Date: 2021-04-30
From: TuckerÃÂÃÂ¢ÃÂÃÂÃÂÃÂs Lane

To: Sam Moore Shelter
Miles today: 22.2
Weather: overcast clouds

Checking in late yesterday afternoon were three hikers who all started in Georgia. Whisper just retired from the army, Cheesecurd is from Wisconsin and looks young enough to make you mad, and Santa: who got that trail name for giving away extra things he didn¢t need but who is only 19. I may have mentioned that every year I pick a few hikers on trailjournals to follow and Santa was one of my 8!  It was trippy to meet him. So I went full nerd and had breakfast at the hostel for the second straight day, as the honorary Dutchman in me won out over the fussy pedant that usually makes my decisions. For $5 we got sausage gravy over a massive biscuit, hash brown casserole, and scrambled eggs along with all the coffee you wanted. That¢s $5 well spent. Today was a tale of three hikes. Started off by climbing out of Front Royal at 8:45 into a sea of wild flowers and trees in full leaf. I saw pink azaleas, white and pink trillium, yellow buttercups and purple violets by the bushel. The first nine miles flew by in gorgeous weather. Then after one o¢clock, the winds picked up and I went through a kind of depressing section of trail through an area of tangled underbrush with dead trees being chocked by vines. It was weird and a little disconcerting.  This was mostly near Sky Meadows State Park. I¢ll just charitably assume the trail went through the most boring part of the park and not that Virginia is into showcasing hellscapes. The last part of the hike is where the sphincter factor went to 9.3 on a 10 point scale. I knew I¢d be entering a section of trail referred to as ¢The Roller Coaster¢ where you go up a steep incline, then down a steep incline, then up, then down and so on and so on. I also knew that high winds were going to be around until the wee hours and that rain was likely as well from 4 until 7. Well, everything arrived as promised.I had a chance to finish hiking early around 2:30 near a shelter, but had heard there was a lot of dead trees and widow makers in that area. So (stop me if you¢ve heard this before) I pressed on, hiking further than I had planned. What I failed to take into account was how these ridges and hills compress the wind and make it a terror. Depending on the wind direction and what side of the ridge you are on, you can hiking in a placid calm or watching trees whip around wildly while casting off branches like a burlesque dancer with her feathers. If a burlesque dancer were standing in the woods. In the rain  in Virginia  Walking through this in the rain while huffing uphill or trying not to slip and fall downhill added an exiting element to the festivities!  I heard several large trees crack and go down. The trail was strewn with branches, sticks, leaves and assorted tree trash. I¢d occasionally get pelted with bits of bark or twigs. Just before 6pm I heard from ahead the unmistakable rushing sound of a big tree falling. The noise was awesome. 10 minutes later I came to a creak crossing and found two large trees tangled across the trail. I had to bushwhack around them as the trail was impassable, almost running into a small Doe that was just looking at this fat, wet, turtle looking thing floundering about in the brush towards it. Then, huzzah! The rain tapered off and a few minutes later the sun was shining. I stumbled into a shelter area and thankfully found some nice young trees with (seemingly) no old nastiest ready to fall on my hammock. I got out of my wet duds and am now cocooned in my quilt, listening to the wind race through the trees one ridge over and praying it stays there.Today¢s tallies:122.495 flowers1 large rat snake I nearly stepped on1 ring snake I shooed off the trail1 actual turtle messing about a pond419 flights of stairs climbed22 miles1 hiker grateful to be safe. Back at it tomorrow.