Once again we have been very lucky with the weather and had a perfect cold, clear and sunny day for going up the next big mountain, Roan Mountain 6212ft. We left camp at 8:45 and just as a warm up for Roan the AT had us climb up and over Little Rock Knob down to Hughes Gap 4040ft. It was then a four mile steady climb up to Roan Mountain summit through spruce forest. There were a couple of good view spots on the way up. The ground was frozen luckily otherwise it would have been a slippy muddy climb. We did have to negotiate quite a few icy patches on the trail again but nothing too difficult. Roan High Knob shelter on the summit is the highest shelter on the AT. We're glad we didn't stay there last night, at 1700 feet higher than Clyde Smith shelter where we stayed last night and woke to a layer of ice on our water, it would have been extremely cold.
We passed an old stone chimney, a remnant of some sort of building then descended down on very well maintained paths through the spruce forest to Carvers Gap. From here the terrain changed from woods to grassy balds. Probably a very popular tourist spot on a weekend, there were a few people out today. We stopped at the top of Round Bald (5818ft) for a snack sitting behind some rocks enjoying the view, it was quite windy on the top. From there it was a little down and up over to Jane Bald (5794ft) and then skirted Grassy Ridge Bald (5900ft) before heading downhill back into forest on a very muddy path. Apart from the mud the descending paths were easy going all the way to Overmountain Shelter where we are camping tonight. A great spot with great views. The shelter is a converted barn but is full with 30 youngsters from Florida. We're actually camping on grass for a change, rather than mud and leaf litter.
Today is our 30th day on the trail and a bit of a milestone for us. We are aiming/hoping to complete the trail in five months/150 days, so we are splitting the trail down into fifths or 30 day sections. We are now one fifth of the way in time and only short on the one fifth mileage mark by 54 miles. In our first 30 days we have taken two zero/rest days and one nero/half rest day. We have walked a total of 391.9 miles, 8.8 on the approach trail and 383.1 on the AT making our average daily mileage 14.25 miles, excluding rest days. We are very happy with this and our progress so far. We do need to increase our daily minimum average mileage by a couple of miles. In another couple of weeks time the trail becomes less mountainous so we hope to be able to make up the differences.
Neither of us have suffered with blisters, and apart from Nigel's bit of chaffing and heel problems which are now resolved and my niggling knees which are getting better we've not come off too bad health wise.
Congratulations on 30 days
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