Down Time

Just a quick update on our hiatus, which has been quite hectic and more than a little overwhelming. We rolled into Pancho’s mom’s place near Annapolis in the middle of the night, after a long, stressful drive from Maine. Then came three solid days of shopping. Oy. We were both in need of clothes and supplies for our trip to Amsterdam, especially Pancho, who had no pants that fit anymore. Losing 6 inches in the waist seems to necessitate a trip to the mall. And WOW is the mall a horrible, anxiety-inducing nightmare after four months in the woods. The noise, the light, the ridiculous consumerism were pretty overwhelming for us both.

These boots are no longer made for walking....
 I was just hoping to make it up Katahdin in them.
It's never a good thing when you can see your socks through the top....

Manscaping in process--the mutton chop phase.
Thankfully short-lived.

Fortunately, we survived the mall (actually 3 of them, with which I am now WAY too familiar) and headed off to Amsterdam. Much like Vegas, there is very little that I can reveal about the trip J, just that Pancho really freaked out some of our friends and we still have no answer to the eternal question: how many entrepreneurs does it take to find a brothel in Amsterdam? (More than you might think….) We do have an answer to the question of how comfortable wooden shoes are—not even a little bit. Especially when you’ve been pounding the hell out of your feet for months. Yikes.

Sue rocks the clogs.

Dean, Eric, and their special friend.

On the party boat.

We’ve been delayed a bit this week in our preparations to head back out onto the trail. We’ll be taking off from central Virginia on Sunday, heading south this time. Actually a touch nervous about changing directions—we’re so accustomed to looking at the map and the guidebook in the other orientation. Hopefully, we’ll stay on track the right way—if not, we sure won’t be publishing the fact here! 



Before--in Buenos Aires, right before we started hiking.

And after--4 months, 1400 miles, and 56 pounds later, in Amsterdam.