Date: 2013-05-14
From: Walker Gap, mi 566.5

To: 2 mi north of Helveys Mill Shelter, mi 591, VA
Miles today: 24.5
Weather: clear sky

I was about 4 days north of Damascus at Walker Gap. My luck with the weather continued with another sunny day with moderate temperatures. I had a good night sleep, having made the last minute decision the day before to bypass the Chestnut Knob shelter about 1.5 miles south and up the ridge. An older, very odd man, who went by Chris was staying in this shelter, along with perhaps a half dozen others. I woke before the two couples sleeping next to me in Walker Gap, lowered by food bag, packed up camp, and ate a cold breakfast, before heading up a relatively short climb to the next ridge line. The ridge trended east-north east along mostly exposed white, quartz-rich sandstone. Topographically the ridge was relatively flat, though the rock slab made the terrain rough, with short sections of steep up and down. It did not take long to notice what I first guessed to be bioturbation preserved in the rock. I vacillated between sedimentary structures called tool marks and remnant burrows. The structure appeared like tangled roots to the untrained eye. Tool marks, from my recollection of sedimentary geology, are the result of a cast and mold process during deposition in a basin. A layer of recently deposited silt or sand or mixture, may be scarred by a new deposit of incoming sediment containing debris or larger grains for example (referred to as "tools"). These surface scars are then infilled with more sediment. I hiked along this ridge for about 8 miles before dropping down a series of switchbacks to the Jenkins Shelter. A short distance of hiking south of Jenkins Shelter, the AT climbed the eastern limb of what appeared to be a syncline plunging to the north east. I crossed the gravel VA 615 at Laurel Creek before climbing the next ridge leading to US 52. The day had warmed up significantly by this point and I had not been drinking as much water as I should've been. Not more than a few hundred feet before the AT reached US-52, I intercepted a case of bottled water, and two cases of soda in plastic bottles left in the middle of the trail by a "trail angel". It could not have been a better time to find it since I was thoroughly parched. I guzzled an orange soda and a water and carried the bottles out. At the intersection of US52, I set my pack down and attempted to orient myself without a map or compass. I wanted to grab a light resupply in Bland, including stove alcohol. Bland, VA is 2.5 miles east from this location according to AWOL's guidebook. After a few minutes of hoping for someone to drive by in the right direction to Bland, Chris had caught up to me. The two of us managed to hitch a ride into Bland with a kind older man who pulled up to us in a black SUV rental and offered us a ride without us asking. He said he had just come from Bland, but had no problem taking us there and back. I cannot remember his name, but recall that he was taking a few zero days from his own hike. Bland was not ideal for resupply. The only option was a Dollar General store, a short distance down the US52 after it turns west of town. I was about to grab a packet of tunafish, when Chris reached down and grabbed the last three for himself. He told me that he was not getting enough protein in his diet, which seemed to somehow justify his selfishness. I ended up purchasing candy instead, and purchased a yellow bottle of Heet. Where denatured alcohol was unavailable, this product substituted quite well for stove fuel, though I believe was more expensive per ounce. After we were dropped off at the trailhead in the late afternoon, we hiked a short distance down the 52 and headed east on the 612, which crossed Interstate 77 and along the Kimberling Creek drainage, about 0.8 miles of road total. The AT would cross this torpid, meandering Creek again about 17 miles mostly east of this location, on a large suspension bridge at VA 606. I made it to the blue blaze junction for Helveys Mill Shelter after a little more than a mile of steep climbing onto the ridge. It was a long 0.3 miles into the shelter and about an additional quarter mile to a water source down a steep, switchbacked trail. The shelter was loaded and hikers were either preparing or already eating dinner when I arrived. I happened to recall one particular young female hiker named Pippin who was hiking in her home state of VA. She was carrying a heavy pack that was developing a painful looking heat rash on her hips, where the pack belt rubbed. She was apparently using duct tape to shield it from further rubbing, but it did not appear that she had treated it for infection. I needed water badly, so bit the bullet and made the hike down slope for water. I filled both water bottles, after slugging a good bit of water, then filled my 64 oz collapsable Sawyer squeeze bag too. When I made it back to the shelter, I decided to continue a ways further along the ridge into dusk. I found a spot off the trail and pseudo-stealth camped on the ridge line, a short distance off the AT. The next reliable water on this ridge was about 9 miles further east. I enjoyed a large pot of pasta and cup of hot chocolate, then settled into my tent well after dark had set in.