Date: 2016-03-31
From: Black Bear Resort via Dennis Cove Road

To: Vandeventer Shelter
Miles today: 17.7
Weather: overcast clouds

Woke up at just about the same time as usual after a night of pretty damn good sleep at Black Bear. 10-46 snored some, but earplugs are a great invention. I ate my pop tart and builder bar and settled up for my evening there and resupply. Golden Snitch pulled me into the hiker "lounge" where he had pulled up the satellite weather report. The weather across the south was insane from huge hail in Texas to tornadoes in Mississippi. We were just supposed to get some bad thunderstorms at 1. I headed out along the road before anyone else and got back to the trailhead. The trail along the Laurel fork was gorgeous, flat and wide in most places with rock staircases between. At one point the trail even headed right along the rocks next to the water. Laurel Falls was wide and tall and gorgeous with a huge swimming pool. If it were nice out and later in the day I might've taken a swim. It was still nice to look at. The next few miles were all up and down over a mountain called Pond Flats. Looking at the awol guide, the climb makes no sense. 2.5 miles up and 2.5 down, rising and falling almost 2000 feet with no view or point to go to the top. I learned that the trail over pond flats was made as a replacement to a road walk through the town of Hampton. Getting rid of road walks is fine with me but jeez. Instead of putting it over a gentle contour, they made a very long hard backtracking hike up the side of the Laurel fork gorge. We don't even hit the summit, so why make it go so high? Everyone has agreed that it was the most pointless climb of the trail yet.At the bottom of pond flats I found a cooler, and said "aww no way!" It was full of root beer and Mountain Dew, and was left by a thru hiker from last year. I was only the second person to sign the register in the cooler, so it must've been put down right before me. I continued down to the edge of Watauga Lake, another lake, like Fontana, created by a dam, with very pretty blue green water. The whole time I was hiking over the mountains and around the lake, I had my phone in my hand; in about a week, im heading home. I've got a memorial service to go to on the 10th, so once I hit Atkins Virginia, I will be heading down to Tri cities airport and flying home. I had been texting my parents all morning to figure out my itinerary. My dad finally sent me a link to a final itinerary - that cost way less than I was expecting! - and I filled out my information, and now I am ticketed to go home and come back! Frankly, I thought this trip home was going to be an unwelcome interruption to my hike and just a struggle to find my way home. But instead, it's been keeping me going for the past weeks knowing that I'm going to see my friends, my family and Ali for a few days after putting in a month of solid solid hiking. I'm so excited to get that break, and especially to see Ali. When I come back, it may be a weird situation. I'll be seeing people I haven't seen for weeks, and I'm betting people will no longer be impressed when I tell them I started on the first of March (just about everyone who asks me when I started has the same reaction: "wow! You're flyin!"). I've been leaving my phone number in the shelter registers so that people who know me can text me and I can try and meet up again with them. When I get back, I will have another about 6 week chunk of time before I am going home again, this time for commencement. I am hoping that I can up my miles through Virginia and Maryland and find myself in the middle of Pennsylvania or even further by that time. I passed over the Watauga dam, where a bunch of emergency vehicles were gathered for some reason. The trail from here starts up the side of Iron Mountain, a giant single ridge extending from here all the way to the Virginia border. The hiking started tough but became classic ridge walking, a lot of alternating ups and downs. I was shooting for Vandeventer shelter, about seven or eight miles up on to the ridge. The rain that had been predicted all day held off til this point, when it began to sprinkle on me. It wasn't unwelcome, though. It had been humid and stale all morning and the rain drops felt pretty good on my salty skin. It was supposed to downpour starting at around 3, moved back from 1. I passed zen master and pants, two hikers whose entries I've seen for quite a while. I also stopped at a small spring a mile and a half before the shelter. I had heard that the water st Vandeventer was down the mother of all terrible side trails, .3 straight down a hill. So I filled up my bottles at the small pools of water and cameled my way to the shelter. It's a pretty small shelter, for 6 people, made of cinder blocks like a few other have been in Tennessee. There was an older hiker here named Dream On, as well as Hootie, who's been hiking with the two hikers behind me for some time now. I was happy to be in the shelter and having a spot for the evening before the storm hit. The storm at this point had been postponed to 5 pm. Zenmaster and Pants showed up momentarily and though they were considering pushing on 7 more miles to the next shelter, decided not to risk it. So we hung out, made food, talked about a lot of things, and admired the spectacular view from right behind the shelter, which looks down onto Watauga lake and its marina, the surrounding town, and away to some gorgeous ridges in North Carolina. The ridge is very sharp on this southern side and the rock outcropping next to the shelter was a great place to sit. The shelter was now just about full, with just about one space left. The storm that was predicted never hit, and we cursed the weathermen and their lies. I dunno if I would've pushed on even if I'd known. Would've been a longer day, but would've left me with an awkward possible 25 mile day into Damascus tomorrow? Who knows. About 6, Golden Snitch and Seeker pulled up, looking only mildly moist from the sprinkling rain. I thought we were about to have to squeeze down in the shelter to accomodate, but they decided to set up their tents. I'm not complaining. 10:46 came up soon behind them and set up his own tent. Snitch made a fire and soon the place felt pretty homey. The reception here is pretty great and I was even able to FaceTime Ali as the sun went down. The Stars came out, I could see the twinkling lights of the town below, and a barred owl called for a few minutes nearby. It was a nice way to wrap up the day. Well, I hope I get at least some rain to justify all my worrying. It's supposed to storm now starting around 3am. Postponed 13 hours. Brilliant. The rain for the morning has been downgraded too, but there may be some sprinkles on me tomorrow early. Hey, I've been absolutely blessed with weather so far, and it looks like it'll be decent for the rest of my time until Atkins. Tomorrow I'll make a longer day, because the trail sticks up on this flat ridge. I'll probably go 22 miles. Some people are talking about making the 32 miles trek all the way to Damascus. It's an easy 10 miles, it looks like. I'll start with the 22 and then we'll see.