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View Full Version : Searching for trail angel, Paddy O



Sundance05
12-08-2005, 18:43
Paddy O is a trail angel in NY. He did myself and friends a real kindness this summer. But we failed to get a means of contacting him to say thanks. any help with his where abouts would be greatly appreciated

Uncle Silly
12-10-2005, 03:35
He helped out myself and a big group of hikers as well. In fact he might be indirectly responsible for 11 hikers and 3 dogs going through Harriman SP at night and over Bear Mtn a little after dawn. He was a great guy... a truck full of trail magic supplies (even fuel!) and a great register to flip through. I think he said he hits Trail Days?

lilmountaingirl
12-10-2005, 19:19
I did a little section of the AT in VT over the 4th of July weekend with some friends and ran into Paddy O near Rt 12 in Woodstock. He was slackpacking a group of 3 and trying to locate them because he was unable to meet them where he originally planned to. He was a great guy and offered up cold sodas and snacks to us. A SOBO hiker happened to be taking a break with us at that point and was thrilled with the sodas. Our group politely refused ~ we were only out for 4 days. :)

We ran into the 3 slackpackers at the Winturri Shelter the following morning and passed along the message from Paddy O. They went on and on about how great he was and how much he had been helping thrus from NY on up. I've wondered how far north he kept going with his trail magic since he was from NY?

BTW ~ I do remember him saying he hits Trail Days, as scotsghost mentioned.

Trill
12-27-2008, 22:37
i have his contact info if anyone is still interested

Red Hat
12-31-2008, 13:32
spammer, thanks for removing him!

Uncle Tom
01-01-2009, 11:30
I talked to Paddy-O this past Thanksgiving. We keep in touch regularly. He has a cell number, but since he has over 700 people he has helped as the grandest of all Northeast Trail Angels, it is hard to actually reach him. I have rarely had him answer his phone, but he gets back to me eventually. He once told me that during the hiking season he keeps 60-70 cell numbers of hikers in his phone and in any one season he is in contact with 300- 400 hikers who call him with requests, etc.
Paddy-O has only made the 2007 Trail Days and he told me it is not his thing. He often hangs with Crazyhorse, the original.
Some of Paddy-O's trail magic efforts are legendary. He really helped me and the rest of MEGATEX get through our 2007 thru hike. One time, Paddy-O called us from New York when we were heading for the Churchill Scott Shelter on Aug. 3. He said he was coming up. He drove the Paddy wagon up that very evening and arrived at the shelter at 9 PM, in the dark carrying a 70 pound load. In it he had a mini keg of German beer, and a propane grill. He then proceeded to lay out chips, assorted dips and crackers then cooked up ribs and calzones, then broke out chocolate milk and brownies. We went into the night with his Trail Bombs, which were tell glasses of Guinness into which we dropped shot glasses of a mix of Bailey's Irish Cream and Jameson's whiskey.
He is a huge fan of Frank Sinatra, and has encyclopediac knowledge of minute details like what exact band played on each of the over 3,000 of Sinatra's recordings. He made MEGATEX a Sinatra 101 CD compilation, complete with handwritten multi-page annotation sheets that is one of my treasured possessions .
He was up to Maine the end of this summer and we just missed each other as I was winding my way through the 100 Mile Wilderness.

Lone Wolf
01-01-2009, 11:32
i met paddy o in damascus a month or so ago.

TrippinBTM
01-01-2009, 13:18
Paddy O is awesome! When we hit Harrison State Park in NY this summer, he was there doing a hot dog cookoff, with beer, chips and salsa, and of course, "trail bombs". Made everyone very happy. I'd actually met him a few miles before that, and informed him that there were a good number of hikers behind me (and a few ahead) so that it was indeed a good day to do the hotdogs (he was worried only a few hikers would show. Anyways, after the feast, he hiked in about a mile or so to where we all camped, brought whiskey and moonshine, and we all had a big ol party around the campfire. Good times, man.

If you still need his contact info, I can probably get it from a friend of mine, who is a friend of his. :)

Highway Man
01-01-2009, 14:15
I still clearly remember i met Paddy O at Agony Grind near Harriman State Park when I had my day kike over there. It was in August, 2005? give or take. I met him on my way down. He seemed me to very knowledgeable about the trail, but was not in a crazy mode of hiking like me. And soon we saw two young guy/gal backpackers coming down the slope. Paddy O asked them where they were from. The girl said they were from Georgia and conplained the heat that really sacked her down, and lack of water along the trail. Like thru hikers or me on a backpakcing trip, they quickly disappeared in order to make the distance. I noticed the girl was really suffering. I got drenched wet all over my body due to the excessive sweating that day. If any trail angles there read this, please cache water in the low states when I'm coming through there this July and August. Because i know it is most likely dry everywhere, and my heat radiator does not have a lid on it!

I saw there were many 1 Gal. water bottles behind a blowndown tree right before trail exit to Rt. 17, and couldn't figure out why they were there at that time. It was not supposed to be a dumping or caching site inside a state park? LNT?:-? He talked about how AT got rerouted at east side of NY Througway due to issues with a private owner there and many other things when we walked back to Elk Den parking lot. My impression was he was a very talkative person, very nice, but felt a little strange that why he was interested in talking to people on the trail since I knew nothing about trail angels or hiking communities. In a word, I was quite confused about many things that day. We had a conversation for more than half an hour and waved to each other when he drove away in his big truck.

It was my first time to know AT thru hike, very shallowly though.

TrippinBTM
01-01-2009, 14:44
As I mentioned in my earlier post, I'd met Paddy O at just such a water cache, 3 or so miles south of Harriman S.P. There was a ton of water there, seemed pretty well kept up by whoever it was that refills the jugs. I greatly appreciated the water, too!

Highway Man
03-28-2009, 21:55
I met Paddy O again at Campmor this afternoon. He just came back from a hike in Harriman State Park. We had some very interesting talks. He doesn't want to post at W.B. for some reasons. He said he's met over a thousand hikers throughout the years. I declined exchanging our cell phone number as I understand he has too many hikers' phone numbers. We recalled we met some SOBOers last year. I feel he is very supportive of AT thru hike community. We might be seeing him again this year.