Date: 2019-05-03
To: View Entry
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: clear sky

I slept fairly well at the rest stop north of Harrisonburg. It's sort of like tenting at a shelter for highway travelers. It has a privy (okay, a restroom), a water source, and other people. But, unlike a shelter, I don't feel particularly safe, and nobody wants to make eye contact let alone chat over a campfire.It's still 250 miles home. But minutes after I pull out on I-81 the driver-side front tire blows out. "Noooooo!", I silently scream. But it's entirely predictable and entirely my fault. The tire pressure alert went off yesterday, but I ignored it because I was in a hurry trying to intercept my friends to do trail magic. I assumed it wasn't as critical as it was. Fortunately the highway shoulder is wide enough for me to change in the spare, and even more fortunately the spare has enough air to get me to the next gas station a few miles away where I check all the tires. Last August I was a passenger when Mongo had a blowout near Pearisburg, and his spare was flat. So fortune has smiled on me, or at least not kicked me when I am down.I want to drive straight home because I've committed to driving my son to a scouting weekend tonight, but I know that's not wise. The spare is not meant for highway driving or 250 miles. The next Audi dealer is eighty miles away in Frederick and doesn't even open for more than an hour. I drive slowly up the interstate, aggravating morning commuters. When the dealer opens I call and find out they can't get the right size tire until this afternoon. So today's plan is blown up. Sara thankfully is able to cover things at home. I exit I-81 at Charles Town to head for the dealer in Frederick, but decide to try a local tire place along the way. Same story. But Mike the service guy is able to arrange a special late day tire delivery from Manassas to exactly match my tread. Until then, I have an afternoon to kill.Everything happens for a reason, I suppose, even if we can't see it at first. In this case, I have wound up a few miles away from Harper's Ferry, the place I started the Appalachian Trail almost two years ago. I've come full circle.I decide to do some trail magic. The cooler still has a couple dozen sodas, though all the beer went yesterday. I grab some fruit, donuts, and beer at the market and drive over to the parking lot by the bridge over the Shenandoah River where the trail crosses. No hikers are in sight, and there's no good visible spot to park, so I drive a few miles south to Keys Gap. There's a great spot, but after chatting with a couple dayhikers and looking at how close the shelters are I realize the thruhikers have already come through. So back to the bridge, where I glimpse several hikers disappearing into the woods as I pull up. I set up and hang out for over an hour but no others show up. By this point any who come through would be coming from shelters twenty or more miles away and won't be here for hours. So I pack up and head over to the ATC headquarters hoping to catch the hikers there. The volunteers tell me it's been nothing but dayhikers today. The Flip-Flop festival was last week so it's been slow recently. The older couple volunteering thrued in 2010, and just got back from hiking the Arizona Trail. A couple of sweaty hikers come in. From Milwaukee and Cleveland, they thrued in 2011 and are in the middle of a 117 mile southbound section. Having miserably failed at trail magicking today, I recover enough to ferry them to the post office down the street.After lunch in the historic downtown I walk across the Potomac into Maryland and along the C&O Canal, remembering my first day on trail when I attempted to walk 45 miles to Pennsylvania. Dummy! And a couple months earlier, when I hiked into Harpers Ferry with my then 12 year old daughter, trail name Snickers, on my first multinight AT trip. It's like walking through the past, a little surreal. I return to Harpers and wander up the hill, following the AT, to Jefferson Rock. A view worth crossing the Atlantic, according to Thomas. That leads me through the town's historic cemetery, holding the founding family and generations since. Maple trees release their seeds at the wind picks up. The helicopters twirl overhead and land silently in the grass. Each seed holds the potential for new life, even among the memorials to the dead.I head over to get my tire. Turns out they sent the wrong model - right size but different tread. But at least they sent two, so we can keep it balanced. A minor setback, all things considered. I pawn some donuts off on the mechanics. Don't want to take all these sweets home. It starts to drizzle as I leave for home. Soon it's rain and then a downpour. The rain comes so thickly at times the wipers can't keep up. The storm surrounds me for hours, along the local highways through Gettysburg, York, and Lancaster. Finally I get ahead of it and arrive at my house to a dry, quiet night. Everyone is asleep. An eventful day, but now I'm safe, warm, and dry...at home.