Date: 2018-05-18
From: Blacksburg VA

To: Damascus VA
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: light rain

Slept decently on the smallish couch and awoke around 7:30 in anticipation of our potential 8am ride. Swamp (Swamp Fuck, actually) showed a bit after 9 and we thanked David once again and piled into our sedan chariot for the 1 hour 45 minute haul to Damascus. We all swapped trail stories and I began to notice my knees were really throbbing today. By the time we finally got to Damascus, they were absolutely screaming. Not good. The trail obviously puts a great deal of strain on many areas of the body and I have had issues with knee pain in the past. Years of skiing and hiking will do that. Regardless, it¢s concerning that I can¢t be in a seated position comfortably for more than 30 minutes before they start singing. May need to look into preventative measures or get more proactive about stretching and working the tightness out. Anyway....We rolled into tent city and almost immediately ran into Juke box. He is one of those people that you inevitably see everywhere so that made sense. He gave us the lowdown on where to tent and we walked back to the forest off to the left and found a suitable spot about a quarter of a mile in. By suitable, I mean fairly rocky, totally saturated, and surrounded by tall weeds. We set up as best we could knowing that the rain would be coming down on our tents all weekend. Being fairly dry at the moment, we decided to walk out to the park where most of the vendor tents were set up and also get to the post office where ibex and I both had things to pick up. The walk through town was a moving reunion of hikers we hadn¢t seen in weeks and it was really fun seeing everyone. There was katie and Francis that I hadn¢t seen since day 2 and were instrumental in me adopting my trail name. Matt and Naps who we hadn¢t seen since Hiawassee. Rebel Yell not seen since Gatlinburg. We almost didn¢t make the post office in time for closing because we were catching up with everyone. I got a great care package from uncle Joe and aunt Andi (thanks guys!) and some important items from Amazon: a merino tank top for the warm weather, a case of indomie noodles, and a small case of glow sticks. Glow stick wanted the glow sticks because she thinks this is a music festival and not the hobo convention that it actually is. We also bought beer at the dollar general for fear that they might be bought out completely by the end of the night. We spent the remainder of the night bouncing around the various party sites in tent city and also hid from the rain for at least an hour under the clean water tent. After the sun went down we finally found original Juke box and Girl Scout. So good to see them after weeks apart, our tramily was reunited! Juke box and Juke box 2.0 agreed not to battle to the death and instead decided to collaborate. I¢m skeptical, though. In the end there can be only one Juke box. We all then cruised through the slopping mud over to the big bonfire near the wonderland and Riff Raff tent sites. Despite the hard rain, we stayed and drank until after 1am. Finally, I cruised back to our tents and I crawled in for some sleep. Hopefully not too soggy.