Date: 2006-04-30
From: Blackrock Shelter

To: Hightop Hut
Miles today: 21.2
Weather: overcast clouds

9:04 p.m. On the 28th we woke up and left the place we had crashed the night before. It started with the vertical rock scramble that made us stop when we did, but then continued with pretty mild terrain. The walk, if I remember correctly, was pretty uneventful. We planned a short day into Waynesboro, and it was even a little shorter than we had thought it might be because our night hike went long. We didn't leave super early, but we still made good time into town, getting to Rockfish Gap at 1:30ish. At 5 miles before the gap we hit a shelter, where we had snacks and I used the privy, which I had been desperate for all day. The last five miles flew. Most of us did it in around an hour and a half. Flying. Once at Rockfish, we call a trail angle off a list provided by the Information Center there. Alice picked us up in her brand new car, and was nice, even though she had seemed grumpy on the phone. It is nice that Waynsboro has people who will give you free rides, and that there are lists around so you can contact them. We got taken to the Quality Inn, where we planned to stay unless we decided to go to Charlottesville. Sunshine has a friend from Charlottesville, who offered to take us there to see some live free music and eat at a good restaurant and go to a bar,etc. A college town with real things to do. Lockjaw really wanted to go - music and beer are among his favorite things and I imagine getting both would have made his day. We were also trying to celebrate Team Steve's 23rd birthday, which was the 26th. I was more or less neutral, because I thought it would be fun, but logistically difficult in terms of getting rides back, deciding whether to spend the night there, and doing chores. In the end, logistics won and we got rooms at the Quality Inn. We had the nasty surprise that there wasn't really laundry in the hotel. We did other chores though. We got a ride to the P.O. on which Lockjaw's hat fell off and got run over (but we actually rescued it). We went to a steak house for Team Steve's birthday, then threw the laundry in on the way back and stayed there with it while it both washed and dried, then back to the room to just sit around and watch TV, make calls, the usual. The morning of the 29th, we had the hotel continental breakfast, the went to Kroger's to resupply. Getting a ride out of town was more difficult that getting in. We tried manynumbers on the list before getting a nice young guy named Scuba who was a former thru-hike and had room for all of us. Between needing to do stuff in the morning and talking to Scuba, we didn't leave Rockfish Gap until about 11:30 a.m., our latest start yet, I think. 20 miles with an 11:30 start was bound to get us in late. We stopped not far along to register for Shenanadoah National Park. A little later was lunch, with Lockjaw trying to call his roommate to hear about the NFL draft pciks, which he wasn't going to get to watch. By the way, Sunshine bought a 4 lb. jar of PB in Waynesboro and insisted on carrying it. Whatever. Idiot. Up a hill we came to a radio tower and some random tractor seats mounted in the ground. We hung out there for a while. We took a few more breaks, and soon it was about 4 pm and we were only half done. That kind of sucked. I hiked with Lockjaw for the rest of the day, whose feet were hurting in his new shoes from Waynesboro. Later Sunshine caught up with us too. We got in quite late, and I actually didn't even cook. This morning Kaptain was up early, as usual. We got a fairly late start overall though. Sunshine, for some reason, had expressed an interest in seeing the effects of my mace first hand when we were in Waynesboro. He decided that a parking area with a faucet two miles into the day would be a good time to try it. Nasty stuff, pepper spray. The guys had been debating whether they would rather have a kick in the balls or be maced; this was to be the experiment. So Sunshine encouraged me to mace him. I did, but only like two drops actually got him. I was pretty timid because I didn't want to hurt him. He then grabbed it from me and showered his whole face with bright red mace. Moments later he was on his hands and knees by the faucet, in extreme pain. Poor thing. What stupidity! Fortunately he recovered but it took a lot of time and cold water to get to that point. We didn't end up leaving that parking area until about 11:00. We hit a closed campsite around 12:30 that had a soda machine and snack machine outside the office. We ate lunch there. THat was a nice treat. Seeing on the map that there was supposed a wayside with food and milkshakes on mile up and .5 miles off the trail, we set off for that, but in the end all we got was the use of a really disgusting port-a-potty and an extra uphill. The side trail was called Frasier Discovery Trail. We are proud of our yo-yo section hike. Sunshine's feet and legs had been killing him all day. I blame both problems on the fact that he switched footwear from his boots to Chacos (hiking sandals). Anyway, a little way after the unsuccessful milkshake escapade I encountered him and Kaptain at one of the many places the trail crosses Skyline Drive. Sunshine had gotten off at a previous crossing, then hitched to that spot, where he knew we would pass. He decided to get off there, because he had cracks in his heels and the balls of his feet so bad that he could hardly walk. He took my phone card and some cash from Kaptain and got an easy hitch. He said he was headed to anywhere with a phone, and would get in touch with some friends or his aunt that live nearby. The four of us went to the shelter, and have it to ourselves.