our yard. As such, he was prescribed some steroids to deal with the reactions. He drove up from Jersey to Maine, pretty much non-stop, and felt he didn't need a break when he'd finally arrived at Shaw's. We ended up rotating drivers on the way back between him, myself and my mom, but he wasn't tiring out at all.

    Before we left the magical kingdom of Shaw's, we took a group photo on the front lawn to remember the hikers that had traversed the 100-mile wilderness together. Joe and I also took a photo in front of the building. After gathering our belongings and saying our goodbyes to the great group we'd been traveling with, we set out for NJ.

    Funny thing about that following night, and a few afterwards: I was unable to sleep on my mattress. I kept waking up, pulling out my worm sleeping bag and crashing on the floor instead. It was simply something I'd grown used to, and I've never had a problem sleeping on hard surfaces to begin with.

    I had a barbecue/get-together for most of my Cooper associates a few weeks later, so they could ask Joe and myself about our time on the trail. I let the beard keep growing that entire time, I didn't shave it until about a month later. I kind of reminded me of the trail while it was with me, but it was certainly no match for what Otis had amassed.

    Beyond that, aside from occasional queries and stories with friends about the trail, there was nothing significant...until March of 2006. Squeaky Quail had found me, and e-mailed me. Aside from the usual "how ya been?" chitchat, he had some interesting information on the fates of our other hiking buddies. Rather than paraphrase everything he wrote, I'll take the lazy way out and simply post his letter.

"i don't know if you know anything about the others of the group, but eric heaps (the colonel) had to pull out after a few months, developed irritated bowel syndrome or something to that effect.  being a mormon and all, he went on his 2 year mission trip (i believe to portugal) and has since returned.  mike (the gardener) who didn't plan on finishing went back to tennessee after monson.  otis and collin from what colonel told me made it through to virginia and i'm assuming finished strong.  speedo and gentle ben pulled out at monson too since they realized they could accomplish what all they set out to on the trail without separating themselves completely from society (religious enlightening?  i don't know, but that's just what i gathered from the car ride home).  don't know what happened to brett (piper), fred baby and little moose, or tunaberry.  i heard from a south bounder i encountered recently on the trail that old man shaw died (the guy that ran the hiker hostel in monson) and his son keith now runs the family business.  as for me, i pulled out of monson too due to a calf injury, but i wasn't planning on doing the whole trail either...until now.  i'm about to graduate from virginia tech, and have decided to take a semester off before graduate school and thru-hike the whole trail from north to south (i ain't no northbound sissy).  it got in my blood (that delicious blood the mosquitoes crave) and it's been in the back of my mind my whole undergrad"
 

    I thought it was kind of cool that Quail was taking a semester off before grad school to do the hike, as that was the original plan Joe and I had. At the time of this e-mail, I had only completed my trail journal up to Day 9, as it was a very arduous process. Transcribing entries as long as these from sentence fragments and memories take quite a while, especially since I'm anal about not leaving out any details I may want to remember years down the line. Also, whenever I managed to get enough free time where I might be able to work on the journal, I'd normally be distracted and do something more relaxing, like Starcraft. As such, I didn't even complete the bulk of this journal (missing a picture here or there) until July of 2006. I won't lie, Quail's e-mail was a big motivator for me to finally finish this. It was right around the time my job hunting was hitting big strides, though, so I got delayed longer than I would've liked. But, it's finally here, so anyone that's interested in this sort of crap, I hope you enjoyed it. If not, I wrote this up mainly for my own sake to have years down the line, so nuts to you.

    To anyone that hiked with us way back then in the summer of 2002, if you're reading this, toss me an e-mail. I'd love to hear from you guys, especially if you can correct any mistakes I've made here. Ha.