Despite being a bit chilly, the morning was fantastic. I actually woke up happy and rested. Although that crazy determined screeching owl I heard would probably have rather kept me up all night. Ha! The joke is on you owl, I slept. These last couple of nights have been the best sleep I’ve gotten while camping on the trail so far! I credit it to switching over to our summer weight bags (something mom and dad Warthog brought with them when they visited). My bag is now rated to 35 degrees, where as the winter bag I used was rated to 15 degrees. It was good in the beginning, but left me way too warm and sweaty most of the time – even when I left it open and just used it as a blanket.
We camped right at the 400 mile mark. Another hundred down! I’m so excited.
I wore my running shorts, a t-shirt, and long sleeve shirt. My trailrunners were still wet from the rain yesterday. We expected that I would need to change socks partway through the day. I only had one pair of dry socks left, Warthog loaned me one to get started. I didn’t need to change them, my feet stayed dry and the shoes were also dry within a couple of hours. Success! The only way I could see these shoes being a problem is if we have multiple days of rain and they can’t get dry overnight. Regardless of what I wear, multiple days of rain would bring wet socks and tons of blisters, so I’m glad for the light shoes and happy/dry heels these trailrunners give me in the meantime.
My heels are getting better. No new blisters from the shoes. There are a couple of hotspots or pressure points, but if I loosen the laces that’ll take care of those. The skin from my allergic reaction rash is dried out and starting to peel. New healthy skin is underneath. Things seem really positive and I am immensely relieved. I especially enjoy that I have little to no morning prep work for my feet. It’s the first time on this trail that I haven’t lost 15 minutes to getting my feet ready. Freaking awesome!
We pushed through about 16.4 miles in total today. The final two miles were added on last minute since we were at our original goal at 5p. We wanted to walk until 6p, plus the extra miles we got in today means we can have a shorter day tomorrow when we meet back up with our “tramily” (trail family). Kirby and Lotus are already in Hampton, TN where they are waiting for us. We have 10.4 miles of trail tomorrow and hope to be in by 1p. Atlas is ahead of us and will only need to cover 8.5 miles to get into town. Most of the tramily will be back together then. Snow Monkey and Bullseye are ahead, but are taking slow days so we can hit Damascus at the same time in three or four days. Hype pushed ahead. His goal is to hit 500 miles and then SOBO (southbound) back to Damascus before he has to get off of the trail. Hype and his wife found out they were pregnant a couple of weeks ago. She went home to play it safe, but he stayed to hit this milestone and then will join her. We are hoping to all be in Damascus at the same time so we can give Hype a send off party. I’m excited. This is a good group of friends and I’ve missed being around them. Hopefully we’ll all be on pace with each other for a while… at least until the next one of us has family that visits.
Warthog and I had our breakfast (protein bars) at a waterfall this morning and then ate lunch at “Hardcore Rapids”. In little words on the sign someone wrote, “Hell yeah!” It made us both laugh. I just picture rock n roll fingers being thrown up with that. The rapids were pretty. I’m not sure I would call them hardcore. Although, I did lose the bear bag in them for a moment. That’s what I get for being lazy and tossing the thing. Well, really, it was that I was too sore to move and I was balanced on rocks. Regardless, I shouldn’t have tossed the bag. It went up, landed on a boulder, bounced, and then went into the stream. I yelled, “Oh no! Oh no!” Warthog lept and pulled the bag out. It was soaked and I deflated. We had just dried it out. Warthog just laughed at the absurdity. That’s why I love him, he just rolls with it. I probably would have been way more stressed out than he was.
There’s nothing too overly fantastic about today. We are starting to get into the monotonous routine of walking. A previous thru-hiker said it like this, “The 15-20 miles a day gets old. There’s no lying about that. But it’s the people that you meet who will make this trip.” That’s not to say we don’t enjoy the hiking. For the most part, we do. There are a lot of moments where we stop ourselves to enjoy the view or whatever else is happening then. Boulders still really get me. We walked through some boulder fields today and I thought it was absolutely beautiful. We also followed next to a river for a bit, which was a fun change of pace. Warthog and I looked for fish and saw a couple of minnows. All that to say, we still love hiking. However, forests can sometimes blend into others and all of the footsteps after footsteps can sometimes be remembered as if they were in a haze.
It was near 5:30p when we came out of our hiker haze and onto a meadow with a campsite in it. It was the site that Lotus had recommended and the one we intended on staying at. The only problem was, it was 5:30p… there was still plenty of daylight for walking. Additionally, tomorrow we go into Hampton to meet up with Lotus, Kirby, and Atlas. Kirby and Lotus will have been waiting on us now and we want to get there as early as possible. Therefore, the more we hike today, the less we hike tomorrow. We stopped at the site to deliberate on whether or not to move forward. On a sitting log near the campfire was a piece of paper weighed down by a rock. Warthog went over to read it. He cleared his throat and continued in a dramatic reading voice; “Ansel and Warthog…”. The note was for us! It was from Lotus! She was writing that she was excited to see us tomorrow and hopes we enjoy the campsite but to be careful of the poison ivy all around. I loved it!
You can’t rely on phone service, plus most hikers are conserving their batteries. So you sometimes have to rely on old fashioned communication… like a handwritten note. You might also draw in the dirt or use sticks and stones to write to other hikers. It’s one thing that I think is awesome about the AT. It takes you back to the basics.
Even though the meadow was gorgeous, Warthog and I decided to push on another hour. It took us to a small site that was literally three feet off of the trail. There was room for the fire pit, our tent, and a sitting log. That was it. But it was enough. Plus, we were now two miles closer to town for tomorrow.
We ate dinner and crashed. We plan to leave at 7:30a to try to be in town by 1p. I’m tired too. These new shoes are doing great, but my body is still adjusting to the new step. I knew it would and I’m glad to no longer be fighting blisters and too much moisture, but until I fully adjust, my body will be a little more tired at the end of the day. A small price to pay for being able to get my heels under control.
– ansel