Date: 2017-09-03
From: Bear's Den hostel

To: Whiskey Creek shelter
Miles today: 18.2

As I reached the top of the hill, I found Sweetblood and Dirt lounging in the sun on an open grassy patch, enjoying the view. It was a truly idyllic location.¢What would make this even better?¢ I asked them.The usual answers came forth. Most of these, as befits being on the second half of a thru-hike, tended to revolve around food.¢What about cold beer?¢And then before they could say anything else, I produced three cans of cold beer from my pack. This is something I¢ve managed to do at some point on my other two thru-hikes, thanks to my personal capacity for shamelessly soliciting trail magic from strangers in a way that blurs the boundary between yogi-ing and downright begging. What can I say? It¢s my super power.The best part is always the look of incomprehension on the recipients¢ faces. ¢But... but... how...?¢I explained how I'd suspected the odd chalk markings on the trail we¢d been following for the past hour had been left by a hash house harriers group, an international organisation that was started after WWII by British officers in what was then Malaya who sought to recover from their weekend hangovers through exercise. The movement had since spread to all seven continents and its adherents describe themselves members of ¢a drinking club with a running problem¢. I¢d been a member of one such branch in Abu Dhabi and that was the connection with Sara, who I¢d just visited in DC.As we climbed the hill after crossing Virginia Route 50, I fell behind ¢ as usual, and as befits hiking with people well under half my age -- and was on my own as the chalk markings became increasingly fresh. When I reached a trail junction and found a group wearing mildly risqu© T-shirts, I asked if they were hashers. They were. Being hashers, one of them had hauled up a pack containing a bin liner filled with ice and cans of beer. Did I want one?They were kind enough to extend this offer to beers for Sriracha, Sweetblood and Dirt as well, although I suspect the unfortunate designated beer carrier was happy to lighten his load.All of which led, about 15 minutes later, to Sweetblood and Dirt¢s surprised expressions. To be fair, it took them about a nanosecond to get on board with the idea of drinking cold beer while sitting in the sun on a patch of grass.We¢d set off that morning from Bear¢s Den hostel as the last bit of overnight drizzle was replaced serendipitously by clear blue skies, leading Dirt to announce that she¢d definitely made the right call in opting to pay to sleep inside. After an initial chuckle at a sign that read ¢To AT. To rocks.¢ -- and a discussion about how much more appropriate this would have been in northern Pennsylvania -- we embarked on the second half of the Roller Coaster. To be entirely honest, the Roller Coaster was barely distinguishable from the rest of the trail and although the last two ridges involved solid climbs, every single metre of it seemed better than the average trail we¢d encountered in New England.In the midst of the Roller Coaster, we encountered Plus One at a shelter. After seeing her and Skittles at a shelter north of Harpers Ferry, she said he¢d been stalking her. Indeed some of the others hiking around us heard him talking about her as ¢my girl¢, even though they¢d barely interacted. Sweetblood and Dirt also hiked with her while Sriracha was doing the four-state challenge because she was too scared to hike alone and she¢d tried to enlist park rangers at Harpers Ferry to her aid.There was, I suspected, a fair few shades of grey in this and what might mostly kindly be called her erratic manner meant it¢s possible she had added two and two to get seven. But similarly there was no doubt that her fear was genuine and heartfelt.I noted also that while most of our group had hiked the short side trail to the shelter, one of our group had heard her voice ¢ let¢s just say it¢s pretty shrill and carries far ¢ and immediately turned around to continue hiking the trail.I was still wondering exactly where the truth lay in all this as we hiked past another important point on the trail, where we had 1000 miles left to Springer mountain. I was expecting this important nobo landmark to be commemorated in some way, such as ¢1000¢ created through rocks or something similar, but there was nothing.It was soon after that when I found a circle marked in green chalk on the trail and wondered if this might be a hash trail, although that seemed entirely unlikely. But then more familiar hash markings followed, including ¢BVC¢ at the highway crossing, urging hashers to be very careful.And then soon after that, I was surprising the others with cold beers.There were another few miles to our intended destination for the night, which was a brand new double-decker lean to called Whiskey Creek shelter, which replaced a still extant but much smaller and mankier lean to called Dick¢s Dome shelter. We were about to discover that these double entendre names were something that Virginia specialised in.Three goldilocks and the bear were already there, as was my erstwhile hiking companion Train. All of this made for a convivial night and a reminder why I was happy to be hiking with Sriracha, Sweetblood and Dirt again.Life is good.AT fact of the day: There¢s a difference between facts and truth. If anyone today had asked me about the roller coaster, I could have stated, with absolute accuracy, that it had taken me three days to cover the 12-mile stretch. Omitting the bit about camping half a mile into it, hiking four miles the next day and then completing it today without difficulty is what created the gap between facts and truth. But it was fun to think about the ways one could mess with gullible and/of apprehensive nobos. After telling them that, I could have really freaked them out by saying: ¢And West Virginia... Man, it took me three days to cover the six miles in West Virginia...¢ Two neros and a zero-day trip to DC might have been a little closer to expressing the truth.