Today's miles 15.1. AT miles 817.7
What a great day today apart from a nasty uphill to start. It was another beautiful warm sunny day. Dena, Iron Mans wife, kindly shuttled us and Team Berlin back to the trail in the morning at US60. Team Berlin is now three again, Pillow is back walking with Wall E and Milk Monster, he walked with Iron Man and Extra Miles for a couple of weeks just for a change. Iron Man and Extra Miles were dropped off earlier at James River. Because they took a rest day yesterday they still had that section to walk so are a day behind the rest of us. They plan to slack pack while Dena's down and cover four days hiking in three days to catch the rest of us up.
The first part of the trail today though was a nasty 2000ft three mile uphill to Bald Knob, there were no nice switchbacks so it was quite steep in places. Once at the top though it was worth it, a lovely bald with amazing views. It was down again to a junction with the Old Hotel Trail where we saw a sign advising of a temporary closure of the AT for two days due to a prescribed burn. Luckily we missed that, it would have been a long detour. From there it was up again to Cold Mountain, after that though the trail became easier for the rest of the day.
We came down from Cold Mountain to Hog Camp Gap where we got some amazing Easter Monday trail magic. Fresh Ground, a guy we met the same time/day we first met our German friends way back at the beginning at Woody Gap, mile 21, was providing trail magic. He had told us he would be providing trail magic on the trail at a later date. He'd set up a tarp shelter and served us CoolAid (cold drink) and coffee plus numerous hot dogs followed by chips/fries, Milk Monster helped him by chopping up the potatoes. I had three hot dogs and Nigel had five or six! Uff- da another thru hiker was there also. We had a very relaxing hour and a half with Fresh Ground and all left feeling very stuffed. I think he was pleased to have the company also, some days he doesn't get many hikers passing by so it can get quite lonely. With us he had had twelve hikers through so far today. He will stay in the same location for about ten days providing trail magic and then move to another location further up the trail so we may see him again. What a great guy, thank you Fresh Ground.
With full bellies we continued on our way, we had another nine miles to go to our camp spot for the night on a lovely warm sunny afternoon. The trail was much more easy going for the rest of the day, although full bellies, heat and up hills were not a good combination! We stopped to refill our water then completed the last three miles to Porters Field where there was a camp spot and spring arriving about 5:45. A lovely camp spot, we were the only ones there. Most hikers seem to just head straight for the shelters ignoring all the lovely camp spots in between. Our German friends braved it and continued another 5.5 miles to the next shelter. We didn't want to carry on and have a really late finish. We'll maybe catch up with them tomorrow, if not when we get to Waynesboro.
Just before Porters Field, Team Berlin stopped for water also, the way Pillow was sat at the waters edge with plants growing beside him, he looked just like an English Gnome. Even more so once Nigel put his red scarf on his head and had him pose with his walking pole! I'm not sure our German friends know what a gnome is!
No comments:
Post a Comment