Northeasti(ish) trip mid-May help

A couple of thoughts in north-central PA:

• West Rim Trail – 30 miles point-to-point.  Since it sounds like you’ll have multiple cars you can drop one at the southern end and then hike north-to-south.  I’ve hiked it about 6 times so far and really like it.
• Old Loggers Path – One of my favorite 30-mile loops.  Starts in Masten PA.  I’ve hiked it numerous times as well (always with different groups) and it’s a nice hike
• Again, since you’ll have multiple cars, I could put together a 30-mile (or so) section of the Mid-State Trail.  I did the section from Little Pine State Park to Blackwell last May and it was probably my favorite portion of the MST so far.  One thing that might help you here is that the trail actually runs right through the Little Pine SP campground so if one of you needed to get there early they could easily camp until the others arrived.

Please feel free to PM me if you have any questions or want other PA ideas.

Unless you are used to what large clouds of blackflies can mean, I suggest you do not start further north. May 15th you are as close to being guaranteed blackflies in the ADK’s as it gets. Even the FLT can be bad in spring, though this usually happens around May 1st. They have a 4-6 week hatching cycle, and not as bad as further north.

I usually manage with them, because the trout think they are food…good fishing. I might get a few bug bites, but generally very few. I have seen people without a single square inch of exposed skin not bitten. Legs, arms, face and neck a mass of welts.

1) Keep moving.
2) Use permethrin on everything (‘cept undercloths.)
3) Spray everthing with DEET at least once per day, after every stream crossing.
4) Coat your hands, face, ears and neck with DEET.
5) Liberally coat your hair and hat with DEET.
6) Wear bug proof clothing, unknitted nylon or poly is best. Tuck your pants into your socks. Wear rubber bands around your wrists. Use a tight fitting collar. No buttons or other holes in your cloths. Wear a head net if they get really bad.
7) Light a smudge fire…one with a lot of smoke. Smoke cigarettes or cigars. Take a bath in wood smoke…it slows them down a LOT.

They need to eat through your skin, so they can be wiped off before that happens. Alcohol works well to sterilize a bite. Then a bit of Afterbite or ammonia. Two or three repeats over 15min or so will mostly clear up a minor bite. Yes, it will sting.

Head into PA and not worry about it… Sorry, that is a bad time for many.

Old Loggers path might be a winner. I had forgotten about that. We did the west rim trail last October so something else would be good. In mid-May would black flies be an issue or more of a minor nuisance? Also reading some online trip reports there are mentions of lots of washed out roads from 2016. Has most of this been repaired or is it still an issue? With that being said what is the best spot to kick off a hike?

Heading south, to PA sounds good to me. I was down in PA many times fishing around back when I could see to tie on a size 26 hook and 8x tippet without glasses. That stream looks nice. Good Luck!

Going to PA, I would also recommend the 42 mile loop.. Black Forest trail!! It’s a loop so no need to shuttle.. It’s fairly rugged, definitely beautiful, plenty of water and when I did it, I only passed 1other person over my 3 nights and 4 days, and that was just a day hiker.

2 nights.. Hmmm.. West Rim trail may be better then Black Forest trail..

The Old Loggers Path is one of my favorites.  They definitely had a lot of flood/erosion damage and one of the roads to Masten was still closed when I was last there (October, 2017).  But you still can get to the traditional trailhead.  There’s an unofficial campground there with picnic tables and port-a-potties now so you’re likely to see at least a couple of people camping there for free, but I’ve never seen them on the actual trail.

I’ve done the OLP four times, always starting in Masten.  The first time I hiked the loop in a counter-clockwise direction, but the other three times I hiked it going clockwise (guess which way I prefer).  If you can get a morning start it’s about 11 miles to a really nice campsite right along Pleasant Stream.  Day 2 is another 10.5 miles to a group of campsites at the confluence of Rock Run and Yellow Dog Run.  That leaves about 7 miles for day 3.

With that said, they’ve recently (in the past two years) put up two 3-sided AT-style shelters, and they’re located to give you much the same daily mileage if you hike the trail counter-clockwise from Masten.  Alternatively, if you got there in the afternoon, it would be about 6 miles to the first shelter hiking clockwise.

Please let me know if you need any more info on this trail.