Date: 2012-05-29
From: Holiday Motor Lodge in Pearisburg

To: The Captain's Place
Miles today: 20.5

I woke up to white noise from the rushing stream mixed with intermittent breeze through the tall trees. I was up early and the farm was silent otherwise. I laid in my hammock from 4:30 until the first bird chirped at 5:26, just letting the wonder of my surroundings flow through me. By 5:33, there was a symphony. I got up and walked down the hill to take an outdoor shower. I remarked on the beauty of the morning. So clear and crisp. Clean air in the lungs. I have grown to love these rustic showers. Frosted corrugated roofing lets the sunlight in, dark wood and a linen curtain gives you some privacy, and the gravel floor naturally drains and feels great on your feet. Thankfully the water was hot too. You naturally seem to keep these short, feeling the connection to the resources. Breakfast was huge and delicious again and I overheard Nevel make a remark that I will never forget. She was talking about making a decision to indulge in some serious eating while at a recent BBQ and the difference between body-look and body-feel. And it made a serious impression on me. It was something most men probably don't think about as much as most women, if ever. It made me think about how our clothing doesn't fit to such tight tolerances, nor does it reveal as much, nor are the social expectations upon us as unforgiving in this area. Such a simple statement in this context, conveyed one huge difference in the way social conditioning molds the genders. I think the magnitude of the comment was lost on most sitting on the porch, but there was delicious breakfast to eat. Afterward, I excitedly helped out with dishes making up for my previous indiscretion. Such great energy here! PMo had the brilliant idea to slackpack from Pearisburg up to The Captain's place. The Captain was a prominent member of the trail community, letting hikers stay on his porch and often feeding them. He even installed a "zipline" from the trail running across the river to his house on the other side. It was to be a big day - the girls' first 20 for the trip. I knew I couldn't keep my cheese and bread today and offered them up to Blue Skies and Samson. I gave everybody a hug and piled into the car with PMo, Anna, Kurt, and Baxter. We drove to Pearisburg and unloaded our tiny packs onto the lawn. I drew a big map for Kurt on how to get to the Captain's. Our biggest fear was that we would arrive and our bags would be delivered to a house other than the Captain's. We were sweating in the heat of the day just standing still and were thankful to have the luxury of slackpacking today. We waved goodbye to Kurt and Baxter as they drove off with our bags and we got to hiking. Shirtless and free of a normal load, I bounded up and down these big hills, crossing road after road, realizing that the road winded through the saddles of all of these hills. One other hiker was complaining pretty loudly about it. Of course, if you didn't want to do any work, you could've simply gone to the mall instead of deciding to hike the AT. We finally got out of town and started to hike up this long ridgeline. Big views in both directions. We ate lunch on several rocks with a young hiker named Mary overlooking the view west. I got some cell service up on the ridge and got an email from Campsaver regarding my new sleeping bag. Apparently, they weren't going to ship it to me until I called them since the billing and shipping addresses were different. That is a terrible policy for a hiker. Of course, the cell service was particularly bad and made communicating with them difficult too. It was frustrating but we got it all settled and I walked another 100 meters where I stumbled upon an AT&T antenna building. I guess I must have been too close to the antenna to get good reception. Sigh. The weather had been changing since lunchtime and it looked like it was going to get pretty bad. Big gusts of wind chilled to the bone as big clouds roared overhead. All the trees were straining against the load and I thought, what a perfect day to be slackpacking without raingear, shelter, or even a shirt. I ran. The girls were up ahead and I wondered how far. The rain was coming down now and the thunder was cracking a few miles off - it was headed right over this ridge. I finally caught them casually walking. They were as poorly equipped as I was except Anna, who had a poncho neatly packed into her fanny pack. The thunder and lightning were getting closer together and we all booked it, hopping over rocks and splashing in unavoidable puddles. The puddles were all combining into one long stream. This trail ran along this ridgeline for nine more miles before dropping into a canyon where the first shelter would be. Of course, that wouldn't do us much good without sleeping bags. As