Date: 2017-06-08
From: Bear's Den Hostel

To: Crampton Gap Shelter
Miles today: 30.9
Weather: overcast clouds

Bear's Den does a make-your-own breakfast and put out some pancake mix and freak mulberries from the trees out back, which was delicious. I got up early and made a first round, took a nap until a more reasonable hour, and then made a second batch before hitting the trail for the morning.I soon came to the road I had been hearing yesterday afternoon, VA 7, which was busy enough that I had to wait several minutes before I could frogger myself across all 4 lanes of traffic. The trail was definitely becoming rockier and I crossed a couple of rock fields as I finished that last couple ups and downs of the rollercoaster. Just before finishing I came to a view with a couple camped out in their tent out on the ledge, a great campsite now that the rain had cleared and the valley below was visible.I came to a sign proclaiming the VA/WV border, which I'd be following for the next couple miles before finally leaving VA. The sign marking the end of the roller coaster was missing, but I've hiked this section before and so recognized the mount for the sign that remained. The rollercoaster done, the next couple miles up on the ridge were easy and I took the opportunity to call a couple friends to make plans for this weekend when I'd be off trail. The morning was beautiful, sunny but not too warm as to be uncomfortable, and I turned on some Dave Matthews to hike to and enjoyed the morning. Through the trees I caught a couple glimpses of farmland as I hiked and I didn't end up seeing anyone else for the rest of the morning.I stopped in at a really nice shelter that had a  porch, benches, lots of space, separate picnic table that's covered, and swinging chairs. The local trail club, PATC, likes making fancy shelters. I headed down to the water source to refill with a large group of school children, but didn't linger long. Pretty quickly after that I passed into WV border, done with VA! VA's been fun, but it's good to be done.Lookout and I met up and headed down into Harper's Ferry, across the bridge across the Shenandoah River and into town. It was about 330 and the ATC closed at 5, so we headed straight there to check in. I was NOBO 655 and Lookout was 656 for the year. This is really the first good idea of our positioning we get (I was hiker 1456 in Amicola, but that doesn't include anyone who skipped the approach trail and many people who simply don't register) and so i looked through the book but didn't see anyone we had met before since we're moving a little faster than most people we meet.Lookout and I headed down into town and got some food... I had a celebratory steak sandwich and beer. The restaurants all closed at 5pm, since they mainly catered to tourists, so it's a good thing we had moved as fast as we had this afternoon. After dinner I split with Lookout, who is taking zero tomorrow, and grabbed some ice cream from a stand which was also just about to close. I wandered around the monuments and signs as I ate, dumped my trash, and then kept moving. There was no sign for the WV/MD border as I crossed the railroad tressle over the Potomac. Finishing WV crossed off my second state of the day, 5 states down and 9 to go! The next section of trail followed the C&O canal for a couple miles and was easy hiking. After that the trail headed up Weaver Cliffs, which weren't as bad as I remembered from the last time I had hiked them at the end of my 3 day MD section hike, and then the trail flattened out again. I stopped in at Ed Garvey shelter and chatted with a couple hikers there for about 45 min while I decided if I should stay for the night or so a couple more miles. I still felt good and so decided to move on as the sun set to the west, lighting up the sky with oranges and pinks through the trees.I reached the state park that had the war correspondents memorial just as the first stars came out. Muscularly I was feeling great, even after all the hiking I had already done, but my right knee was hurting a bit and so I decided it was smart to listen to my body and call it a night. At the state park's facilities I refilled on water for the night and used the bathrooms before continuing on another mile to Crompton Gap Shelter. By now it was fully dark, but it didn't take long for me to setup and crawl into my tent, tired from the long day. Even the planes flying overhead on their approach to Reagan didn't keep me up for long.