Experiences While Thru-hiking the Laurel Highlands Hiking Trail - Part 2

NOTE: This is a continuation from last week's post. Check out "Part 1" to get caught up.

Dan put the truck in park and jumped out, “I think we are going to need someone to pull us out. I can’t stop sliding sideways and the truck will soon be pinned up against that ash tree.”

“I’ll walk out to the main road to see if I can flag anyone down,” I said.

I made the three-quarters-of-a-mile walk along the dirt road until it intersected a paved road. Here I attempted to flag down any truck or SUV that I thought might be of assistance. Several people stopped, but no one was able to offer any help. For the better part of an hour I attempted to find help, but after a while I figured that I had better walk back up to the parking lot and see how the rest of the crew was fairing. On my way up the gravel road I saw a white Ford Explorer with green lettering across the door. “Park Ranger” the letters read. Elated, I politely waved to the driver and got him to stop. I moved around to the passenger-side window and saw a rather portly park ranger with a white handle-bar mustache. Something about his appearance reminded me of a walrus. Before I could utter a single syllable the man behind the wheel said, “I already talked to them.”

A bit taken aback by the irritated tone in the man’s voice, I paused before attempting to get more clarification, “Oh, so you already saw that our truck is stuck?”

“Yeah,” he said, still in an annoyed tone, “I told them that they’ll have to call a tow truck, and it’s the Fourth of July, so he’s probably too busy to give you a tow anyway.”

“You don’t think you could pull us out?” I asked. “I don’t think it would take much—”

“No! I can’t pull you out with this thing!” he said as he slapped the steering wheel of the Explorer, “the tires on this hunk-of-junk are bald and your buddy’s truck weighs too much. I told you, you’re gonna have to call a tow truck.”

I must have stood there, looking at the walrus-like man, for several long seconds. It seemed unbelievable to me that this "Park Ranger" had no interest at all in offering any kind of assistance. I fumbled for something to say, but without another word, he slowly eased his Explorer down the road. I watched his tail lights as they disappeared. I was completely baffled by the utter uselessness of the whole conversation that I had just been involved in. What was the point of having a park ranger if that was the kind of “help” they provided? I was still staring down the road, perplexed and annoyed, when I saw the headlights of a truck heading in my direction. As it got closer, I could see it wasn’t just any truck, it was a big and beautiful F-250. It was our savior.

Again, I politely waved and was able to get the truck to stop. The man behind the wheel of the big Ford rolled his window down. He must've read my mind because he said, “Are you stuck?”

“Yessir. We are stuck at the Laurel Highlands Trail parking lot. All the rain really made it a mess. My buddy has a tow-rope, if you wouldn’t mind pulling us out?”

“Hop in,” the man said.

We started to drive up the hill to the parking lot. “Did you talk to that park ranger?” Ford-Truck-Man asked.

“Yes, I did. He was no help what-so-ever,” I said.

“Was he a fat guy with a mustache?” Ford-Truck-Man asked.

“Yep!”

“Yeah, that guy’s an asshole,” Ford-Truck-Man seemed like a straight-shooter, I was starting to really like him.

We made a left-hand turn into the trail’s parking lot. Madi was standing close to the entrance of the lot trying to get a cell phone signal.

“That’s my sister,” I told Ford-Truck-Man.

After the vehicle recovery. Packed up and ready to go.

He slowed the truck and leaned out his opened window. Madi looked into the cab and saw that I was with the stranger. She smiled and waved.

“I got him,” Ford-Truck-Man said as he slowly rolled passed Madi, “he smells terrible!”

When we pulled up, Dan and Rob walked over to greet us. I looked around and noticed that the ash tree, which had been inches from smashing into the bed of Dan’s truck, was felled and lying in the mud next to the GMC.

“How did you guys cut that tree down? It looks like it’s about ten-inches in diameter!” I asked.

Rob laughed, “with our multi-tools!” Beaming, he held up his Leatherman with the saw blade still open.

Within a matter of minutes, Ford-Truck-Man had Dan’s GMC pulled out of the mud. We thanked him profusely. I got out my wallet and produced a twenty-dollar-bill. Ford-Truck-Man refused to take it at first, but he eventually relented. “Well,” he said, “I guess I can buy a case of beer now.”

