Date: 2012-04-09
To: Neel's Gap
Miles today: 14.1
Weather: clear sky

Today was the day where I learned how hard this could be.  It's not the hiking.  That's hard too but the real challenge is the logistics and the transition from thinking about hiking lots miles to thinking about food and getting more of it.  This point in the trip is as far as I had planned things out.  Up until now,  I was only focused on the hiking aspect.  I knew there was going to be food at Neel's Gap but I had not yet thought about how much I would need to get to the next resupply point.  I could just buy enough today to get me to Maine.. but what I really need to do is shift my mindset some so that it isn't like forward and reverse but more like just naturally shifting gears.  I will have to get better at it and I planned out the next 100 miles this evening.  In other news, my feet are starting to get somewhat stronger.  These dogs are definitely tired tonight after 14 miles of almost continuous hiking and climbing the first "real" mountain of the trip but they are getting tougher and I can feel them healing every night.  I also solved a litter mystery today.  I won't talk about it here until I talk to the person it involves first.I am staying at the Mountain Crossing Hostel at Neel's Gap tonight.  I had read about this place and was already familiar with many of the characters.  But it wasn't what I expected.  And that is fine.  I did however send home 3.6lbs of extraneous stuff, ate over 1400 calories for dinner in the form of an entire pepperoni pizza and an orange soda, resupplied my food for a few more days, took a shower that involved soap, laundered my clothes, and again met some lovely folks including Dudditz who is walking with Lakota.  Lakota is a curious Husky who looks like one of my childhood pets, Cody, which was short for Dakota.  Their trip is going to be so much different than mine and I am excited to read about it one day.  I also met Lora who I hope to run into again at Trail Days.  Upon first meeting her in the parking lot of Mountain Crossings, I felt as if we had known each other for a very long time.  We later had a very natural conversation across the bunk room similar in nature to those I enjoy with my dearest friends.  The rest of the world just went away and our souls somehow found a way to be perfectly present amidst the many distractions of our environment.  We shared a thoughtful and introspective energy oddly lacking on this trail thus far.  She has plans to travel to India after finishing her thru-hike and am sure she will be rewarded with much wisdom along her journeys.  Sometimes it seems you were meant to meet certain people and tonight I felt like the universe put us both here for something.The air in the hostel was thick and moist with pungency in the upper bunks and I just couldn't stay in there to sleep.  So I went outside (probably loudly - sorry everybody) to setup my ground sheet, sleeping pad, and bag on some gravel out behind the hostel and spent the night slipping around on the Tyvek while the wind gusted wildly above me.  I need to trim the ground sheet as the sides flapped and crinkled in the wind on either side.  I also could feel how the wind would rob my sleeping bag of warmth when it whipped by low enough.  I eventually drifted off thinking about the constellations moving through the creaking tree branches above me.