Date: 2007-11-07
From: Brown Mtn. Creek Shelter

To: Daleville, VA
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: scattered clouds

Two-thirds of the way done! I'm in Blacksburg, VA, living it up at my brother's apartment with El Presidente, and we are headed back to the trail in the morning.We were able to escape frost on the evening in the Brown Mtn. Creek valley, which was nice. It was also pretty still, which kept most of the smoke frome blowing into the shelter, which makes for rather unpleasant evenings. I left the shelter with El Prez, and we huffed it down to a river crossing, where we found a brand new suspension bridge, which was kind of cool. Runway and Andrew showed up a bit later to say that Uly and Betsy were planning on blue blazing for the whole day, and were going to meet everyone at the shelter in the evening. We all left the bridge together, and huffed up a pretty significant hill to a shelter that had a pond next to it. There was a spring under a tree, but the water coming out of it was just as nasty as the stuff in the pond. It was my first time as a water filterer turned treater that I wished I had my filter! Uly and Betsy showed up after aborting their original plan, and we all headed up a 1200 ft climb to get to the top of Bluff Mtn. There was a memorial to a little boy who had died up there back in the 1890s, which was interesting, as people had left everything from an LSU football Pez dispenser to a little rubber duck sitting next to the monument. We finished out the day with some really good views of the James River, which was really nice. We dropped down to the shelter to find Andrew, who had skipped the lunch break for some reason, even though it was the only water in 10 miles. We did our part to burn a bunch of trees that someone had cut down near the shelter, and prepared ourselves for a hard frost. Runway was in quite the bad mood in the morning because she had been cold all night, and lashed out at the rest of us over stupid stuff. She left the shelter in a funk to do the 1.7 miles to the road into town for a resupply while the rest of us took our time and got to the road to find her still standing there waiting for a hitch. We got picked up by a guy in a pickup who dropped us off at the only restaurant in town, which had changed hands since the Companion was published, and wasn't nearly as good as the book made it sound. They had a stupid TV that was blaring, and they kept showing footage of some little cruise boat that was run aground in VA Beach in the Intercostal Waterway. There must have not been anything else going on in the world, because they just kept making you want to think that it was going to sink, but it was only 20 feet from the shore, and there were a bunch of fire/rescue, coast guard and marine patrol boats tied up next to it. The biggest shock to come from watching the news was to find out that the DOW had dropped 360 points the day before, so we all talked about how we probably lost a bunch of money and couldn't even check. We headed across the street and got a resupply, and El Prez and I stood on the side of the road for a good 30 minutes trying to get a hitch before being picked up by some old man driving a 1976 Caprice, who dropped us off half way back to the trail. After another 15 minutes of standing on the side of the road, we got picked up by a guy driving a Lexus, whose step daughter was the youngest female to complete the AT. We walked across the James River Bridge, but it was a bit too cold to dare jumping into the reservoir below. We grabbed a quick lunch at the first shelter in, but by the time we departed there, it was 1 and we still had 17.7 miles. El Prez and I came across a trail maintainer, which was neat, we thanked him for his work and pushed on, now even later than we already were. Uly caught up to us a few hours later, and we talked about how we weren't really excited about doing a bunch of night hiking but how we didn't have much choice. The intermediate shelter was dry, so we stopped a few miles before it, ate a bunch of food and headed up the hill. It got dark halfway up the first climb (2500 ft), and from then on it was an interesting adventure. We came across a few lookouts, which were interesting in the dark, and I switched to leading for the last 5 miles or so. We ended up hiking 10 miles in the dark, to make it a 22 mile day, and pulled into the destination shelter at 9:45. We cooked and ate, and as we were falling asleep, Runway and Andrew showed up. Uly had been really cold for the past few nights, and I thought about lending him my bag liner, but he has really nasty smelling feet (you can smell them walking 15 ft behind him). I ended up selling him the bag liner after considering a few different options, because I didn't have any desire to get it back used and get something growing on my feet!El Presidente and I didn't really have much of a desire to hike in the dark the next evening, so we awoke somewhat early and made a concerted effort to get moving instead of sitting around. We had to climb one small mountain, and from there it was a 5 mile descent into a valley to the Bryant Ridge Shelter. The shelter is timber framed, and had three different levels to sleep on, a picnic table under the front loft and a brand new privy. Everyone else arrived as we were getting ready to go, and I caught up with El Prez after a few miles at a creek. We decided to hike together for the rest of the day, and talked about all kinds of stuff, but particularly potential outdoor employment as guides. When we got to an intermediate shelter it was sprinkling rain, so I called home and confirmed that the majority of rain was far enough away that we would be able to get to the desired shelter without getting soaked. We did 3.5 miles per hour, which felt good, and rolled into the Bobblets Gap Shelter with plenty of daylight left to gather firewood and water, which was quite a challenge. We had to put the water through a bandana and then let it settle in milk jugs; it looked like apple cider before we let it sit. Uly came in, and after hearing that there was lots of rain, with a chance of snow nearby, decided to stay the night. Runway and Andrew did the same, so we gathered more wood and had a decent size blaze. There was rat poop in the corner of the shelter, but unfortunately no broom. The rain held off until we had finished cooking and everything, and as I was falling asleep it started to rain a bit.There was definitely a rat in the shelter. Runway's headlamp and gloves were missing in the morning, and Andrew discovered them under the shelter in a spot where they couldn't have fallen. It must not have rained much after I fell asleep, because the ground was not that wet at all. El Prez left a few minutes before I did, but I caught up to him at the first stop, and we hiked near each other for the whole day. It was 43 when we left the shelter, and I was wearing shorts and a longsleeve lightweight t-shirt and wasn't even cold. I got a bit chilled during our lunch break, but once I got moving again I didn't have any problems. We all had town on our minds, so we hustled right along through the day. Prez and I put up two deer right before we crossed under I-81, one of which was a 6 pt buck that just stood on the ridge above us looking down at us. We got Daleville, VA and I got a titanium cup and a pair of gaiters to protect my socks and then we sat at the coffee shop until Kevin showed up. We headed to his apartment for showers, which was awesome, grabbed some Mexican food and after pregaming at the apartment, headed down the street to a Ski & Snowboard club house party...insanity! Reagan and I were rather overwhelmed by the number of people, and sat on the front porch until some kid came out and said "free cups for kids with moustaches," and gave us free cups! Apparently, Tech is in the middle of Noshavember, so we got lots of comments on our beards. We didn't get to bed until nearly 4:45 in the morning, so to celebrate our completion of 2/3 of the trail, Reagan and I decided that we would give ourselves a gift of 20 miles. Tomorrow we're going to get dropped off at Catawba, and Reagan's going to hike McAfee's Knob later in the week when his family comes to visit him in Pearisburg, and I'm going to come back to hike it with Kevin after I complete the trail.