Date: 2005-06-17
From: Pass Mtn. Hut

To: Gravel Spring Hut
Miles today: 13.1
Weather: scattered clouds

I seem to be getting to planned meeting areas quicker. Leaving real early doesn't help matters either. The group was going to meet at the Elkwallow Wayside. No planned time but it was the halfway point, about 7.5 miles away, for the day's hike. I got there around 9:00 AM, got a cup of coffee and broke out my book. I've been getting a lot of reading in lately! By 11:00 everyone else was there. The reason for meeting here was we were going to read a couple of chapters of The Hobbit. If we wanted to finish it at a decent hour tonight we had to read some at lunch. By now, the constant followers of the Hobbit numbered 11, and by noon we were sitting under a tree listening to Clothesline and Touk read the chapters. I have to say, doing this read has been a heck of a lot of fun! I hope that someone picks up the torch and decides to do it next year so we can say the 3rd annual reading is taking place. After we read we all hung around for another hour or two. During that time Jack-a-roo came in from the south. He told me about a bear and a couple of cubs that he ran into, about a mile from the shelter we were heading to. I remember thinking that I was glad I wasn't there to see it and didn't think much of it after he finished (much to my later dismay). We all sat around for another hour or so and at 3:00 I headed off. Before long reached that area that Jack-a-roo had talked about. I was walking along the trail and all of a sudden I run into a bear. This bear was right next to the trail and it wasn't going anywhere! It would look at you, growl and walk around the tree it was by and then make some more noises at you. I backed up, silently and steadily. When I thought I was safely away the bear growled again, as if to say, "Keep moving back bucko! Not far enough yet"! I complied. There was no place to bushwhack around the bear and I sure wasn't go to try to walk right by it so I headed back to the road which was fairly close by. What Jack-a-roo had told me was that there was a bear by the trail with her two cubs in a tree. They wouldn't come down so the mother was guarding the tree. Jack-a-roo had passed them early in the morning and here it was, late afternoon and they were still up there. I knew Gypsy wasn't to far behind me so I waited for her. When she got there we put a note up for the others and then walked down the road and picked the trail back up below the bear. (For the purists out there I did go back and pick up that section the next morning!) Now you know why I was so freaked when I just saw the cubs the other day! You don't mess around with mama! That night, after everyone came in we finished The Hobbit and devised our food bag hanging plan. This shelter had a racoon living near it that had figured a way to climb the food hanging poles to get at the bags. Other hikers had even greased the pole but the racoon still managed to get up it. We added more grease to the pole and Clearwater tossed some cayenne pepper on it to help deter the bandit. We also moved the bag lifting pole (this thing is a two pole system, one sationary and one that is used to lift the food bags in order to attach them to the stationary pole). We were laughing and saying we would have to assign guard duty for everyone during the night. Since I get up and leave so early plus the fact that I was going to do more miles tomorrow I said my goodbyes to the Garland 5. I may not see them again till Maine. Good people and the kids are great. I was glad to get to know them even though I was schooled and brought speechless by a 14 year old a couple of times! Wolfsong, I still owe you! I told Clearwater, Gypsy, Touk, and Sunshine that I would see them in Harpers Ferry in a few days and off to bed I went.