Rain was in the forecast, to begin around nine a.m., so I rose early and started breaking camp. I had plugged the cellphone into an electrical outlet on a nearby site to recharge, and had placed it atop a post that held water connections. While taking down the tent, I heard a rat-tat-tat and looked over to find a robin perched on the post beside it, pecking on the screen. She didn't manage to shatter it, though.
Jordan is full of interesting little shops, and although everything was closed when I walked down its streets, I noticed a small plaque in one of the windows, with an interesting quote from one of my fellow countrymen: "You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star". (Nietzsche). Made me feel better about my own perpetually chaotic innards.
I stepped onto the Trail and crossed more dried-up streambeds. I wondered why they were so dry - was this area more affected by drought than areas I'd been in earlier, which had running streams? Or was it because time had passed, and we were later in the season now? It began to dawn on me that the lack of moisture was probably largely responsible for the limited amount of biting insects I'd been exposed to. I felt a bit selfish, praying for no rain the past few weeks. All this greenery really wasn't looking especially thirsty, though.
Bird bangers boomed incessantly, accompanied by the tapping of a distant woodpecker. The Trail followed a road lined with vineyards, black clusters of grapes hanging heavily from the vines. At one winery, workers were busy assembling a huge white tent and hanging flower-filled baskets from trees. I entered Louth Conservation Area, and wasn't surprised to see that the falls there was displaying its great layers of rock, without even a trickle of water falling from its rim.
The Trail took the form of a boardwalk, and then brought me through the middle of a soybean field. The sky showed promise of clearing, finally; it hadn't rained yet but had remained cloudy all morning.
I walked through a meadow, where Black-eyed Susans lined the path. A small black frog sat to the side but didn't jump as I approached. It appeared he had a bum leg, so I moved him off the Trail a bit, for fear he would be stepped on. Then the Trail took me back into the woods and up the escarpment. It seems a rope had been strung here, and subsequently removed by the BTC because of safety concerns. They had left a note for the owners in case they wanted to retrieve it.
I discovered a small reroute near Rockway that wasn't reflected on the latest paper map of the Trail. It was on the app, though. The BTC must have obtained more permission, and fairly recently, too.
As I hiked into Short Hills, the sky grew quite dark and the wind began to pick up. I listened to my nagging inner voice and decided to bail down a side trail, and as the wind worsened and the clouds began to swirl, I quickened my pace to a jog and managed to arrive at a pub just before the skies opened and torrential rain began to fall.
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