After Ford-Truck-Man drove away, the rest of us stood in a circle and looked at each other. Madi let out a sigh, “Well, I guess it’s time for me to go too.”

Once again, we said our goodbyes to Madi. While we gave her a hug, we all hoped that this time, she’d actually make it out of the parking lot without any more catastrophes.

She did, and we waved to her as she drove away. Now our group was just three, plus Lacey. We shouldered our packs, and without saying much to one another, we headed down the trail.

We made pretty good time for the remaining fifteen miles. In the evening, we finally came to our next camp. There were more people at this shelter area than any of the other previous nights. We found an empty shelter and dropped our packs. We made a quick fire in the shelter and started boiling water for our meals. Once we ate, I broke out the dice and we started playing. It was now dark, and we used the light of the fire and our headlamps to illuminate our game. We heard footsteps approaching our shelter and turned around to see a headlamp bobbing up and down as a man approached our shelter.

A look at the cozy lean-to style shelters with the stone fireplace at the front

“Hey guys,” he said, “what are you doing with your food if you’re worried about bears?”

“Well, I guess we aren’t worried about them. Our food is with us in the shelter,” was the response from Dan.

“Oh, okay,” said the man. He started to turn to leave, but then decided to ask another question, “do you guys have mice in your shelter?”

Dan responded again, “Yep. There is one right there, just above the fire place,” Dan pointed with his headlamp to the side of the shelter’s stone fireplace.

“What about them?” the man asked, “are you worried about them getting into your food?”

“We aren’t really worried too much about them either,” Dan said.

“Oh, okay,” the man said again, “I think I’m going to put my pack in this empty shelter behind you, if that’s alright?”

“Fine by us.”

As the man walked away, we joked a little and discussed the possibility of sending Lacey out of the shelter to go and greet the man. Due to her sheer size and jet-black coat she would undoubtably look like a massive lumbering black bear in the darkness. We decided not to make any enemies among the other patrons of the campsite; although, the proposition was extremely tempting. We played several more rounds of dice before laying down to go to sleep.

The next morning, we all felt invigorated. This was our last day on the trail and we only had eighteen miles until we reached the Youghiogeny River, and the end of our journey. For most of the morning, we seemed to move effortlessly along the trail. It seemed to all of us that we finally had hit our stride and after fifty-two miles we had finally developed our trail-legs. We trekked up and down the steep ravines while maintaining an average pace of about 2.3 miles-per-hour. When lunchtime rolled around, we decided to take a longer break because of the great time that we had made all morning. We broke out the camp stoves and made a hot lunch, followed by hot cups of coffee all around. We sat on a log next to the trail, enjoying our coffee, when the sky became gray and foreboding. The distant growls of a thunderstorm were heard in the distance. We quickly gulped our coffee, wondering how bad the storm was going to hit us. We didn’t have to wonder long. The sky opened and sheets of rain came cascading down on us.

We resumed our hike through the rain. Lightning and thunder seemed to flash and boom right over our heads, but we still continued to walk on. We didn’t have much of a choice. After a while, Mother Nature must’ve decided that we were saturated to a sufficient degree because the clouds suddenly parted, and the sun shined down on us as brightly as it had the entire trip.

A muddy and fast-flowing tributary to the Yough

We had now entered the final leg of the journey, the Youghiogeny River Valley. We made several steep descents followed by equally steep climbs. The rain made the trail more challenging, and we had to be careful of our footing on the wet and muddy trail. As we neared the town of Ohiopyle, we could hear the distant shouts and laughter of happy whitewater rafters and kayakers as they enjoyed the rapids in the now-swollen river.

We made our final descent and finally stepped onto a gravel road that ran adjacent to the swiftly flowing Youghiogeny River. We had completed the Laurel Highlands Hiking Trail, all seventy-miles. My mom and Madi met us in the parking lot in Ohiopyle. They gave us fresh fruit and Gatorade. We were all quite happy with how the hike had turned out, and we joked that we felt as if we could keep going. Where should we walk to next? Pittsburgh?

I will fondly remember this hike. It was challenging in terms of the miles that we put in, but the trail was easily navigable and the shelters were very well maintained and made the nights quite comfortable. All in all, it was immensely enjoyable. I am glad that I was finally able to hike this local legend, but more than that, I’m glad to have shared the experience with great friends and family. On to the next adventure.