Date: 2007-05-29
From: Cornelius Shelter

To: Matts Creek Shelter
Miles today: 17.7
Weather: few clouds

Last night there were only 4 of us in the shelter but there were about 8 tents. They were a group of guys called the Maine Train/Texas Franchise. This morning I left at 6:45. Soon Birdawg passed me and told me he had just seen a bear! Lucky guy! I had just seen a deer. One of the sights I photographed was the Guillotine, which is a suspended boulder over the AT. It was 85', but once again we were shielded from the sun by the rhododendrums and tall trees. We rarely had a view today, and when we did it was very hazy. At noon, I caught up to TK Express taking a break at a road crossing. We joked about waiting for the ice cream truck to come. Just then, the Channel 7 News van from Roanake pulled over and spoke with us. They said that a man had approached a couple tenting near that road (not on the AT and not Thru Hiking) and he had lifted up the tent flap and fired two shots into the tent wounding the male hiker in the leg and arm. The authorities have not apprehended the suspect. This incident happened yesterday morning. The newscaster asked if she could interview us about safety precautions on the trail. She asked us questions while a man filmed us for tonight's news. It will also be on their web sight. I hiked on for almost 8 miles. I met Doug who recognized me from Trailjournals. He is a trail maintainer and was doing a great job clipping back the branches infringing on the trail. When I arrived at the shelter just before 5 pm, we all mentioned what a great trail Doug was providing for the hikers, and how we could notice a big difference where his 2.5 mile territory started and ended. The Maine Train/Texas Franchise stopped by and had dinner, but moved on to the next campground, closer to the James River. TK Express and 501 also left because Kimmie sprained her ankle and they wanted to get it checked out. The town is just 2 miles away. Four of us are left here for the night. It is a great location with creek in our "front yard". I went for a ! dip and it felt refreshing! OK, so you all know about Trail Magic... Wait til you hear this one! At 10 pm head lamps woke the 4 of us up, as three runners named Pianist, Yoho and Space Cadet delivered 3 Pizza Hut pizzas, a bag of oranges, cherries, a case of soda, beer and some energy bars. They all graduated from Liberty College and are living in the area and are avid runners. We feasted on their generosity and enjoyed their company for a hour. They even took all the trash with them, returning to their cars 2 miles away. I can't wait to have an orange for breakfast! What a treat. We went back to sleep and it wasn't long before I heard a crackling sound, which I thought was someone's platypus of water that had fallen off the picnic table. I shined my headlamp in that direction and saw that it was a water sack (sort of like a clear beach bag with a zip lock closing) standing upright on the ground under the picnic table. An unlucky mouse had climbed up the bag and entered the sack through the opening and drowned. I felt obligated to wake 60 up to warn her not to use her water sack for breakfast. Gross!