Date: 2015-10-27
From: Brahms Gap Overlook

To: Skyline Drive Mile 18.8 (AT crossing point)
Miles today: 10.2
Weather: light rain

As most of you are aware, the remnants of Hurricane Patricia came scooting across the Atlantic coast early this week and provided a wind and rain event for us here in the Shenandoah Park in VA. We watched the progress of the storm over the weekend and by Monday it was clear that Patricia would reach us around mid-day on Tuesday. The Princess plan was to get to the trail as early as possible and she picked a section of trail north of here that crosses Skyline Drive a number of times so that I could easily get off trail when the initial rain bands started to show up. We were up at 5:30 in the morning and out the door around 6:30. We got to the starting point, Beahms Gap around 7:00 (in the dark) and I waited about 15 minutes until it was light enough to see the trail. No rain yet, but it was damp and chilly and below 40. I had my cold, wet weather gear - essentially the same as Sunday, except for a second pair of warmer gloves and a pair of Zpacks glove shells. Princess also gave me a set of ear muffs, but I didn¢t need them for long.The first section of trail was about 5 miles before I reached the first road crossing at Elkwallow Wayside, so it took me a couple of hours to reach Princess who was waiting at the wayside. It was still dry and I was warm enough from the climbs to take off my poncho, so I pressed on to the next point. But shortly after crossing the road I stopped cold when I spotted a bear about 20 yards ahead of me along the trail. He wasn¢t big, but he wasn¢t a cub either. So I made noise to try to get him to move away, but he was more interested in an acorn breakfast and stayed put. A few minutes later I heard someone further up the trail making a lot of noise and I started yelling to him. Before long I saw him maybe a couple hundred yards north and realized that he was making noise for the same reason I was. And I saw another 3 bears moving to the side of the trail not far from him. Eventually I moved past my bear and he worked his way to me. He said he saw several small bears up the trail and was worried that my bear was the mother. We both agreed that this was not likely the case and that the other group of bears (that I also saw) had moved on. I learned that he is a SoBo thru-hiker named Soytec from Romania and he took a number of photos of my bear that was still hanging around, but minding his own business. Soytec said he was hiking with NapTime from Lithuania who was behind him (and I saw him later). Eventually I moved on up the trail, making a lot of noise and searching the woods in all directionsPerhaps 20 minutes later I met two other hikers who had just broken camp and were coming on the trail to head north. They were section hiking through SNP and hoped to get to a shelter before the rain started. They said they had camped there overnight and had seen at least 6 bears around their camp. So we all moved warily forward. I did see a lot of deer and squirrels and a beautiful hawk, but I never saw another bear. Princess met me at every road crossing and offered me the option of quitting the trail, or pushing on to the next crossing. As time wore on, the temperature dropped and the clouds became more ominous. At higher elevations, I literally climbed into a cloud bank with a damp mist. Eventually I put in over 10 miles before I decided to quit for the day and head back to the room. The rain had actually started at that point and the showers began in earnest before we made it back to Skyland.