Date: 2005-06-20
From: Shelter, Sam Moore Shelter

To: Hostel, Blackburn Center
Miles today: 10.9

Tomorrow is hike naked day. I'm pretty sure that no one wants to see any of us hiking naked. Will we or won't we? Whatever, there will be pictures taken. The weather Gods smiled kindly on us again. The humidity didn't go up and the temps didn't rise above the mid 80's AND the sun stayed mostly behind the clouds. You can't ask for much better hiking weather on the day before summer. Today was roller coaster part 2. We did the 1st 2 hills and stopped at the top of the 3rd hill. The Bears' Den Hostel is there. They had pizza and soda for sale. Yum. My wonderful Troll bought me an extra Dr Pepper for energy later in the day. We spent a couple of hours there. We were able to weigh ourselves there. Numbers were 43 lbs lost, 25 lbs lost and maybe 1 lb gained. You should be able to figure out which number goes with which person. We finished hill number 3 and went up and down hill number 4 with no problem. Hill number 5 sucked. A lot. But about 4/5's of the way up we passed into West Virginia. My border picture looks like I was dying. I felt like it. At the bottom of hill number 5, Oblivious and I shared that Dr Pepper. Sugary caffeine goodness propelled me up the hill to the ridge. We followed the ridge right to the Blackburn Center. I was a little P.O.'d at Wingnut. I hiked really fast from the top of the ridge and never got to a road listed in the book. I knew the Blackburn Center was 1.2 miles from the road. It seemed like I had hiked fast forever and never saw the road. I was getting depressed over the 1.2 miles that I would have left when I finally made it to the dang road. Luckily, there was no road and I just wound up at the Blackburn Center. The Blackburn Center is the best shelter ever. They have a free spaghetti dinner. It was yum. There was garlic bread, corn and green beans, and spaghetti AND desert. It was a brownie with a strawberry on top. They also have a free bunkhouse or sleeping on the screened porch. It is so very cool. It was really neat to talk with Bill, the caretaker. There is more to report on the guy with the suitcases from yesterday. Remember that this is all trail gossip and should be taken with a grain of salt. Apparently about 1.5 weeks ago he showed up at Bears' Den Hostel. You can get to this hostel via a road. He asked someone who worked there where the closest shelter was. They asked north or south. He looked confused and said it doesn't matter, how about south. The person then pointed him in the correct way to go south on the AT and told him it was about 3 miles away. He then took his stuff and left. In the meantime, while this exchange was going on, a hiker saw one of his open suitcases and assumed it was a hiker box. It was filled with cans of food and personal stuff. The hiker then realized there was no way that any hiker toted that stuff through the roller coaster. It had to belong to someone who wasn't hiking. The hiker went in search of the owner of the stuff. The guy with the suitcases packed his stuff (2 wheeled suitcases, daypack, and boxed backpacker tent) and left headed south. When the hiker met up with the person that worked there and asked about the suitcases, they both realized that the suitcase guy was probably asking for the location of the nearest homeless shelter and had instead been given directions to the nearest AT shelter. Over the last 1.5 weeks, suitcase guy has made it about 10 miles. When you realize what he has to drag and how many times he must cover the same ground, it is pretty incredible. Take care and we will see you on the trail.