we were hiking the weather got worse. And when you thought it was raining as hard as you could think it could rain, it would rain a bit harder. The lightning was close and bright. PMo and I exchanged a look of terror and we decided to get off the trail and hiked down the steep ridge through the sopping moss and underbrush. We stood for a pretty long time while the storm raged over top of us. We kept in a fairly good mood considering the situation. I started to shiver after awhile and couldn't keep warm enough. Normal shivering turned into uncontrollable shaking and PMo suggested that we all huddle together. Yes please! I got warmer and started to think about our situation more. It was going to be a much longer day than any of us imagined. When the majority of the lightning made its way east of us, we struggled back up the slippery hill and continued north. Until a giant blast of lightning hit the hillside and thunder deafened all other sounds. We all looked at each other and headed right back down the hill to a higher likelihood of safety. We rode out the storm with humor and continued on when it became safer. We were running down the trail and came across a tent belonging to Knoxville. He was tucked safely into his little nest and reading through the storm. He was ok so we cruised on. Miles and miles passed. We came across a box turtle on the trail out for a walk too. We took pictures in the rain and she seemed to understand that she was both safe among us and a momentary celebrity. I do believe she gave me a little wink at one point. We moved on and walked through the rain with much less stress than previously felt now that the lightning risk was lower. It was starting to get dark and we had finally come to the valley. We dropped down the switchbacks and the river below was roaring. It was so loud. The lower switchbacks were totally eroded and the river was rushing right next to us. It was a wild maze of water and trail. Anna exclaimed, "This is just like Jumanji." This was possibly the third or fourth time she had made this reference to progressively crazier terrain/weather. We decided that would be an incredible trail name. We had tried a number of less-than-flattering names but they just didn't fit. This was a strong, memorable name and she would have a great story. Plus she liked it! We came to a swift river that would have normally been a trickle at best. It was fast and deep and I almost lost my footing as I waded out above my waist. I turned back and returned to the southern bank; it was just too deep. Jumanji found our way across just up-river and PMo and I followed her lead. We found the main river that everything was draining into and were ecstatic. It was still four more miles and I was getting cold as the night set in. I made a verbal wish for a t-shirt to the girls. Jumanji offered me her poncho but I decided I would rather be cold than cold and clammy. Ten minutes later, we came to a tall manzanita bush with a women's purple Icebreaker wool tank top hanging in it. It was as if someone was trying to dry it and forgot it after their swim or lunch. The shirt was in pretty bad shape but I was very thankful. It had been quite a day and now we knew we were getting really close to the Captain's place. Just a few more miles and we would be there! We hoofed it and got lost a few times trying to make sense of the signage. Back and forth, checking all of the side trails, we finally found what we were looking for: zipline! However, there was a big sign waiting for us. The Captain left us a note saying that since the zipline was completely under water. he had tied it off for safety. Our note instructed us to walk 2.5 more miles north to the bridge where we could safely cross. This would require us to walk 2.5 miles back to his house. Our day just got quite a bit longer. We trudged on, soaked through, ready for two more hours of night hiking. We tried a shortcut resulting in another short backtrack but gambles like that sometimes pay off and we were looking for a miracle despite the long odds. The Captain must have seen us with our headlamps blazing and met us as at the bridge, driving us back to his house. He told us an endless string of jokes, trivia, and riddles. Though we enjoyed his company, the Captain's constant presence, made it uncomfortable for us to change out of wet clothes and into the dry, warmth in our safely-delivered backpacks - thanks Kurt! It got to a point where we couldn't take it anymore. We stripped down, dried off, and started to warm up. Our feet dried out while our dinners cooked. It became a family-style dinner because one of us, ahem, Jumanji, decided to make a terrible meal.. the dreaded Thai Sweet Chili Pasta Side. Beware. The rain continued to fall lightly outside and we conked out hard on the dry porch nestled in safety and relative comfort.