I just ran through the sprinkler. Divine.

So I got out of shenandoah a couple of days ago. It was kind of a bummer. There were little food stops throughout, but they just ended up being places to waste time.

One of my Dad's friends picked me up at the trailhead. Now I am at a small child's birthday party. There are ponies.
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So I just got off of the infamous 'roller coaster' section of Virginia. Just lots of steep ups and downs for about ten miles. It actually seemed to go by pretty quickly. There's blood all over my shirt because I had a nose bleed yesterday.
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Roach in my motel room. He's not trying to suck my blood. We can coexist.

Did a 50 miler into Front Royal, just snuck a whole milkshake into Iron Man 2. Is there no stopping me?

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Took a zero day yesterday in Waynesboro, VA. Had very good Chinese buffet, got new shoes. On to the Shanendoehs.

Seriously.
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From the Cedar Cliffs. The weather is clearing up.
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I have found it! The secret Appalachian Trail mind control orb!
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Coming down Cove Mountain.
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I haven't done a view picture in a while.
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On a very nicely maintained section of trail along the Blue Ridge Parkway. Just got some trail magic strawberries.
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This is one of the olde tyme trail markers. There aren't very many left.
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There was a rat snake at the motel last night. It was just about the most sluggish and inoffensive creature imaginable, but this woman couldn't get to her room because she refused to go within 20 feet of it. I had my umbrella with me, so I slowly herded it out into the bushes. The woman's husband was way more impressed than he needed to be.
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The tarp is a pain to set up. You have to fiddle with it until it's just the right height, and even then there's barely enough room. The rain pours. The tarp keeps me drier than I would be out in the open, but I am still pretty wet, as is all my gear. That day I hike over Dragon's Tooth and McAfee Knob, but I completely miss the views because of the fog. Coming down the steep, rocky descent from Dragon's Tooth I slip and snap one of my poles. That night I hang all my gear up in the shelter and huddle in the corner in my remaining dry clothes. My feet at this point are slimy and discolored like a pair of cave fish. Some section hikers arrive a little after dark, and one lends me some dry clothes and a sleeping bag liner. It's still very chilly. The next day I make it into Daleville and today I'm taking a zero day to dry off and get my pole repaired.

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After a long, steep climb, I reach an incredibly rocky ridge line with a great view. The entire ridge is covered with giant, smooth boulders, all of them slanted steeply to one side. Thankfully, the sun has dried them off, but they're still hard on the ankles, and they seem to go on forever. I'm getting cranky, so I stop to snack on some pretzels. It's amazing how quickly food can liven up one's mood out here. One minute I'll be cursing at every single little bump in the trail, and the next I'll be cruising along thinking about how great pretzels are. I finally get down to the trail magic, and I'm the first hiker there. There are some women with Dutch ovens, and they have potato salad and lasagna and apple crisp. It was totally worth it. They tell me that it's supposed to rain that night, but I'm too tired to hike to the next shelter so I set up my tarp nearby. Now, some hikers swear by
the tarp, but I am not so enamored. For me it's really only for emergencies. To be continued...

So I reach the next shelter, and stop to rub antifungal cream all over my feet. I change into cleaner if not that much drier socks. But to no avail. As soon as I'm out of the shelter I run into a dense patch of undergrowth and my feet are even more soaking wet than before. But after all this, I cannot stop now. I must reach the trail magic, or I will have labored in vain. Day breaks, and I change into my second pair of shoes and my third pair of socks. Their is a monstrous climb that the guidebook neglects to mention, and then a gap full of annoying little hills. Then I emerge onto rolling grassy meadows and the sun is shining and there's a cooler of cold drinks next to the road and I pass that giant tree I sent in earlier. And then I look up. 'No,' I say. 'Surely there must be a tunnel or something that goes under that giant, unbroken wall of mountains.' But there is no tunnel. To be
continued...

