Date: 2004-03-10
From: Thomas Knob Shelter

To: Old Orchard Shelter
Miles today: 11.0
Weather: overcast clouds

Log entry: 39Starting time: 0900Ending time: 1630Morning weather: Thermometer read 20 at 0900, well below that at night. The coldest I have been so far on the trail. Not the coldest night temp wise. Snowing.Afternoon weather: Clouds broke and eventually the sun came out but never got above freezing per the texture of the snow.Evening weather: Crystal clear, stars were amazing. Cold but not unbearable. My themometers both said 28 when I went to bed at 2100.Breakfast: OCP, too cold to make instant breakfast or eat my Jello.Lunch: Jello, can't remember what elseDinner: Coca Krispies and the dinner entree escapes meTrail description: Very cool stretch of trail. Some of my favorite so far. the snow that fell overnight covered the trail making it very difficult to determine the route. I would guess between 8-12 inches in spots and drifts. the snow was still very powdery so walking was easy. Grayson Highlands is an awesome state park and my favorite part was the climb up Stone Mountain was cool and down into "the scales". All a bald with great views of the outcroppings on the Grayson Highlands.People: Icecold and Bo, the Solemates, some spring breakers.Animals: Bo, birds, oh yeah and wild ponies.Money spent: noneBiggest complaints: Trail hard to find at times due to snowfall.Thoughts: Yeah so it was a cold night. I slept in my bivy sack inside the shelter and was still cold. I even heated water in my nalgene but still had a hard time sleeping through the night. I just ate my OCPs because it was too cold to chug instant breakfast or nibble at jello. Icecold and I set out together at 0900. Our start was slighly delayed because when Bo went out for his morning business he returned without his blanket. His blanket snaps onto his harness when his pack isn't on. Icecold started out in front of the shelter and I followed his tracks behind the shelter. My guess was correct, his red blanket was hanging in the barbed wire fence behind the shelter.We covered the first 40 yards easy enough but once we crossed through the stile, we stood there scratching our heads at where the trail went. The powder snow filled in any depression wore built from years of use and the blazes were all on rocks. Which is probably sufficient 360 days a year. but no one had broke the trail and rocks looked like snow drifts and snow drifts looked like rocks.Finally by kicking and cleaning rocks I was able to find a blaze here and there.About a third of a mile into the morning I realized that my nalgene had fallenout of my pack. So I backtracked and probed the powder for my nalgene. It wasthe first nalgene I ever bought. I couldn't just let it be. But after manywasted minutes I gave up. The nalgene had fallen and gotten swallowed by thepowder. Rest in peace little Lexan brother.Icecold and I had a bear of a time staying on the AT. We went about a third of a mile down the Pine Mountain Trail, which cuts the U-shaped route for today in half. Had we stayed on it we would have cut like 9 miles off the day. We spent a good half an hour in the area of rhododendron gap trying to find a white blaze. We kept going back to the the last white blaze and could not find the offshoot. Finally we located it and still had a tough time working our way to Grayson Highlands. Finally we crossed the fence at noon. 3 miles in 3 hours. So much for a quick day.Once we started up into the park we were immeditely greeted by a herd of wildponies. How cool. They even got along well with Bo and only chased him once,which I caught on video.After spending time with the horses we made our way down to wise shelter wherewe ate a quick lunch. It was too cold just to hang out.The walking was easy but we still moved slow because the route was not obvious.I took the climb up Stone Mt as slow as I could, trying to soak it all in. Theviews were almost too much. Hard to walk the right direction because you justwanted to look around. There was also another group of ponies here. Before Iknew it I was at the shelter. Icecold and I chilled and before long theSolemates strolled in. They had a long cold night in their tent but made goodtime as they didn't have to break trail. The 5 NOBOs finally together. All iswell.