Date: 2013-05-26
From: Brickleys Gap

To: Daleville
Miles today: 12.3
Weather: overcast clouds

Day Seventy Nine - Brickley's Gap to DalevilleToday was awesome! I had everything packed up and ready within half an hour of getting up. Within minutes of getting on the trail I found a rain jacket hanging from a rock on the side of the trail (remember I had left my rain coat at the Captain's) it was like trail magic because it was so windy this morning! I will admit that it had that hiker funk smell that made me aware that this was definitely used by someone else but they had obviously left it behind and I was just cleaning up. Tinker Cliffs was amazing! I thought it was even better than McAfee knob. The cliffs were made of giant rocks some of them were like islands out from mainland and it went on for half a mile. I could imagine several cool photo opportunities if only I had been hiking with someone today so that we could take each others pictures. Oh well! Melkie loved the cliffs and gave me a few good scares when he would rush right to the edge and look down so I decided it wouldn't be the safest place to linger and moved on. The whole day turned out to be great! After the cliff, the trail went down below the huge rocks and down off of that mountain and along a ridge. It was beautiful and the trail was pleasant (by pleasant I mean no big crazy ups) an was just gentle ups and downs for the most part. At one point I stepped too close to a rattlesnake that I hadn't seen and it started rattling. I didn't even stop to look, I just kept on going knowing that Melkie was behind me and we both had to get past the snake before he got too mad at us. Later someone had left a note on the trail saying that there was a copperhead ten feet ahead on the trail and had put the time and date on it. They had seen the snake twenty minutes earlier but I couldn't find it! Needless to say I was pretty cautious through that section. The last stretch before town had view after view of the town below to the left and a river below to the right. The only thing to ruin the trail today was the many (5) giant power lines that the trail went under. Coming down into town my knees were a little sore but I realized that I had worn my new sandals for two days of hiking with no problems! I made it into town by 2pm and went straight to the hotel to shower. After cleaning up and making sure that there were no ticks on me I went to the convenience store and bought junk food. Hard to believe that I can eat all this crap and still lose weight. Hobo is here and we are both at the same mile marker! After catching up on trail gossip while doing laundry we headed over to the Mexican restaurant (not because we wanted Mexican but because we are lazy and it is the closest). There we met up with Animal and Scarecrow from the Tribe and ate with them. Good times! As we were crossing the street to go back to the hotel we saw Dreamer, his wife Terri and his dog Charlie. Dreamer is way ahead of me now (he has been slack packing for days) but I will catch him again! It's almost midnight and I should be sleeping. Good night world!Trouble"Live your life. Take chances. Be crazy. Don't wait. Because right now is the oldest you've ever been and the youngest you'll be ever again."