Daily statistics – New policies of the Vigorous Hikers – Hiking on the Appalachian Trail – Travel plans become increasingly tentative – New cases arising within a short time
As of 4:30 PM today the figures are – # of cases worldwide: 299,125; # of deaths worldwide: 12,762; # of cases in U.S.: 24,148; # of deaths U.S.: 285. The virus appears to be exploding in Italy, which is rapidly approaching the number of cases in China, with a much smaller population.
The Vigorous Hikers group has abandoned its carpooling; we will still have hikes, but we will meet at the trailhead. We figure that since we’re a relatively small group and since we hike at different paces, our activity should be reasonably safe – safer, perhaps, than walking along the streets, which at this point have a much greater concentration of pedestrians
“Stay home! Practice social distancing!” I see that everywhere when I drive on the freeways on the signs normally used for estimating times to various destinations. Well, I haven’t been staying home much (is staying in one place and never venturing out really such a good idea?) but I certainly have been practicing social distancing; the trails I hike for the most part are miles away from human habitations. Several others seem to agree. Today I went on the AT from the Rte. 850 parking area, first doing a there-and-back to Darlington Shelter (or actually to the junction with the Tuscarora Trail – it seemed pointless not to complete the entire ascent) and then a there-and-back to the view at the pipeline: 9 ½ miles in all, with about 1500 feet of elevation gain. I encountered about two dozen other hikers in various groups – from a safe distance, of course.
This now completes the segment of Pennsylvania for me from Pen Mar to the Clarks Ferry bridge of the Susquehanna River. Imagine – I have only 144.6 miles to go for completing the state! However, it’s unlikely I can do so under the current conditions. Eventually I will reach a point where it will take me more than 3 hours of driving to reach a trailhead unless I stay at a hotel; and at this point hotel bookings are extremely precarious.
The following are the trips or excursions scheduled for the year:
- April 7-10, visit to the Midwest to look up various friends
- May 6-7, visit to JF in Ocean City, NJ
- June 6-14, hiking trip to Kings Canyon and Sequoia, and staying in Napa a couple of days afterwards
- July (date not set), segment hiking of the AT somewhere in Vermont
- September 5-12, hiking trip to Rocky Mtn. National Park
We shall see how many of these (if any) actually come to fruition. Some of us were planning to segment-hike the AT together in central Virginia at the end of May, but that idea has now been abandoned.
In the time it’s taken to write today’s entry, the # of cases has shot up to 303,001 and the # of deaths to 12,950.