Date: 2010-05-09
From: VA635 Stony Creek

To: Rice Field Shelter
Miles today: 15.9
Weather: scattered clouds

Day 64After a night in the man cave we were all ready to hit the trail. All but me, but I went with them anyway. After about 1/2 hour in the car I realized I had left the Droid plugged into the charger back at the cave. Ben quickly turned around and drove back for it. Oops.Once that was worked out we drove to the trail head, but now we had to find it. My guidebook said the trail intersected VA625 twice and we wanted the first one since that would make it a 13 mile day. We found a blue blazed trail that the sign/map next to it said connected to the AT. It also showed the ATcrossing the road about 3 miles further on. I told Creekdancer that I didn't like taking spur trails and would rather start on the AT. So we drove to the AT and her, Brian and I started hiking. Well after we had walked a ways and hadn't passed the shelter that was supposed to be 0.3 miles south of the trailhead I knew we had started at the second road crossing and that it was going to be a 16 mile day. Oops again. 3 miles later we walked past a spur trail and I could see that sign/map less than 200' away. Wasn't much of a spur trail. Another funny thing was that there was a decent pair of heavy military style boot just sitting in the middle of the spur trail. Very odd. We stopped at the first shelter for a quick break to read the register and then started up the big hill for the day. It wax pretty big but at least it had a lot of workable switchbacks, not to steep but also not so flat that you wind around more than you need to. I left a jolly rancher with each of them and I headed on up. There was no water ad the top so we headed for the water/campsite 5 miles away. The trail was pretty rocky and my shin was nagging at me, but at least the trail was now mostly flat. When we arrived at the campsite the view was awesome but the water source was a frog pond full of tadpoles. I walked down the hill a few hundred feet and got some water from a small seep dripping from the rocks. I figured the grass and then going underground for a 100' was enough to filter the frog poop so I didn't bother to treat it. Brian and Creek didn't bother to get water. They must not like frog poop. The next water source was 3 1/2 miles away so we got moving. After a little while I saw Fredo and Tintin coming northbound and just as they were passing Brian and Creek I ran screaming like a crazy man straight at Fredo. I think it startled Creek more than anyone else. It was good to see those guys again. After introductions Creek and Brian walked on figuring that I would catch up with them later. I had a good time chatting for about 20-25 minutes with those guys. Turns out that they wont be coming back to trail days this year so this will be the last time I see them. Hopefully they will both be back for it next year. I caught up with creek and Brian at the next water. It was close to the trail and coming out of a spring. What else could you want? There was a nice campsite near the water and Creek was looking at it wistfully since we were now near mile 15 for the day. Tintin had told me that a lot of thrus I knew were at the shelter so I really wanted to be there. So being a gracious person, creek and brian hiked on with me. The Rice Field shelter has a great view of the sunset from a big grassy field in front of the shelter. It also had a lot of great firewood all around the shelter. Brian and I made a very large fire that cut through the cold front that had come in. Its supposed to be in the 30's tonight. At the shelter was little john rummy chef pixie, lab rat, patch. Snickers and murph. They made room for me, but creek and Brian chose to each put up a tent. I had fun chatting with everyone while I cooked dinner. Afterwards I called my wife Ana talked her for a while. Then I wrote my journal entry that I should have written yesterday. Then it was time to stop feeding the fire and get into my 45° sleeping bag and hope that I don't freeze all night. BTW, lab rat said his wife said I was getting all crazy in my journal recently LOL. For the record, there are no beefcakes pictures and my friend Doug would never want to see them if there were. I was just trail crazy from too many miles of walking.   So good night and sweet dreams to all of you out there not living the Walking Southbound to Traildays Dream.