Home away from Home - Appalachian Trail

Not everyone, but it seems most people prefer to stay in the shelters. I have tried shelters a handful of times, and when it is raining it is nice to be able to just walk right in, but for the most part I just about always setup my hammock. I just wanted to include a picture of a typical shelter and my hammock setup. One thing I should note, most shelters are rodent infested. Well that is unless they have a resident snake to keep the mice under control, and yes some shelters do have snakes living in them. I usually hung my food more to keep the mice out than to keep the bears away.

Appalachian Trail - First experience in a shelter

App Trail Day 7 Last night was my first night staying in a shelter. One thing you have to realize is many of these shelters are rodent infested. About thirty mins after laying down I started hearing them running around. I made a mistake of laying at the end of the shelter next to the wall. Soon after one jumped on my arm and ran over to my shoulder and then moved on. Later I was laying on my stomach resting my head on my arm and one ran under my neck. Lefty was on the other end and he had one run across his face. They say if you leave all of your pockets open on your backpack they will just go in and out but not chew a hole through it. Fortunately someone left a can of pringles in the side pocket of there pack so the mice filled up on them and left us alone the rest of the night. I could hear them jumping to try and get out of the can, but after about a minute they made it out.