Date: 2005-06-07
From: Sam Moore Shelter

To: Mark Z's house (near the David Lesser Shelter)
Miles today: 13.1

9:00I just crossed the West Virginia border a couple of minutes ago. The sign going North said, "Harper's Ferry - 16.8 miles" and the sign going South said, " Tennessee border - 535 miles".A couple of miles down, I also passed the Devils Racecourse. It's a big stone field, that looks like a river of rocks, but there's actually a river that runs under it. You can't see the water, but you can hear it. We got up super-early, and started walking by 5:45 because I wanted to get this stupid Roller Coaster over with before the heat got opressive. It's getting hot and very humid during the day here. I think I'm over most of it now. I didn't fall a single time during the Roller Coaster, something I feel to be an accomplishment since the footing was terrible. Everything was very slippery. I'm still way ahead of the other guys. They were just waking up when I left. I'm going to stop at the Blackburn Center for a little bit. When I got to the top of the hill, there was a hiker sitting there, his name is A.J. I sat and talked to him for a few minutes while we sat on the rocks. There was a real nice view looking down on a city. Later...I lied. The Roller Coaster wasn't over yet. I just went through another few miles of it. I was walking along and I had to do a double take and take a few steps back because there was a baby deer laying on the side of the Trail. When they are that young, they are all spotted and when they hear something coming, they just freeze in position. This one was just laying there, within 4 feet of me. So I got to take a picture from as close as 2 feet from him. When I got that close, he just took off. He was old enough to run pretty fast because he just bound away. It was very cool.I also forgot to mention Snickers Gap. That is some majorly nasty road to try to walk across!! It's like trying to walk across I-95. Very scary with traffic going by at 70 miles per hour. There's a curve and you can't really tell that cars are coming and by that time, they can run you over pretty quickly. I got to the other side and sat there for a few minutes. I was very tempted to walk down to the restaurant down the road, but the urge passed. I wanted to keep my legs moving. Every time I stop, it takes a good 2 hours to warm up again and it makes me feel like crap. I don't know if I'm warming up, or if my legs go numb, or it's a combination of both. It jkust doesn't hurt as much going uphill.   We made a stop at the Blackburn Center, we went down this windy trail with switchbacks about 200 feet downhill. The Blackburn Center is actually a house with a caretaker. It has a solar shower, a big porch and picnic tables outside. A nice little place to stop. I knocked on the door and I met the caretaker, she gave me a coke. I sat there for about 15 minutes and OC1 and Easy Goer showed up. I hung out there until 1 o'clock. The guys took off on me. I actually didn't know they had left. I got out of the shower after washing my head, and there were 2 packs with 2 guys sitting on the screened in porch, and I couldn't see too well. I sat there making a couple of phone calls and waited for them to come down. They didn't, so I went up there to see what was going on, and I found out they had left. So, I put my pack on and hauled ass to the David Lesser Shelter. They were sitting there. We went down to Mark Z's house at about 2:30. He was already home. He greeted us with Michelob's and invited us in and started throwing food at us. We had chips and salsa, homemade beef jerky that Mark had made with sugar, very good stuff. He had 2 friends come over later in the evening. Donna and Justin sat on the porch with us while Mark cooked a London Broil and a couple of rib eyes and baked potatoes. We pigged out. We had some more beers and a couple of shots of whiskey. We went downstairs to where his computer is to try to get some pictures and journals loaded up. I wasn't successful with the journals but I managed to get the pictures on a couple of CDs. I went to bed at about 11 o'clock.