Date: 2003-07-07
From: Front Royal, VA

To: Manassas Gap Shelter
Miles today: 10.7
Weather: few clouds

Didn't sleep well last night...what else is new, I was in a motel room. My mind always seems to be racing when I'm in town...the things I need to get done, what I'm doing the next day, will I ever be able to make it to Katahdin...you know, all the everyday things that you usually think about at night. I think it's funny what we do when we DO get to town...it's so boring! We go to the grocery store, the post office, the laundromat, the library. If the town caters to hikers, we go SHOPPING...at the local outfitters. We might need more bug stuff, aquamira, or a new stuff sack. Yep, life OFF the Trail when you're on the Trail is a thrill a minute! So, back to this morning...Gerri and I got up at 7:15 and hit the laundromat, then the post office, where I should have had new straps for my backpack. Unfortunately, Gregory did NOT ship them there in time. I didn't get a chance to call them to find out what's going on with them. The ones I have now are twisting and cutting !into my shoulders. I put a card in to have them forwarded to Duncannon, PA...hopefully they will show up there. After the post office, Gerri very nicely carried my box back to the motel while I ran to the library to check online mail and bills. I had only 20 minutes left before we were supposed to check out of the motel, and I was over a mile away...I started running. A man in a pickup at the credit union asked if I needed a ride...I gratefully took it. It was already at least 90...not the best temperature for running! I had 10 minutes left...not enough time. The people who ran the motel were kind enough to let me finish getting my act together. I sent myself too much food...AAAAAAHHH!!! Perhaps I'll figure it out by the time I finish the Trail. My pack loaded beyond belief, we headed to the outfitters to discover that...they're closed on Mondays! I had to get the super-size version of bug stuff at Kmart, and I'll hope that my aquamira holds out till Harpers Ferr!y. We ate at the Kmart restaurant, then hit the road to try and hitchto the Trail. Another easy one...yay! I have come to love riding in the back of pickups...probably not a good thing. We headed up the Trail at about 1:30, sure that we weren't going to do the 15 we had originally wanted to hike. We arrived at the Jim and Molly Denton shelter at 4:15 to find Triple T, Ruff and Tuff and her dog, Jezebel, Iceberg Slim (who had just pased us on the Trail) and Snot Rocket. Bodhi arrived soon after us. This shelter is really nice...a big porch with benches, a separate picnic pavilion, a spigot for a spring and a shower (not hot). Unfortunately, we'd only hiked 5.2 miles and needed to do more than that for the day. We went on...to the supposedly-copperhead-infested Manassas Gap Shelter. Randy and Gerri started before me, and I hurried to catch up. I saw Randy top a hill, while Gerri talked with a trail maintainer at the bottom of the hill. I joined her, then we continued on...a moderate descent with LOTS of switchbacks, then a looooong !uphill. We arrived at the shelter to discover that Randy wasn't there...but we hadn't passed him. Gerri began to panic, and we started back down the Trail, sans packs, to try and find him. I went ahead and ran into Bohdi, who told me that Randy was right behind him...apparently, he had missed one of the switchbacks while picking a tick off his leg and went off the Trail. He had gone quite a ways, so had to backtrack. Then he waited by a road crossing for Gerri, who had already passed through there with me. Bohdi told him that he hadn't passed us, so Randy followed him to the shelter. We were very relieved to see him! We had a lovely snake-free dinner, and are now camping quite a ways away from the shelter. It's sooooo hot tonight! Supposedly we'll get some thunderstorms to cool things off...that'll be good. That's all for tonight, folks!