Date: 2003-06-10
From: The Rollercoaster

To: Mark Z's House
Miles today: 21.0

Exactly 21 miles from just north of Rod Hollow shelter, at the very beginning of the Rollercoaster to Mark Z¢s house which was a little past David Russer Shelter. 300 yards up the AT. So, as I said earlier I believe, I caught up to Ultreya about 12 mile past Rod Hollow Shelter where he had gone off into the side of the woods and had already set up his hammock. I had brought him up a couple of Bud Lights which he appreciated and we basically set up and went to bed. This morning I laid in the hammock for quite awhile. I knew it was getting light outside probably around 5:30 in the morning but I kind of hung out in the hammock where it was nice and cozy and warm. I heard Serge moving around early. He¢d already been basically packed. So, I went ahead and popped out of my hammock and talked to him for a few minutes. I kind of ambled long packing my stuff. I was a little groggy. He ended up leaving at 6:30 sharp or so and I hung around and gave him a good lead of about an hour and fifteen minutes. I didn¢t leave until a quarter to eight. In the meantime, Amble (who had been in town with his friends at Front Royal), walked up. He had actually gotten back on the trail last night and had stayed at the Rod Hollow Shelter with the million screaming little girls that were there. 20 or 30 or whatever there were¢¦. 16 year old girls. He told me he was just walking to Bryn Bears ? Hostel and hanging out there which was the place that Serge was going to go to originally until I convinced him to keep on walking with me because of Mark Zanowski who was a friend of Mark and Jan. He had found out I was walking the AT through Mark and Jan and apparently he wants to hike the AT some day and was very excited. He had left me a note with directions to his house saying I needed to stop by there and he would feed me and I could take showers and he would play the host. The problem was that it was a 22 mile walk to his house and 13 12 miles of that is what they call the Rollercoaster which is extreme northern VA. Basically, you¢re walking out of VA and the corridor that they had managed to get access to for about 13 12 miles is so narrow that the AT had no choice but to go over every single peak. Officially, they say its 10 feet but I counted more like 16. Because they aren¢t counting the uphills that are 200 feet. Anything under 200 feet they count as flat which is ridiculous. But, 13 12 miles up and down and up and down. Very, very rocky. With many good reasons it is called the Rollercoaster and you end up with 8000 feet in elevation changes in that 13 12 miles. Well, we did the entire Rollercoaster and then we also had to walk the 9 miles after that. Understandably, by this time, I was beat and Serge was beat. He¢s in good shape. He¢s 61. In awesome shape for his age. I had also stopped at one of the other shelters, before getting out to Route 7, for breakfast and water. A good part of this day was without water. The first part because, where we had camped short of the Rollercoaster, there was no water. So, I woke up with only 8 oz which I drank immediately. Then walked in the Rollercoaster without water which really sucked. So, I finally was forced to go into a shelter and I ate breakfast which I couldn¢t cook earlier. Had a double portion of grits and some hot chocolate and a twenty ounce bottle of electrolyte mix. So, I had effectively given Serge a 2 hour lead and I had to try and run to catch up to him. But, I finally did catch up to him. He was sitting at the VA road 7¢¦.sitting there a half hour waiting for me. He thought I had told him the place was only 11 miles. So, it was kind of a shock for him to find out that were gonna have to walk at least 21 miles. So, not only did we have to do the Rollercoaster but we had to keep on going after that. The Rollercoaster was enough to kick anyone¢s tail. Very reminiscent of some of the stuff that you had to walk through in GA. Steep and rocky in places. Sharp uphills which you rarely saw in VA. On about 5 o¢clock we stopped. We stopped right there in front of the Blackburn Trail Center, and had a can sardines and crackers each before we moved on. I knew we were running out of time but Serge was tired so we stopped. We got up and kept hiking and I started trying to make phone calls to find out where we were because I knew that we were getting up close to Marks¢ house. His note said that he had left pink ribbons with a little note saying S.W.I.F.T. on