Date: 2006-04-16
From: Priest Shelter

To: Harper's Creek Shelter
Miles today: 7.4
Weather: light rain

16 April 2006 - Destination: Harper's Creek Shelter(7.4 miles)I left the Priest Shelter about 08:25. The Chessman and Baked Potatoe had gotten up before dawn and accompanied the Gettysburg College folks up to the summit for sunrise, and had returned just before I left. Brian was staying behind and reading Richard Burton's Arabian Nights (Abridged). The weather seemed to be reasonably nice.09:05 - I surmounted The Priest, and the drizzle and intermittent rain came.09:45 Brian & JJ reached me. He's soaking wet with no rain protection, but it is a warm rain. I am in Frogg Toggs and am well protected. We walked, with me doing my best to keep up with him. I was really pushing. At some point, while he was somewhat ahead of me, and out of sight, he fell on a tricky stream crossing, and then waited several minutes for me there to make sure I was alright. He said he had not hurt anything, and was just slightly embarrassed by the fall. I was gratefull that he had waited, but I managed to negotiate the stream bed safely. We then continued down together at a more gentle pace, with JJ scampering around us. He is an English teacher for multiple grade Learning Disabled students and we conversed about many of the giants of English and American literature, from Chaucer to Maya Angelou.11:45 - We reached the gravel parking lot at the bottom, where he had parked his car. Someone had left several Leki poles at the USGS map enclosing sign describing The Priest Wilderness we had just walked through.He took me to the little store that he knew about which was around 1.5 miles down the road. It was closed, so he returned me to the trailhead and went on his way, while I proceeded to cross the swinging bridge over the Rye River. I then went down to the river bank to have lunch, and talked for a few minutes with two hikers who were just finishing their lunch prior to hiking up The Priest. I had started to get some water, and then decided not to, as I have 2.5 liters for the 2 miles to the shelter, and there is plenty of water at the shelter. It was a relatively long break, and I finished a pb sandwich and a bag of gorp before hoisting my pack and proceding.I was passed by "Red Ranger" again, as I walked up to Harper's Creek. He had stopped for some time with his wife, and was again slack packing on. I was worn out, tired and a little depressed from the lack of any kind of reasonable improvement in my physiology. The rains and drizzles at least had stopped. I was passed by a hiker coming down and (TRAIL MAGIC) he gave me a couple of snickers and a couple of slim jims. A real perk up. Lee had passed me earlier, moving quickly, and now his partner LumberMack caught up and passed me. He is 63 and a real inspiration, doing the full trail from Daleville, having had problems last year at Dragon's Tooth. When I got to the shelter, he and Lee had built a fire, and we all talked, mostly about the fires. We were trying to reason out why there was so very little available dead wood around the shelter (which LumberMack had noticed when he started to build the fire). Unless you crossed the creek there was virtually no small or medium size dead wood pieces. LumberMack finally got a couple of the big logs burning, and the fire roared nicely. Then I learned something. He put his clothes on one of his poles, and turning the pole over the fire, dried his clothes. Toward dusk, LumberMack actually used a local tree some twenty feet to the right of the shelter (if you were facing the shelter) and set a bear bag up about 15 feet in the air. I continued to use the mouse hangers in the shelter, that I had found sufficient unto this time. During our conversations, LumberMack discussed his knee problem from last year on Dragon's Tooth, when he had to stop hiking for the season, and some of the things he did before retiring from Acer? NC, where he was in charge of part of the public utility infrastructure. We talked about the aging of some of the infrastructure, and what could be done about it, especially the problems associated with reconditioning old pipes. We also talked about the necessity of the bear bags, and how some of the shelters in the Shenandoah Park had them pre-established. True to his name, LumberMack kept the fire burning very well. LumberMack and Lee are friends who attend the same Baptist church outside of Raleigh. Some of our conversations dealt with the theological.There is a chessboard engraved in the floor of the shelter towawrd the back right.