Date: 2016-07-05
From: Atkins, VA

To: Knot Maul Branch Shelter
Miles today: 14.0
Weather: light rain

The next morning I didn't see Elisa and Kolby, the couple with the dog. I did have two interesting conversations at breakfast. The Barn restaurant was open so I had a big breakfast before hitting the trail. There were only two customers, me and a truck driver. He asked me about the trail and he told me truck driving stories. He drives a route for Walmart between Tennessee and Virginia. He asked me about bears on the trail and I told him I have never seen one on the AT. I told him about the time we saw one on the road after my wife picked me up from my hike from Georgia to the Smokies. Two weeks in the forest and no bears, ten minutes on the road and we have to stop so a bear could cross in front of us. He said he sees them on the interstate often. Recently he saw one in the median that seemed confused about how to escape his predicament. He also said he ran over one once that had already been hit. He wished me well on my hike and I wished him well on his drive.I filled up both of my water bottles with filtered water from the restaurant and headed out as another hiker was headed in. His trail name is Wring Way. He is doing a "flip-flop" thru-hike, going from Georgia to Harper's Ferry, West Virginia, and then starting in Maine and hiking south. He said he had until Thanksgiving to finish. Hiking through Pennsylvania in November sounded like it might be cold. I would have done the northern have in the summer, but everyone does their own hike. I thought maybe I'd be hiking with him, but he was taking a zero day because of the expected rain. As tempting as that sounded, I couldn't take a zero day on my 2nd day out. Besides I had new Gortex socks to keep my feet dry. We wished each other well and I headed out to the trail, across a highway, past the gas station, under an interstate, and finally into the wilderness, it had already rained the night before and everything was wet. It wasn't long before I was wet. Then the rain came. I was hiking with a light-weight umbrella which seemed to work great. Any rain gear I have tried leaves me soaked on the inside from sweat, so wet that I can't tell if it is keeping out the rain or not. The umbrella at least kept the rain off of my head, my upper body, and kept my glasses dry. It also meant I could enjoy the cooler air brought in by the rain. The only down side was that I had to put away one hiking pole to hold the umbrella. That's not s problem in flat terrain, but there is very little flat terrain on the AT.By mid-afternoon the rain had stopped. I hiked through another pasture with some cattle. They watched me, I watched them, and we all went about our business. The big news of the day was that my new Gortex socks didn't keep my feet dry. I don't know if it was walking in wet grass in the morning, or rain running down my legs, or sweat coming from the inside, but by lunch time, I could ring water out of the socks from both sides of the Gortex lining. And that had produced blisters on two ties on each foot. I put blister pads on them at lunchtime hoping it would help. I don't know if they got worse or not, but they didn't get any better. I hated getting blisters on my second day out.Early in the day I ran to a sign on a tree that said I was 1/4 of the way fro Georgia to Maine. I think it was supposed to be encouraging, but I found it to be a bit depressing. This is my fourth year of hiking and I have 3/4 of the trail to go. Later I talked to a man who finished section hiking the AT in 2014, thirty-three years after he started. That means I could finish when I am 92 years old. Hmmm.I came to a nice camp site, but I decided to sleep in a shelter because it was supposed to rain again that night. The next shelter, Knot Maul Branch Shelter, also had nice tent sites and I always sleep better in a tent, but I hate packing up a wet tent and the weather did not make it Simons like I could spread the tent out tomorrow to let it dry. I opted for sleeping in the shelter. It turned out I was the only one in this shelter that night. I am always a bit relieved when no one is around when I hang my food bag. I out a rock in a dirty sick, tie it to the rope and throw it over a horizontal branch for the one rope method, or over a fork in the tree fit the two rips method. It her way it is embarrassing how many throws it takes for not get the rope over the right branch.There were either no mice in the shelter or I was so tired and slept so hard I never heard them. Either way, it was a good night ... and it didn't rain.