Date: 2009-06-05
From: Front Royal, VA 

To: Front Royal, VA
Miles today: 0.0
Weather: moderate rain

Cell goodOG notesToday we had a day of well needed rest. We started with breakfast here at the hotel. We then hung around our hotel room, C6 washed laundry here at the hotel, and I uploaded our pictures and videos. I actually enjoyed being at the computer. I surfed the internet reading the news, checking out Ebay, and playing card games as the computer transfered the files. The most ambitious thing was to walk down the street for dinner. In between all of this resting we watched mindless TV.Tomorrow we'll resume hiking and heading north. The rain seems to have stopped now and the weather forecast is for nice weather the next two days. It sounds like we'll see rain again next week. We seem to be working towards having the rainiest hiking year. We'll see about that. C6 notesToday marks the exact half way point in our weather. As of today we have had 43 sunny days and 43 bad weather days. Not a milestone I'd like to have, but one that's a reality in our hike. Looking at the weather over the whole US, it looks as if we'll have a short period of nice days, and then a whole lot of bad days to come...as will everyone else. Oh well.My worry about the heavy rain today is the water crossings we'll have to deal with tomorrow. Yesterday we were lucky to have a road bridge very close to the trail when we reached an overflowing creek. It's not often there's a convenient bridge so close.We enjoyed relaxing today. I took a long nap while OG uploaded our latest photos to our son and did computer surfing. The only walking we did today was to and from the motel lobby, motel guest laundry room, down the street for dinner and to pick up a couple things at a Rite Aid, and to the gas station next door for delicious Baskin Robbins ice cream. The rest of the time was in our room...I finished a book I was reading and OG has been enjoying refreshing his channel surfing skills and he liked computer surfing earlier. This was a day of much needed R & R. It poured rain all day and finally stopped while we were in the restaurant for dinner. Now I pray the night dries things out and lets the creeks and streams go down before we hit the trail again tomorrow.It's interesting how hikers help each other. OG was talking with a couple of hikers in the lobby earlier today. One of them, "Blue Steel," called our room after we got back from dinner. She had left her phone charger in her room and asked if we could get it from the front desk and bring it with us tomorrow. She only knew our trail names, but happened to be at a shelter where Hellbender is tonight. Hellbender doesn't know our real names either, but he hiked with Neal (Old Gear - also known as O.G.), and Hellbender knew Neal knows us well. So Hellbender called Neal, Neal told them our real names, and Blue Steel was able to call us here. We arranged that if the motel finds her charger we'll bring it with us and she'll stop at the shelter we plan to stop at tomorrow night. Unfortunately, the motel didn't find her charger, so we're not sure we'll be able to bring it to her. Blue Steel tried to call the people in the room where she was last night, but they weren't in. She said the charger was down in a corner, so the cleaning personnel probably didn't see it. We may be gone before the cleaning crew starts their rounds in the morning, so we're not sure we'll get Blue Steel's charger before we head out.Old Goat & Check Six