Date: 2008-06-22
From: Pickle Branch Shelter

To: VA 624
Miles today: 6.7

I went to sleep early and slept almost 12 hours except for one pee run.Today we are going to Dragon¢s Tooth and the Homeplace restaurant in Catawba. We are also going to resupply at a store, enough food to get us to Daleville.The day started sunny with a climb up. I was unable to tell Richard and Crabapple what the trail was like before Dragon¢s Tooth. I¢d forgotten because of what comes after stays in my mind. As I was hiking up, I was thinking, ¢I¢m climbing the Dragon¢s backside¢. I saw my second snake this year ¢ a little brown one. Later, a doe calmly walked across the trail in front of me. By the time I got out and turned on my camera, she was gone. I also began to hear rumbles of thunder. When I finally reached the blue blazed trail for Dragon¢s Tooth, I was tempted to keep going on the AT. Oh well, I¢m here. Let¢s take the picture. Then six day hikers showed up. They took less time to look than I did. I got my picture and put my camera away, and put my pack cover on. More rumbles and Ka-Booms of thunder. It¢s getting darker. After Dragon¢s Tooth it si a rock climb down. Some places I¢m holding on to trees to climb down and in other places I¢m tossing my leki poles ahead and holding on to the rocks as I scoot down on my bottom. One place had metal rungs in the rock to climb down. I see flashes of lightening and count until I heard the thunder clap. I¢m hurrying to get down off this mountain. As I¢m going down, day hikers are going up. After I tried to tell them the first group not to go up, I gave up and just counted the hikers I passed ¢ 13. Halfway down it started to rain. It didn¢t last long. Again I got more wet from the bushes on both sides of the trail as I brushed past them. I was hurrying to meet the others.Earlier we had agreed to meet at the grocery store near the first road crossing before Catawba. When I arrived (an hour after Richard and Crabapple), I found Kamin, Inside Out, and Flying J also at the store. They got a ride from the people who owned the white car. They were eyeballing the Homeplace Restaurant and then back to where we left them. They set up camp there and then hiked over Dragon¢s Tooth. When I showed up, they were getting ready to hike 8 more miles to a shelter. I¢ll probably see them in Daleville. Kamin liked the rock climb; it reminded her of Maine. While I was shopping for supplies, a couple who had been section hiking offered Richard, Crabapple, and me a ride to the Homeplace Restaurant. Yea.Hikers have been talking about and writing in the registers about the Homeplace Restaurant for several days It is a lovely family style AYCE place only open from Thursday to Sunday each week. People from far away drive to this restaurant. It is one of the places NOT to be missed. After we paid our bill and left, we found out from other hikers who were eating here that hikers are allowed to set up their tents on the lawn by the Gazebo. Cool. After I set up my tent, I turned in early to do my journaling. I was informed through my tent that we would get a thunderstorm. Sure enough, around sunset. It was on top of us. I¢m happy, cosy and dry in my tent.Oh yeah, while I was only getting rained on while climbing down the rocks, some of the others got hail. My hiking shorts are black where I had been scooting down rocks.