Date: 2010-08-05
From: Salisbury. Vanessa Bretton's house

To: Riga Lean To
Miles today: 4.0

Day 17 - Thu Aug 5Plan: pick up our food box from Post Office, hike 4 miles to Riga Leanto, weather - rainyI heard the thunder last night about 2:00 AM and it rained the rest of the night. Genevieve is up at 6:00 though restacking her pack and I can tell just by the way she is moving around the room there is no chance of a rain delay. I won't even suggest it. "That's what we have rain gear for", she'll say. Seven bells from the library tower. Had a good nights sleep after I wrestled my bed into submission. Looking forward to another fresh orange juice and salmon bagel at The Roast... and of course strapping on the heavy pack and hitting the trail. Rain has abated somewhat. Can't get Sprint service here but ATT seems to work...well our food pack never came in - lesson learned Sofia shipped it parcel post instead of priority mail and it just takes longer that way I suppose. Well anyway no worries we give the PO our details to bounce it forward and we go to the local grocery to buy supplies. We get 14# food: peanut butter, bagels, oatmeal and instant asian noodles with salmon and other stuff. I meet Robert Norris at breakfast who owns Giulia's restaurant. He offers to drive me the 2 miles to the nearest fuel station. It is a Mobil station so I offer to fill up his tank and he says OK since I tell him I work for XOM. Sold a little gas...We restack our packs and I am at 43# minus water. Genevieve is at 28# minus water. Nice. I finally get a head start on the trail at 1:40 but Genevieve stays behind to mail our bounce box - the post office is closed between 1 and 2. At 2:10 we get a sudden torrential downpour. I duck under a large and thick juniper and am staying reasonably dry. It is raining ducks. I put my cover over my pack and it is raining so hard for the first time I break out my rain top. I also put on my short gaiters to see if they will keep my boots and socks dry - it works great BTW. I am perfectly content to wait it out. It is really a downpour. Well of course just like I predicted here comes Genevieve walking by with rain gear and pack cover and says, "Let's go. We'll get just as wet walking as standing". Of course - why didn't I think of that? We find the turn off from Hiway 41 running out of Salisbury back to the AT and the trail is a small muddy stream. Nonetheless we move on through a 1200 foot climb to the Lionshead, a near vertical ascent to a spectacular view. Steam vents are rising out of the forest. It turns out to be quite a nice walk since the rain abates after a while. We chat as we walk make it easy into Riga Lean To at 6:00. We set up camp inside the lean to shelter because there is a 10 million dollar view of the sunrise over the valley below. The early warning should have been the mosquitos. We have always slept in our tent before and we are running out of insect repellent. But we want to see the sunrise and we figure that we can crawl inside our sleeping bags and escape. We cook dinner and while it is the bag steaming we go to the brook down the hill to filter water. The filter is clogged and hard to pump. I put a little more muscle into it and break the handle off. Hmmm...I guess we will have to switch over to our back up tablets. Rangler and Joe show up just at dinner time. Rangler has brought some mango sherbert from town. You never know what he will pull out of his pack. It is all melted but is still good anyway. After dinner he asks if anyone would like some watermelon. No joke he pulls a watermelon out of his pack and slices it up. Joe throws the rinds over the cliff and casually remarks how much bears like watermelon. Joe is an ex marine sargent with two bad knees and he has us crying with his funny stories. There are reports of bear activity at this popular shelter and so we make use of the bear can down the hill for all of our foodstuff and toothpaste and the like. We say goodnight just as it is getting dark we are alone in the open shelter and then it happens... Genevieve cries out! I say "What is it?" "Over there!", she cries. "What over there?" "MICE!!!!" There are mice all over the shelter. She read Bryson's book "A Walk in the Woods" where they have to fight off the mice with their water bottles. "We are not staying here", she anounces and grabs her light to go look for a place to pitch the tent. I am not unhappy with this decision. Genevieve gets the tent setup in 6 minutes flat. So we are finally settled in the tent and it is peaceful and comfortable and it has been a great day. We set our alarms for 5:00 so we can catch the famous sunrise of this peak. I know I am behind on pictures and videos. I have some great ones coming but I have to load them all one by one and it takes a long time. We have another town stop in 4 days - I will try to get caught up then. Goodnight all. 1.0 and Bea on the trail.