Date: 2006-10-13
From: abington shelter

To: damascus!
Miles today: 10.0
Weather: clear sky

======2003====== tuesday,april 1, day 39this morning we were anxious to get on down here to damascus, so we "snacked" for breakfast and were out walking by 7:45 (even though we procrastinated under the WARM quilt, thinking the wind would be impossible to deal with!)....but it wasn't so bad.....the sun was shining and we had only a few more snow drifts to trudge through....the trail was easy, mostly downhill, and the snow levels were diminishing....i wore my yak trax for the first couple of hours , because the trompled trail was frozen and slippery.....at the tennessee/virginia line,though, off came the trax and we celebrated....(we do a little state line "dance" whenever we cross!)....not only did we celebrate crossing into one more state (our 4th), but also the warming air and the clearing trail!.....we were now walking on "earth" again for the first time in 3 days! ....AND ....we were "headed to the barn" as killeen likes to say!....by noon time, we were in damascus, strolling about in almost "hot" springtime air, enjoying the blooming gardens of victorian houses and churches and shops and restaurants!....RESTAURANTS!....go to EAT !....do not pass GO!...do not collect $200!...go EAT!....and that's exactly what we did!.....we went to the famous "hiker haven" we had heard tell of, "the side track cafe",where 'mountain man', the owner, home-made and hand-tossed a spinach pizza for us....we were also able to use a computer there to check our e-mail(which we were just learning).....we thought we had died and gone to heaven!....AND!...(you won't believe this!)....but when we got ready to pay our tab, mtn. man, with a curious grin on his face, said,"your money's no good here"!.....it took us a minute to figure out what exactly he meant and what exactly was happening and then he unraveled the mystery for us....yeah!....good ol' nasty, mike and shaman (who had also just had lunch there and had chatted with us briefly) had PAID for our lunch!!!....God bless their grungy little hiker souls! i'm tellin' ya!....you meet some incredible people out here on the trail!.....i guess they were "thanking" us for the meal we cooked for them at kincora...(mtn. man teased that i should come take over his kitchen! ha ha!...said we were "famous" already on the trail for our "grub"!)....anyway, we had a WONDERFUL lunch (thanks to mtn. man and the"boys")....and then we were on our way to pick up our box that sweet little carli had sent to us, and to check into "dave's place" (the outfitter's hostel)....he ended up charging us only $5 (instead of the usual $10) for a room with a double bunk, because we offered to take his towels to the laundry and bring them back to the hostel for him....MY! MY!...the BLESSINGS!....God certainly has been good to us!.....the REST of the day here today for us will be REST!.....======2006====== wednesday, march 22, day 39 (12.2 miles from lost mountain to thomas knob shelter)it would be difficult to adequately describe this day (for even the best of storytellers, which i am not)....one reason is that it's difficult to even hold a pen here in this "refrigerator" (aka:the thomas knob shelter)...much less get a decent thought out of my frozen brain!.....i really am convinced that if we make it here tonight, it will be by none other than God's grace!....we've rigged the tarp over us here in the loft and are praying our Lord will allow the wind to calm...i'm dreading climbing down from this snow-blown loft to go out for the "necessaries"....i'm not sure how i'll ever get down the icy trail to the solar privy fast ENOUGH in the morning!....wonder if they could harness some of the privy's "power" for a chair lift to and from the shelter!.....i've never had to THINK so much about "voiding"......oh well....enough complaining here....let me instead relate a little bit about our day....it was AWESOME!....it began with a climb up to 'whitetop mountain'*....and that's exactly what it was!i've never seen anything like it! (not even in photos).....i had had this "feeling" as we went out from lost mtn. this morning....i dunno...it was almost as if the Lord was "saying" to me, "c'mon!...I have a surprise for you!...come and see!...come and see!"....i had wondered as we walked out through the green rhododendrens if the bit of almost freezing mist the night before had performed any "wintery magic" up towards the highlands....but i never really expected the EXTRAVAGANT display we began to see as we entered the area up near whitetop!....i hafta say, i was absolutely awestruck!.....SMITTEN to be exact!....so much so that i stopped in the howling wind and unpacked everything to get to my camera (i had packed it away for protection against what i thought might be a damp, drizzly day).....and i'm so glad i did!...the rest of the day was just an absolute picture postcard!....a very COLD picture postcard!....we knew it was really cold because even though the sun came out strong and bright, nothing was melting!....not even off the windblown twigs and trees!....this is one of our favorite portions of the trail, but today was unbelievabe!....as we walked along in solitude over these picturesque mountaintops, i fantasized in my mind that we were the only people in the world (which indeed is how it felt up there with only the sound of the wind in our ears), and that our Creator had fashioned all this magic just for us!....later in the day, however, near elk garden, we met another couple hiking south....and then a little further on, a guy with two dogs.....the dogs came charging down the slopes toward us barking wildly (the dogs, not us)which normally would have terrified me....not today, though....they didn't even phase me!...i figured their bite couldn't have hurt any worse than that wind there in the gap near the road!.....i wore a balaclava and my "poofy" vest all day today...and at this moment, my prayers have become serious pleas to our Maker that He would help us keep sufficiently warm tonite....oh.....i "claimed" a portion of land today for God's kingdom (silly me!....in reality it's all His anyway!)....but i just got this wild idea (as i am wont to do on the trail).....there's this little abandoned brick house right off the trail at the foot of whitetop....i noticed it in '03, too...abandoned and empty these 3 years....i think it could be an absolutely GREAT hostel* (though relatively near damascus)....i even gave it a name: the "Lamb's Back farm and hiker hostel"!(Lamb's back, because that's what the mountain looked like today....white fleece!).....i further fantasized that my family, carli and michael and shea and rachel could come and live with us and we could homeschool and garden and have animals and cook pancakes for hikers!....oh well.....such was my dreaming today....hope i have similar nice dreams as i sleep tonight!...thank You, our Father, for your special blessings to us this day....please help us to survive the night....*NOTES/OBSEVATIONS/COMPARISONS* whitetop mountain.....see more photos of this spectacular day!....just click on the one above and then "next" to view the following pictures of our snow-covered journey over mt. rogers and the grayson highlands...* the "Lamb's Back hostel"....i talked to bob peoples at the "gathering" this year and asked him what he knew about this property....he said he thought the ATC owned it....i sure would love to see this place become a "haven" for hikers!*here's an added note as of this day, january 30, 2007....i can't resist as i work at transcribing these memories from my journals, including a quote which leaps off the desk here at our friends', the dubles, (for whom we are house-sitting)...it is so appropriate for dreaming, would-be thru-hikers and i hope it might serve to inspire someone out there to "go for it"!....here's the quote (i don't know where it comes from):               "YOUR INTENTIONS CREATE YOUR REALITY!"(take THAT and stick it in your pack!)