Day 60
Mileage 8 (oof)
Welp 3 of us got sick in Waynesboro...
So we took an unplanned 0 and a half day there.
Didn't get to the trail again until 4:30...
Still not 100%, but we hike on. Except Darwin and Legs. They stayed back for another night. The tramily is broken up and I'm sad they are behind. We have faith that they will catch up soon!
We had so much fun only hiking 8 into the Shenandoah's. Made a line and listened to the "Throwback dance party" spotify playlist. (Everyone should have it actually)
Got into camp at 7 and cowboy camped.
Day 61
Mileage 24ish
How much energy do I have? 0
Guess I do a 21. Oh it's going to rain all night and our camp plan has signs that says no camping...
Hike down the mountain and it is all rocky. Hike back up the mountain and find a camp spot as it starts to rain. We are on top of the mountain pretty exposed. It's prolly fine...
Cue crazy winds and torrential downpour all night.
Day 62
Mileage 12
Another short day. Fuck I do not want to hike.
Holy shit what a rain storm.
Hiked .6 at noon after rain let up to get lunch at the wayside. Darwin and Legs catch us 3, but we lose the rest of our crew...
Still not back to full strength yet from food poisoning...
Virginia blues are crazy. But we got to mile 900 today. Planning on only doing 20s for a while now. Likely until the quad state challenge, which is only a few days away.
Day 63
Mileage 20ish
No pictures today. I just hiked fast af and kept my phone away. I have been enjoying the balance of silence and nature to the music or audio books. On days when I'm struggling music or an audio book is a nice distraction.
We have no clue where we are sleeping, but it's prolly somewhere not okay.
Made it to Big Meadows wayside and went fucking hard on food. Bowl of vegan chilli, two veggie burgers, fries and mac and cheese. Fuck that was a lot of food.
Ok we decided to not sleep on the bathroom floor and hope we are warm enough tonight. Bought the last campsite spot for 20 bucks.
Seeing normal people camp was so weird. Oh right they have cars to bring shit. Everyone is grilling and blasting music.
It's 8PM and I want to sleep. Ugh.
Day 64
Mileage 21
Todays word of the day is FOOD.
We ate breakfast at Big Meadows. I had 6 eggs, home fries, and a tall stack of pancakes.
We started hiking at 11am very full. Good thing it takes 20 minutes of hiking to be hungry again.
Today we played a game. Pass all the day hikers. Wet wipes and Glim-glom decided to keep up with me all morning. We averaged 4 mph rock hopping.
I scared myself twice. The first I was rock hopping in a feverish game of the floor is lava and the rock slid off this big cliff. I did not... The second time, I was running across a rock field perhaps way too fast.
Made it to the next food stop at 2pm. Got a large beer, an app, a veggie burger with an egg on it, and desert!
We leave at 4 with another 12 until camp to go. This time no restaurant, but we still all eat a full dinner.
All the fucking calories.
Oh shit I forgot to talk about the actual day. We had some breath taking views today. Stony man cliffs were unbelievable. We sat watching a storm come at us laughing. Got called crazy by some day hikers...
Then we also went up to Mary's rocks and the wind was just screaming. Could barely stand on the edge of the cliff lol.
Its still fucking cold at night. We all are regretting sending home our cold weather gear.
Spirits are getting better though in our own delirium we find humor.
It's all we got.
Day 65
Mileage 19.9
Today was gorgeous. The sky didn't look real all day.
As is the theme this week. We left camp late and hiked fast.
Got to the last wayside and took a multi hour break while we ate a bunch of food. We may have napped on the sidewalk in the sun too.. We are vagrants after all.
While the food every day has been nice, I'm ready to get back to normal cadence.
It seems like I finally feel fully recovered from food poisoning. Although my legs are a bit tired from yesterday's shenanigans.
Day 66
Mileage 12
Hiked a cool 6.8 into Front Royal. We are done with the Shenandoahs!!!
The plan was to resupply in Front Royal, eat Thai food, and then go watch Guardians of the Galaxy 2. We also did laundry even though we couldn't shower.
The fucking movie theatre is closed. Fuck.
Night hike the fuck outta this town after eating Thai again to wallow in our anger and sadness.
Get to camp at 10pm and go to sleep gently weeping...
Our morale is fucked again.
Day 67
Mileage 22
It is getting warmer again!
The terrain has been stupid easy. We actually left camp before 10am today...
Get to the shelter 3.3 miles before we are trying to camp out early enough. Then we start the "roller coaster". A 14ish mile stretch of 500 foot up and downs. We did two of them and camped out.
Its going to rain all day tomorrow. I decided to cowboy camp knowing I'd get woken up by rain. I wanted to get to mile 1000 so bad.
Day 68
Mileage 28.6 trail miles. Actual mileage 30.7...
Ok my plan worked. I got awoken via a light rain at 6:23AM. I pull my tent rain fly over all my shit and scramble to pack up.
Good news my food bag held in the tree. I had to re-sew the buckle back on as it broke the day prior.
Light rain has now turned into pouring rain. I eat my cold breakfast and leave.
Pouring rain turns into torrential windy rain.
I go up and down the fucking roller coaster. The trail is a river from the rain. It seems to make me hike faster. I guess that could be because my hands are going numb and pruning already.
Torrential downpours turn into lightening storm with no delays in the thunder. Good thing I'm not exposed I guess.
I stop into the last shelter before Harper's ferry to get water and eat something, because I'm losing functionality in my hands. It took me all my concentration to light my lighter.
Alright my hands are working again mostly and i have 12.5 miles until the start of Harper's Ferry. I still need to get to the hostel I'm staying at.
Made it 24 miles by 3pm. Wet Wipes texts me. They only hiked 7 miles to the hostel. I'm already passed the last shelter before I get the text...
So I get to Harper's Ferry alone and now have to figure out what the plan is. I want to do the quad state challenge, but I also don't want to hang out here for two days. I'm leaning towards just hiking out tomorrow and saying fuck the challenge.
In other news my legs are feeling rock solid. My feet hurt for maybe the first hour each day, but then they warm up and are fine. At this point in the trip it's hard to tell how much weight I've lost so far. It seems like I'm hovering around 200-207 pounds, which is only around 8ish pounds lost out here. I'm hoping that means I'm doing my food correctly, because I know as it gets warmer I'm fucked.
--Strider
