Date: 2018-05-27
From: Iron Mountain Shelter

To: "Ruins" Campsite
Miles today: 20.7

Woke up around 2:30 am to rain. Luckily it wasn¢t strong, and only lasted about half an hour. I woke up at six and quickly tried to pack everything up before more rain. I basically ran everything to under the shelter, and once it cleared up could break down my tent.Braino and I got out around 8:15 and it was mostly let cloudy but dry and easy terrain. A couple miles in was the Nick Grindstaff memorial. Guess he was a hermit in the 1800s, it was tough to read the stone so will have to look it up. Sounds like an interesting guy.A few miles later we got to a really pretty section that involved going through meadows and cow pastures with open views. And the sun was out for a change! The path was gravel but apparently ADA accessible. Unfortunately Braino stepped right in a cow pie. City boy!Lunched a the Double Springs Shelter where there was a hiker, River, with his dog. River didn¢t seem to be in a big hurry and was probably stoned. I¢m sure a nice enough guy, but got some weird vibes from him.When we were almost at the Low Gap road crossing/parking lot, Braino goes ¢I think there is trail magic!¢ I didn¢t believe him as we have been duped before (i.e. at an earlier parking lot a woman pulled up, adjusted a cooler in her trunk, but then drove off). But this was for real! It was a former thru-hiker named Whamo. I¢d say he was mid-50s and had a sweet minivan loaded with sodas, water, fruit, and snacks. He even brought a trash can and soap!We sat there for a bit and started to leave when Mike showed up. When we started to leave again, a car pulled up to the AT on the other side of the road, the driver opened the trunk and sat down. I wasn¢t sure what they were doing, so casually walked over to explore. Long story short, it was another thru hiker, Red, I hadn¢t seen since Fontana! I guess he had some foot injuries and rented a car to drove to trailheads to do half days while recovering. He gave us some cliff bars which was nice. What a small world on the AT!By the time we left, it had been over an hour and the skies were threatening so we were rushing. The dark clouds were slow coming out, but were finally over us and it started to downpour. After a few minutes I see Braino running. Turns out there was an old lean-to/shelter that fit about 3 people. What great timing! As they say, the trail provides...We waited about 15 minutes for the cloud to pass, and just as it was starting to lighten up, Mike comes in. He was soaked, but it was good he came in because lightening and a huge crash of thunder sounded right above us.It was only a few more miles to the shelter where I was planning to stop and would have made 16 miles for the day and ten into Damascus tomorrow. Even though it was already 5 pm, with all the breaks it didn¢t feel like we had done that much and our legs had more in them on this relatively flat terrain. But I was also liked the idea of not setting up and breaking down a tent. We went to fill up water (which was far) to ponder and Mike came and was setting up his stuff for the night. The weather was ok but a good chance of more rain/thunderstorms. We made the decision to press on, and at that time a couple showed up with their dog, along with River and his dog. It would have been super crowded so we made the right decision.Since it was getting late and we wanted to put in enough miles to justify not staying at the shelter, we seriously booked it and ended up doing 4.8 miles in an hour and a half to a campsite at a place noted as ¢ruins¢. There weren¢t any ruins here and there weren¢t great tent spots, but we weren¢t sure what was ahead so set up there.We were both so tired, we didn¢t cook dinner and just had snacks. Still got in bed by 8:30 and before the rain!