them¢¦on the trail. We kept looking for these things. Got as far as the David Messer? Shelter. I was sure, by that time, that we had already passed him. We ran down to the David Messer Shelter. Serge got water and I called Jan and got the phone number and finally talked to Mark who said he was gonna go walk out to the trail and fire three shots off so we could hear the direction he was in. But then he got to the top and his cell phone worked but he forgot the bullets for his gun so he said he would scream and I heard him scream. It turned out to be a mile or a 1/2 mile behind us. So, I turned around and by this time I had already left Serge behind and was trying to run ahead and find the flags. Turned out that it was behind us. Serge had decided to keep on going and had actually ran to Mark. By this time it was getting on towards 7 o¢clock and we hiked down¢¦.Mark Z had gone ahead¢¦. and Serge and I walked down the ribbons. We had to bushwhack through the woods down to Marks house and walk down this road a little bit and there was his house. Beautiful house. Big house..ton¢s of porches. He¢s got 6 levels of porches. He could have a party at this place and hold 150 people with no problem and I think that¢s probably the thing that he¢s probably planning on because Mark Z seems to be very much a party kind of guy. So, anyway, we dropped our packs on the porches and went to the door. He opened the door and he had some company there. BJ, a gal who was actually, the other Marks (Mark and Jan¢s) ex-wife¢s sister and her husband Rick were also there. Mark went about being, not just the perfect host, but way beyond the perfect host. He handed us Rolling Rocks to begin with and invited us into the house. He started cooking up a storm. He made this huge London Broil on the BBQ and BBQ¢d red bell peppers and onions and baked potatoes and hor'devours (nachos with cheese on them and black olives and hamburger meat). It was just awesome. Then he started pulling out bottles of wine. First one was a bottle of Cabernet that was Serge¢s choice. He was giving us the choice. We sucked that bottle down, then he pulled out another bottle of Merlot and we sucked that bottle down too and then sat around and chatted. Then Serge ran in, took a shower and came back out and kept drinking wine. Mark Z had heard about the hikers appetite and he did everything he could to make sure that we were more than filled up. He was just throwing food at us left and right. Cooked broccoli. He kept forcing the London Broil on Serge and I beyond the point where we even wanted any more. Between the two of us we probably ended up eating half of it because Mark insisted. Probably about a pound of this wonderful London Broil. He had, I guess, basted or marinated in garlic and salt and it was perfect. Just perfect. Medium rare on the inside. Melts in your mouth. So, in the meantime, during that process, I managed to take a shower myself. Then after dinner we moved on inside, turned on the weather channel and just sat around the living room talking for quite awhile It was myself and Serge, Mark, BJ and Rick¢¦with glasses of wine. Marks a hardcore hiker kind of guy. He showed us pictures of various places he had hiked and been. Told us some stories about him and Mark and BJ and Terry (who is BJ¢s sister, the other Marks ex-wife). They¢d apparently known each other for a dozen years and had been hiking and backpacking and biking all together. So, they¢d been a tight outdoor group for a long time. On about 10:30 Serge finally got up out of the chair. He stumbled out to the front porch and got his backpack. Mark had set up beds for us. One upstairs in one bedroom. Serge went in there at 10:30 and ¢¦no doubt¢¦he zonked out immediately. I ended up staying up and talking for quite a while with the people that were left there. Finally, BJ and Rick went home and then Mark and I sat up and talked for another couple of hours. I didn¢t even realize how late it was getting. I knocked off the rest of the bottle of wine with him and he said ¢Well, I guess you might want to get into bed¢. So, I went on downstairs and then went back up and grabbed another beer and went out and sat on the porch and had a cigarette and never realizing that it was already 10 minutes after 1 o¢clock. It was probably a mistake to have that last beer¢¦but I went ahead and knocked it off. Knocked off a cigarette. Went to bed. A very comfortable bed downstairs and a huge bathroom that was about as big as most peoples bedrooms. I had a wonderful sleep.