Saturday, March 16th 2002

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Saturday, March 16th, 2002
Mid State Trail
From Seven Mountains Scout Camp to Penn Roosevelt State Park

Map of Hike

Elevation Profile

OK, you're looking for a challenging hike to take before your first camping trip of the year. What do you look for in that hike? Well, if you've recently taken two hikes over some of the steepest, rockiest trails that have provided excellent views at the expense of several injuries, well, of course you combine the two hikes and try to do them both in the same day . . . and add a mile just for fun.

That's how this hike worked out--it was a 8 1/2 mile all-day boot buster with a 1528 foot elevation gain. This is pretty much near my limit as an XXL-sized hiker.

We (JVH and I) wanted to have a 'grueling' hike followed by a relaxing night camping. I planned to hike from the Seven Mountains Roadside Rest to Penn Roosevelt State Park, which was the only place within a reasonable distance where we could camp this time of year.

Upon seeing the sign that the roadside rest was closed, I should have known we were heading for trouble, but not being one to back down from a challenge, I decided to go for it. JVH, being unfamiliar with the area, followed my lead.

We parked at the Seven Mountains Scout Camp, having interrupted two fellows that seemed very confused by my request to park there overnight. Not having a clue where the trailhead from the camp was, I trusted my instincts . . . and my GPS, which still had trail data from the last several hikes I took in the area.

I knew we were heading a little further to the northeast than we wanted to, but blue blazes clearly led us that way. After recognizing that we were heading to Stillhouse Hollow Road (where I did not want to start the hike from) I noticed that we were on State Forrest property and decided to bushwhack up the mountain.

This was actually a lot of fun, but we lost a lot of time, too. The hill was quite steep, and I was reminded of my first bushwhack hike up Pine Creek Gorge. It was nearly that steep, but the footing was much better.

Upon reaching the rocky top of the hill, I met JVH, who seemed to have little trouble with the climb. We found the orange blazes of the Mid State Trail and headed towards the Big Valley Vista, which I had hiked over to a few weeks earlier.

The view was very nice, and we decided to eat lunch on Bald Mountain and just grab a quick snack here. Fortunately, I packed 100oz of Gatorade in my CamelBak, so I was in pretty good shape, energy-wise. This would turn out to be a very smart decision.

I figured that we were making good time, and we headed down to the Route 322 tunnel. The underpass was a lot less creepy this time, since there was a lot more light than the last time I traveled through it.

The hike up Bald Mountain was nothing short of torturous, and it took me almost a half an hour to get to the top. Still, I thought we were making acceptable time, even though JVH thought I might have collapsed, having waited so long for the clacking of my trekking poles to follow up behind.

At this point, the view to the south was unimpressive, probably because I had already seen it, and I was hardly able to stand, my muscles were that weak.

The rocks came back to haunt us, but eventually, the trail flattened out after passing several views of Nittany Ridge. All the vistas were far too windy to eat lunch, so we headed up the trail and found a quiet spot to chow down on some MREs.

After eating lunch, I started having cramps in my thighs, and after trying to walk them out and drinking the rest of my Gatorade, I discovered that my pistol belt (with attached Mark III Navy combat knife) was far too tight and it was cutting off the circulation to my legs. After loosening the belt, I got a second wind and we made excellent time up to the Indian Trail.

Here's where it gets interesting . . .

Several signs indicating that we were much further from camp than I thought started to get depressing. Even after the TriCo marker (where Mifflin, Centre and Huntingdon Counties meet) it was still 2 kilometers to camp, and at the speed we were going, we were not going to beat the sunset.

At this point, most of the major muscles in my legs began to cramp up, and they were all to the point of fatigue.

When your leg muscles get weak, several things start to happen. First, you lose dexterity, and you end up taking bad steps on loose rocks, or your foot doesn't quite go where you wanted it to go. This makes you twist your ankles, stub your toes and generally have a rough time walking right. The next thing that happens is that your secondary muscles try to make up for the loss of power in your primary muscles--they are not accustomed to so much stress, and so they start to fatigue and cramp.

After all your muscles lose their agility from fatigue, your joints start to take the full brunt of every twisted, rocky step. This is bad, since ligaments and tendons never fully heal after an injury, and this is why I will never go on a hike without my trekking poles.

It seems that no matter how fatigued my legs get, my arms are always able to take up a lot of the slack with my poles, and I don't think I could have finished this hike without them. I was able to take enough pressure off of my knees and ankles to get through, even after dislocating my knee near the long downhill to camp. At that point, I was using them more like crutches than trekking poles, so I'm glad I had them.

JVH seemed to be doing much better than I on the trail, so I suggested that he go on ahead and make camp, while I got down as best I could. As it happened, he got to camp just a few minutes ahead of me, as it was quite dark by the time we got down off the mountain.

I wound up dislocating a knee and losing both my big toenails, but I did walk out of the woods under my own power, with enough energy to build a fire and grill some strip steaks :-)

Deciding that discretion is the better part of valor, and because we both felt like hell warmed over, we headed home as soon as the steaks were consumed, all the time wondering if the ranger would yell at us for several violations of the park code that I won't admit to here.

Writing this the afternoon after the hike, I still feel pretty nasty, but not as bad as after some other hikes I've taken. I have no blisters, no permanent injuries, and I feel good enough to go see a movie this afternoon. I will need to take remedial action on my toenails, and I wish I could find a way to avoid the 'black toenail syndrome', but as a seasoned hiker, I think that's to be expected, and it can only really happen about once a year!

The funny thing is, my back had been giving me fits (I got hit by a car a few years ago, and I think I have a slipped disc or something) for about 10 days . . .to the point where I nearly went to get it checked out. It feels fine today, so the hike has spared me another trip to the doctor and/or chiropractor.

All in all, the hike didn't go as planned, but it was still a great workout, we both came out alive and none the worse for wear.

I'll be back on the trial next weekend.