Date: 2010-05-23
From: Daleville, Va

To: Bobblets Gap Shelter 
Miles today: 18.5
Weather: scattered clouds

Day 77I slept pretty good on the floor. I love having room to spread out and to toss and turn without worrying about knocking into other people. The motel had your average " hot breakfast" which did the job of filling me up so I can hike. Freeman, who we had left at the outfitters yesterday did the same as us and elected to stay in creepys room. He's a fun guy but definately slow to get his gear together this morning. It was 10:40 before he and creepy were ready to go and then we were all back on the Trail. The trail paralleled the Interstate for more than a mile then pulled away. It was nice to hear the traffic slowly fading away as we left it behind. The first stop was Fullhardt Knob shelter (feel free to make your own jokes, I am going to show restraint this time). The water source here is a cistern that catches rain water off the shelter roof. It was discolored but I treated it and drank it anyway. I may have been the only one. Freeman carries a guidebook for trees and plants and is very knowledgeable about what's out here. Greendog and I stopped to eat some delicious fruit from what I was told in my your was a Wild Cherry tree. Turns out there isn't a wildcherry tree in his book, so I don't know what we were eating.The next shelter was 6 miles away where I would eat my lunch. At the current shelter I ate every snack i had in my front pack. Usually I am never really hungry out here and have to force myself to eat enough food. It could be because I don't really cook I just boil water and eat crappy stuff. This time I am trying something new. I have way to much food and its heavy food like bread, cheese, pepperoni, bagels, peanut butter and belly, etc. My thinking is since its a lot and heavy I will want to eat it just to get the weight down. Its working. At lunch I went into my food bag and pulled out the big round loaf of bread, some cheese and pepperoni and some honey to spread on top. That made for several very yummy sandwiches. I followed that with vanilla yogurt covered raisens. When thinmint creepy and Freeman arrived I was already done so greendog and I took off for the last shelter of the day 7 miles away. Greendog stopped for water so I passed him but soon enough he had caught up and passed me. He stopped again to clean rocks out of his shoes but it didn't take him long to catch up and pass me again. I felt like the mouse in a cat and mouse game. I was getting tired because my pack weighed so much more than usual. It didn't make it any easier when the AT began paralleling the Blue Ridge Parkway. The parkway ran smooth and mostly flat. The trail went up and down and was rocky. Not fair. I got a picture of a nice dark cloud with the sun behind it and streaks of light racing to the ground like lasers. The Droid didn't do it justice but I posted the pic anyway. BTW, its been raining off and on all day.Around mile 16 my legs were protesting the pack weight so I broke out the Big Medicine (the MP3 player) and cranked up the sound. I soon caught up to greendog And hiked with him until about a half mile out when a particularly fast paced heavy metal song came on and juiced me up. I went past greendog and took off at top speed and singing very loudly. They were some amused looks on peoples faces when I pulled into camp. It was 8 pm so I quickly put up my tent, the shelter being full, and then started eating. It was full dark when I finished so I retired to the tent to catch up on my journal which I was now 3 days behind on. This entry brings me up to date. Good night and sweet dreams to all of you out there not living the Heavy Bread and Heavy Metal Dream.