Date: 2023-06-26
From: Spy Rock Junction

To: Reid Gap
Miles today: 19.4

I did not love going down the Priest mountain with its 3000 feet of downhill, and I wiped out 2x in 5 minutes which is so unlike me. I¢ve only wiped out 2 other times in the entire hike so far that I can remember. I majorly bent a pole going down the second time, but better the pole bends than me!When I got to the bottom, SP and Rabbit were hanging out drinking beer and eating oranges  - trail magic! I chatted with the woman providing the trail magic, who was section hiking and supporting her boyfriend who was doing a thru. While I declined the beer, I accepted her offer to take my trash - which, score! Best trail magics are always fresh fruit snacks and getting trash packed out.For lunch I made green Chile hatch Mac and cheese, which is my current favorite meal even if it¢s super light on calories. While munching on it, a car pulled up to drop off hikers and then the drivers offered us Doritos, oranges, and Bobos snack bars!! How amazing. I ate the Doritos from my hand like a butterfly (lapping it up with my tongue lol) and I yearned to ask for more, but didn¢t want to be greedy. A crazy amount of trail magic, how random but very welcomed. And I didn¢t even manifest this. Post trail magic feast, we set off again for an immediate 3000 feet uphill climb (what was the point of the descent then?). It was hot as balls and I was sweating. Because my straw was broken (call out to Platypus, I bought this in Hot Springs and it didn¢t even last 500 miles) I couldn¢t sip and hike which was annoying, but my left arm was more flexible than when I started the hike so I could grab and put away my smartwater bottle while hiking. We decided to blue blaze with the Mau-Har trail which was supposed to be super scenic. It started with an insanely steep up and down, but then had a pretty path passing waterfalls for a mile. I jumped in a pool and it was SO refreshing. I wish I had more time to splash around but it was threatening to rain and SP already had hiked off because he didn¢t want to be scrambling off trail in the rain - which, fair enough. I caught up with him on an uphill but my shorts were very slow to dry which was disappointing since they were shorts presumably geared to be worn outside¢¦. since the brand is called Outdoor Research. We marched onwards trying to make it to Reid Gap so we could hitch to Devils Backbone brewery to shower and tent for the night. SP had his usual last hour of the day bonk, so we snackbreaked and then marched on. Of course as we started the final mile descending into the gap it started to rain, which felt but hyper localized to us as we could see the blue skies to either side of us which made the rain feel very personal. We were like ¢fuck this¢ and just rushed down instead of stopping to put on jackets, shouting ¢fuck you rain!¢ all the way down. Of course when SP got to the gap and finally put on his rain jacket, the weather immediately cleared. Rude.Respawn had already been at the gap for 20 minutes trying to hitch a ride, and we collectively were unsuccessful for another 20 minutes to get a hitch or shuttle driver. At this point I walked away from the guys, up to the road junction to try and seem like a solo hitch. Of course the next 2 cars then immediately pulled over. Success! LOL.We got to the brewery, and I was chilled from the rain but didn¢t put on a fleece - should have! I was just so hungry and wanted to eat. I ordered the nachos, smokehouse platter, and 3 samples of their sour beers with different syrups (passion fruit habanero, strawberry rhubarb, and ginger thyme which tasted like kombucha). The sour was surprisingly delicious as I notoriously dislike the taste of alcohol and hops. I was still hungry after all that food, but the AC was roaring on full blast and the place was closing down, so we left. I grabbed some paper towels on the way out as the brewery did not provide towels for its showers, but when we stepped outside it started storming. And I mean storming. The thunder shook the roof we were standing under, and the rain was coming in sheets sideways. We made the executive decision to flee to Stanimals Waynesboro since they ¢had floor space available¢ and while we were frantically dialing shuttle drivers Respawn wisely remembered the existence of Uber and called us a ride. Rabbit had already set up his tent since he got there first (he was able to nab the first car he tried to hitch) so he had to run out into the storm and grab his stuff. And he got DRENCHED. The Uber came and deposited us at Stanimals where showered, and decided to sleep on the living room floor (sleepover party!). Annoyingly someone decided that it was the perfect time to start playing Mario Kart (despite it being past hiker midnight¢¦) so we couldn¢t go to sleep until 11. But at least we were clean, warm, dry, and sheltered from the rain.