Date: 2003-06-06
From: Helveys Mill Shelter

To: VA 606 (Trent's Campground)
Miles today: 16.3

(Craig says)...It was a great morning. The combination of the smell of pineneedles, the crisp dry air, and the soft morning sun filtering through the trees got me up early. I left Erin asleep while I brewed Foldgers hazelnut coffee and rested on a log savoring the quiet secretive feeling of morning. The pain in my shin/ankle seems to have plateau'd. It's not anyworse or better but holding steady at very painful. Could it be a shinsplint? I've had shinsplints before and they were no where near this painful. A stress fracture? Possibly, but the pain wasn't on the bone, it was on the muscle right next to it. How is it going to get better? Walking 18 miles a day probably isn't the answer. Will ignoring it help? Yeah...that's it.Erin eventually rose, whipping her eyes and agreeing that this was probably one of the most beautiful mornings of the trip and that her pain too was stuck at the extremely uncomfortable level. The hike that morning was relatively flat and the weather stayed cool and dry. The wind gusted at times pulling at the leaves,drying our sweat, and quieting the steady scream of the cicadas. The woods seemed very buggy today. At one point in the hike we came upon a dead fawn in the trail. There were two hikers hanging out by the fawn with their dog. They said that they thought the fawn was attacked/eaten by a bear. The hikers were saving bones from the fawn to use to carve to make earrings and needles. Very Cast Away. Erin booked it to Jenny Knob Shelter. She was reading at the picnic table when I got there. She's not checking her watch as she hikes today, so she said it actually helped her to hike faster. We ran into the hikers with the fawn bones at the shelter. We planned to relax there longer than we did, but it was pretty disgusting.... the hikers laid out the bones to continue drying and it attracted a huge swarm of flies at the shelter. We had to trek down a creepy, long path to get water at the shelter. We had to follow a dry creek bed under twisted and dense stubby trees for nearly half a mile. At least the water was plentiful. At around sixteen miles we crossed the long wooden footbridge over the swollen banks of the South Fork Holston River and onto 606 where we would depart the trail and hike .8 of a mile to Trent¢s Grocery and Deli. We decided we would camp there for the evening because we couldn't find a good campsite along the river. (The guidebook said there was camping at Trent's)Trent¢s is an interesting place. It has everything a hiker would want. Air conditioning, Greasy food, sandwiches, soda, sweets, resupply food, beer, cigarettes, gas, and so on. But it also had other things to offer; like a whole array of guns, ammo, hunting bows, camouflage clothes, stuffed animals (of the once alive kind), car supplies, videos, CD¢s, tapes, fishing lures, hardware, tools, etc. etc. It was like a southern-style mini Wal-Mart stuffed into a room the size of the first floor of your average house. Erin and I bought a few things and paid Trent 3$ a piece to camp.Immediately after stepping foot out of the store a small black cat came up to us and weaved its way in and out of our legs. She purred and pranced around and followed us through the gate and into the 'camping area'.I use quotations because this isn't the image that one would normally conjure up when they hear the term. This camping area was a large field set behind the store, penned in by a wood post fence and entered through a swinging metal gate. An array of livestock milled and grazed on the long grass outside the perimeter of the fence and small rickety trailers were lined up in messy rows along the the dirt road inside. We walked between the rows of rusty seemingly abandonded trailors looking around for a nice patch of grass to pitch our tent. We saw Boogie sitting at a picnic table chatting and laughing with a tall bearded man smoking a pipe and a plump middle aged woman. Bud cans, food packages, and camping stoves littered the table. We waved hello but didn¢t feel much like chatting. We walked past the dusty windows of the trailers, the cat following quickly behind, and a found a nice flat spot a little ways away to set up camp. Not far away, on the other side of the fence stood a pigpen where a large sow laid lazily in the hay. Erin whipped together her famous tuna-kit concoction, letting the cat lick the wrappers, while I took a little rest in the tent. We then we dined on our favorite meal of tuna and triscuits.Not long after dinner the sun began to set and fireflies came out and danced around in the grass and tall dark pines.   I showered in the cement cell bathhouse nearby that Boogie had pointed out to us. The shower room was an 8¢ by 4¢ cement block with paint chips floating around on the floor. The drain was slightly clogged and within minutes I was standing in two inches of dirty water with clumps of hair floating around in it. But the water pressure was so hard that not only did it blow off the dirt but probably stripped away the first two layers of skin and the heat seemed to have no end. Everything you could ask for in a shower. Erin showered after me. While she was showering, I stood outside the tent in my boxers, arms folded, breathing in the sweet night air. I felt waves of nostalgia and peace wash over me and I thought back to the days camping with my family at Pawtuckaway. I was tempted to go over and say hello to the pig but decided to stay still in fear that I would lose that feeling. The black cat came out of the shadows in the tall grass, hopped the fence, and began purring and rubbing between my legs again. I don't know why the cat took such a liking to us, there were other hikers spotted around the field, but Erin and I welcomed it's company. Eventually, after sitting outside and breathing in the night together, we retired to the tent. But apparently the cat was not ready for bed and was not ready for us to do so either. Every ten minutes or so it would take a giant leap onto the fly and slide down. I kept zipping it open so it could come in with us but it would just tip-toe up to the door, look curiously around inside and then hastily back out. I guess it prefers the freedom of the open farm.   Either that or we really do smell that bad¢¦