Date: 2005-09-17
From: 1/2 mile N of Little Irish Creek, Va.

To: Petites Gap, Va.
Miles today: 25.3

I checked my watch last night thinking that it must be at least 1 or 2am...it was almost 6am!! I love nights when I slept that soundly. I stuck my stove out the tent door and started the water boiling for my coffee. I had two Little Debbie fried apple pies along with my coffee for breakfast. I packed up and started walking at 7:10am. The trail went around the ridge that I was sleeping on and when I walked to the other side, I saw where I slept last night. I thought I was near the old trail since I was walking in the other direction on the new relo...ooops, I slept right next to the A.T. last night. I walked the rest of the way down the new trail to a really nice suspension bridge. I saw a trout and a turtle in the water as I walked over the bridge. I was at 1000 foot elevation at the bridge. The trail started going up from there. About 1 1/2 miles later, I found a nice little spring and tanked up and filled my water bottles. I kept climbing and got to the summit of Rice Mountain. The air had been very still at the lower elevation, but there was a really nice breeze blowing up higher. The trail leveled out for a few miles and I stopped by a spring I always like to get water at near the Blue Ridge Parkway. I started climbing again right after that and passed by Punchbowl Shelter without stopping. I continued ascending to the summit of Punchbowl Mountain which was about 900 feet above the spring I had stopped at. It leveled out for about half a mile, then went up 500 feet to Bluff Mountain. The was a beautiful breeze on top and the views were very nice. I could see some lower mountains with clouds still hanging around some of them. I finally got to go downhill for a while. It had been almost 6 miles of uphill this morning. I came off Bluff Mountain down to Saltlog Gap. I headed on down the trail with about a 15 mph breeze blowing on me and I was eating a Milky Way and walking in new shoes...life is good. :-))) It was sidehill trail for a couple miles from Saltlog Gap to Saddle Gap. I love walking on sidehill trail and there's alot of it in the south. You can look up a mountain to one side of you and down the mountain on the other. I like that feeling. I started climbing again up to Big Rocky Row. There were lots of very nice views today. A 500 foot descent took me to Fullers Rocks with more views. I had about an 1800 foot descent down to the James River in the next 4 miles. I didn't stop at Johns Hollow Shelter because I was thinking about lunch in Glasgow, Va. It's a nice walk for the last mile before the James River along a nice stream most of the way. I spotted some 6 inch trout swimming in it. I started hitching a ride into Glasgow at 12:50pm and didn't get a ride for 25 minutes. The guy that gave me a ride dropped me off at the restaurant and I ordered 2 hamburgers, 2 chili dogs, fries and a soda. While I was eating, Stuart came in and sat down. He had given me a ride back to the trail 2 years ago and said that when I was ready, he'd take me again. I left my backpack with him and walked next door and sent in my journal entry, then walked to the brand new Dollar General and resupplied with enough food for a couple days to Dalevile. Stuart took me back to the trail and I got started walking at 3pm. There were about 30 to 40 teenagers on the James River Foot Bridge and they were all jumping off into the river. Looked like a good way to cool off. I kept walking until I got to Matts Creek Shelter where I sat down for about 15 minutes to take a break and sign the register. While I was there, a couple of section hikers by the names of Driller and One Step came in. One Step is working on completing the whole trail, Driller already has and is just helping One Step. From there, I had a 2000 foot climb.I was getting thirsty because of something I ate and I had about 6 miles to Marble Spring. I conserved the little water I had. Once I got up to the ridge, I still had about 3 miles to the spring. I saw a lone turkey running away from me on the trail. When I got to the spring, I drank 2 1/2 litres. That water tasted great!!! I was very thirsty by then. I carried out 4 litres of water because whatever I ate today was making me very thirsty. It was only another hour till it would be getting dark, but I still had Highcock Mountain to get up and over. That was a fairly steep 1000 feet and then I went down 1000 feet to Petites Gap. I found a suitable spot and set up my tent for the night.