Date: 2015-04-28
From: Lexington, VA

To: Lexington, VA
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: few clouds

All things considered, Lexington is a great place to zero. A picturesque community in the Virginia countryside. The 2 universities here provide enough support for a collection of good restaurants and independent retail shops as well as some of the standard franchises on the outskirts. Also plenty of historical highlights. The 502 South Main is the quintessential B&B. Extremely comfortable with all the expected amenities and a distinctive southern flair. When we came down last evening to head out to dinner, another guest was playing a Joplin rag on the grand piano. The owners, Mary Stuart and Russ, are superb hosts and very responsive to their guests.We typically leave very early for the trail, so we don't get to take advantage of the breakfast "B" in B&B. Today was different, we slept in and drifted downstairs at 9 to a delicious breakfast of cranberry-pomegranate juice, cantaloupe with raspberry & yogurt, cheese ham & mushroom omelet, cherry tomatoes, toasted English muffin & raspberry jam, cranberry scone and coffee. We had lunch downtown and did a little shopping, then back to the B&B to rest my leg. We have decided to zero here again tomorrow, so Princess has revised our hiking plans and we should end up in Waynesboro on Thursday evening. I indicated yesterday that I would talk some about our gear. I haven't built up a gear page on this website - I may do some of that in the next couple of days. I'll start here by describing what we take in our slack-pack, and I'll include a pic. Bear in mind that the strategy behind slack-packing is to minimize weight by only carrying enough food and supplies for one day. It assumes that the hiker has a reliable means of getting on and off the trail in one day, what many call a "day hike". So there are fewer contingency-related items than a backpacker might carry. I'll start with the slack-pack itself. Last year (boy) Grasshopper suggested a bag made by Sea to Summit that we use and like. It's extremely light weight, frameless, and scrunches down into a bag that's smaller than a tennis ball. Most outfitters don't stock them, so we had to order them online. Water is very important. For a medium-length hike we each carry 2 Smartwater bottles, 28 fl oz, the kind that have a plastic cap that seals (they typically end up side ways in the slack-pack). Usually we fill them initially with Gatorade for extra energy (we use Gatorade powder that we get online so we can control the concentration). For a long hike we may take 3 bottles, depending on water sources along the hike. One of us also always carries a Sawyer mini water filter and a "dirty water" Sawyer collapsible water bag (use it to get creek water before filtration and the Sawyer filter screws onto the bag). If we stop to get water at a source, we fill our Smartwater bottles too. We carry the page/s from AWOL's AT Guide to identify reliable water sources and to track where we are during the hike. Princess also carries the section map from the AT Conservancy that shows off-routes and crossing trails (except in the Blue Ridge and Shenandoah parks where parkway crossings are frequent and listed in the AT Guide). Princess has a wristwatch and I have a whistle on my slack-pack. Food varies depending on the hike and other factors. Often we just take 2 or 3 Powerbars each. We eat a big breakfast before we go and we usually finish within 7 or 8 hours, so energy bars are enough along the way. But that's just us.Princess reacts to bee stings, so she carries an Epi-penn all the time. She also carries an emergency mylar thermal blanket (a thin sheet that folds into a very small package). And we usually carry some Advil. Other meds depend on need. For safety's sake, this year I'm carrying a DeLorme inReach 2-way GPS communicator. I've described it previously, but the most important feature is an SOS function. We both carry iPhones, but often there is no signal so they aren't reliable as emergency communicators. But we do have a PDF of the AT Guide (available from AWOL) as a backup in case we lose the daily hike paper copy or it gets wet. So we can still look up water sources. And it's a good idea to ask the shuttle driver about phone signal access along the hiking route if you plan to be picked up. We like to update the driver on our progress midway during the hike, especially if our pace is different than we predicted.ID and insurance card/s are essential, a credit card and TP (mountain money) or wet wipes. I have bifocals, but I found that they aren't good for hiking. So I wear another pair with only my long-distance prescription. I carry my bifocals as a backup. Princess also carries a backup pair of eye glasses. As the weather gets warmer we carry bug spray and head nets (flies can be a distracting nuisance even if you have a good bug spray). We use Zpacks ponchos for rain gear and we carry them most of the time. They are also good wind protection. Once we start climbing, we find that we can get by with a Tshirt and the poncho for temps in the 40's and even down into the 30's. We roll the ponchos up and squeeze them down into small bags to stow in the slack-packs. We also carry arm warmers in cooler temps. We get them in bike stores and they're a good complement to the ponchos. We pull them down to our wrist when we're warm, but if we swing to the windward side of the hill we can pull them back up to stay warm. And they're lightweight. Essentially all the time we carry Thermoball jackets. They're very lightweight and good for cold and wind. But they're not waterproof and they don't breathe well, so we're inclined to pull on ponchos if it gets damp or if we're doing heavy climbing. When we're not wearing the jackets we scrunch them down into small dry sacks and stow them in our slack-packs. Finally gloves: these are critical to me when it's cold or just cool out and I have several different combinations of liners, gloves, and waterproof shells. I've talked about those before. And when it's not cold I use biking gloves for hand protection. IWe put almost everything into Zip-lock bags: electronics, ID's, filter, etc. We typically add an extra ziplock and 1 or 2 empty plastic bags to cover our dirty boots when the shuttle driver picks us up at the end of the hike.