Date: 2021-08-22
From: Damascus 

To: Iron Mountain Shelter 
Miles today: 26.3
Weather: broken clouds

After a slightly hot and stuffy night at the Broken Fiddle Hostel, Quiksilver and I were packed up and out the door just before 7 am. As luck would have it, the gas station/deli across the street opened at 7, so we able over there so Quiksilver could get a breakfast sandwich and a sticky bun. I¢m back on the ¢breakfast is for nerds¢ bandwagon so I just window shopped. While we were outside eating and not eating we chatted with a local who was curious about our hike. Turns out the gentleman lived up in Michigan for almost 40 years working as a tool and die man before retiring back to Damascus where we was born. In chatting with him it also turned out he lived in Clarkston, Mi for many years about one half mile from where my friends Mike and Vicki live (cue the animatronic Disney characters).  Weird world we live in. We hiked out of town and began the climb up (they build surprisingly  few towns on top of mountains) from 1900 feet up to 4000 feet where we remained most of the day. About three miles up we came to the Virginia/Tennessee border and took the de rigueur pics at the sign post. Quiksilver pulled out the small painted rock made for him by a neighbor¢s child that he had carried all trip and takes a photo with at every state line. Something he¢ll only need to do two more times!Shortly after crossing the border I crossed paths with a FIOUS (Flying Insect Of Unknown Species) when it flew directly at my right eye and stung me on my eyebrow. I immediately dropped my trekking poles and exclaimed something along the lines of ¢golly!¢, as it felt as if I had been hit on the head with a hammer. I suspect it might have been another yellow jacket, but can¢t confirm that and I don¢t wish to cast unearned shade in their direction.  But dang, it did hurt. Luckily there was no swelling (one of the benefits of having a swelled head is that it can only get so big¢¦) and other than a few hours of pain, I was no worse for wear. Quiksilver and I hiked fairly close most of the day and both had carried out just shy of 4 liters of water due to dry conditions up on the ridge. Additionally, there is an 18 mile stretch south out of Damascus where camping is currently banned due to aggressive bear activity. We had pre-decided to hike 18 miles to the Double Spring Shelter and then figure out the rest of the day. Arriving a little after two we took a break and looking at the map, saw an unofficial campsite about 4 miles further on. Onward we hiked.  It was mostly downhill in this section and just before the campsite there was a good water source at a piped spring and we took advantage to fill up. Hiking to the site, we found a small clearing with a few hammock-ready trees and being a little footsore after 22 miles, I talked Quiksilver into calling it a day. But after some closer inspection, we saw several large dead trees that could potentially ruin one¢s night or life. So in the grand tradition of this AT hike¢¦we decided to go just a little further. The little further was another 4 miles mostly uphill to the Iron Mountain Shelter which made for a total of 26.3 miles on the day. A hiking marathon!  We covered the distance today in 10 hours all told, and yes, I¢m feeling it. But this is a good shelter area and we are the only hikers here. This also sets us up for a ¢short¢ 16 miles into Boots Off Hostel where we have a planned zero day on Tuesday. We¢ve got some pen and paper work to do as we begin to flesh out where we want to stop over the last 430 miles and what miles we¢ll need to average to finish on our appointed date. I don¢t think you¢ll be seeing many days like this again, barring weather. But if we do decide to do bigger days we¢ll have to schedule some more zeros as well. This is fine.It¢ll work out as it works out and hopefully we can both stay healthy and injury free in the coming weeks. Hope everyone had a restful (or at leash interesting) weekend!