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So there I was in the middle of the night, in the rain, surrounded by the flighty, herbivorous denizens of the underworld. I make it to a road crossing and checked my book. My feet are soaking wet and there are still five more miles to the next shelter. My heart leaps as I spy an SUV parked nearby. Maybe some idiot left their car unlocked! But no such luck. After briefly considering crawling under the vehicle, I decide to push on. And then, suddenly- I freeze in my tracks. A whole host of deer, emerging from a fiery portal. I shout and bang my poles together, hoping to scare them off. But what's this? Laughter? It's a campfire, surrounded by college students. They have strung up a tarp, and there is a nice fire and a dry sitting area beneath it. They invite me to sit down, and for the next two hours I sit there trying to dry my socks and eating an embarrassing number of s'mores. Then
the rain lets up a bit, and I thank them and press on. To be continued...

McAfee's knob. As you can see, it is foggy and there is no view.
I apologize for the lack of updates in the past several days, but they have been very trying, full of dramatic ups and downs (literally as well as figuratively, ha ha.) First off, I got poison ivy all over my shins the day before I got into Pearisburg. Then, in my motel, I saw a flier for trail magic 50 miles out. But I only had two days to get there. So of course I carefully weighed my options and chose the most awesome one: hike day and night and into the next day to get there. I arrived at the shelter that evening with about 30 miles to go, and this guy gave me some caffeine powder (which burnt my tongue). Night arrived swiftly. First, I hiked over a rocky, slippery ridge line in a thunder storm. There were deer everywhere and let me tell you they are terrifying when you are alone in the woods at night and all you can see are their sickly green eyes and emaciated outlines. To be
continued...

Here's the Keffer Oak. You might not be able to tell, but this is a HUGE tree. The fence next to it is made of 2X4s, if that helps. Passed it on my 50 mile overnighter to Craig Creek Valley. More on that momentarily.
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I think a precipitate formed when I mixed Gatorade powder with my iodine treated water. There was grit on the bottom. Chemistry types: identify.

You know you're clean when you can scratch your scalp without your fingernails turning black.

So a few days ago I bought a box of grape nuts and discovered the hard way that all the nutrition in the world won't help you if you can't choke it down.

My food buy was kind of expensive today, but it's getting up to the $10/day estimate that I had read about. Partly because I'm tired of just crackers & granola.

And here's a salemander. I saw the tail of a larger one while I was getting water yesterday.
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Got up early today to go into Pearisburg. Here are some panoramic shots of the sunrise.
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Hmm, it sure does smell bad at this road crossing. Oh look, a rotting corpse! Hopefully a deer and not a dog or the noble Sasquatch.

Millipede party!
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The hiker hunger took over and I devoured one of the ponies. Actually it was a bad winter and some of the ponies died.
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Here's one of the ponies up near Mount Rogers.
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Haven't had reception for a few days. Mount Rogers has been the most beautiful part of the hike so far. I'm in Atkins, VA right now.
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Buzzard Rock or white top or something.
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Borrowed this guy's poles during my Damascus rush. They made hiking way easier. Bought some poles today.

Awesome day yesterday. Hiked on into the night and did 50 miles into Damascus. Been relaxing today.
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Watauga Lake.
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I made a friend. His name is Niko. We hiked together for a while, but he got tired and I sat down and gave him some water. Then he ran back down the trail to his owner.
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Kincora Hostel. Was going to go two miles farther but the ice cream store was closed and I took a serious blow to my morale. Took the shuttle and now I have clam strips.
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Argh! I just wasted an hour accidentally doubling back on myself.

I had a bad dream where my dog was eaten by a bear. But then I had a dream where I was 007. I was in a hotel and it started filling with mustard gas.

Last night these guys met everybody at the shelter and took us to get burgers. I had a corndog as well.

It's a nice little town.
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Cows.
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This is either Big Hump or Little Hump.
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The barn is Overmountain Shelter. I am not staying there.
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I think this part is called 'the apple orchard'.
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Power lines! Nature's most beautiful creation. Everyone likes pictures of power lines.
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Looks like there was a fire here. Witness the burnination!
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The Nolichucky River.
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