Date: 2022-04-21
From: Stealth campsite 

To: Johns Spring Shelter
Miles today: 13.4
Weather: broken clouds

Last night we slept warmer than we have this whole trip. We were up by 6am because today we climb the Dragon¢s Tooth, a monolithic rock formation on the top of the mountain (sorry, I don¢t know which mountain.)!! It is the first in the Virginia Triple Crown. It was a great hike up and there was no one there when we got there. You¢re supposed to be able to see McAfee Knob from up on the tooth but we forgot to look. We were just so impressed with the rocks!!The hike down was even more impressive. If you want a day hike that includes rock scrambles, this is the one! A couple of times I had to sit down and slide down the rock. There was also a place where you had to climb a couple of rungs to get down.At the bottom was VA rt 620 and .4 was a small grocery for us to resupply to get us into Daleville. As we walked in a guy and his dog stopped to see if we needed a ride. We told him we were going in to eat. He couldn¢t stay as he was on his way to McAfee Knob but said that maybe he would see us there. We got to the store and ordered a hamburger each and a fry to share plus 2 Pepsis. While waiting for our food we talked to a SOBO (southbound) hiker named The Machine. He started February 24 at Mt Katahdin, Maine and was already in southern Virginia! He said when he started he hiked 50-75 miles a day!! That¢s how he got the name The Machine. We wolfed down our lunch like we hadn¢t eaten in a week and then bought our resupply. We wished Machine well and started back to the trailhead. A great part of hiking, especially in the spring, is watching the forest come alive. So many spring flowers are coming out and the trees are budding. We saw our first blooming azalea today. We got to the McAfee Knob parking area and wasted no time going up the trail. We were only a short ways up and saw the guy and his dog coming down. We chatted for a bit and then parted ways. A few minutes later I saw an airpod case laying on the trail. I told Coffeebean that I remember that the guy had earbuds in and maybe the case was his. I decided to leave the case at the shelter we were going to stay at as it was only a mile up. We got to Johns Spring Shelter and began setting up when another hiker came in. He introduced himself as Gorby, which is a kind of bird and also Scottish-Gaelic for ¢glutton¢, so he told us. We watched this raccoon come down the shelter towards us. It went under the shelter, with its tail wagging the whole time. That didn¢t seem normal so we scared it off. Thank goodness, it didn¢t come back.  We were both tired after a long day and still fairly full from our townie food so we didn¢t feel like a big dinner. We shared a snack size bag of Lay¢s BBQ chips and a small bag of M&M¢s. Dinner of champions!I was getting ready to head to our tent and remembered the airpods  case in my pocket. I pulled it out and mentioned to Gorby that I found them and hoped the owner would come back looking for them. Gorby jumped up and yelled ¢That¢s what we were looking for!¢ He had met the guy and his dog on the trail looking for the case. Gorby told the guy if he found it he would leave it at the Johns Spring Shelter and put a note in the log. He kept saying ¢I can¢t believe I found it.¢ Hiked 13.4 today, got in about 6:10pm.