Date: 2016-06-11
From: Wilson Creek Shelter

To: Jennings Creek Campground
Miles today: 17.0

I woke up around 6:30 but decided to fall back asleep. I was beat and didn't hear anyone else in camp up yet. I got up not to much longer and we got on trail by 7:30. Scavenger and Slosh (the Royal couple) left first followed by Ompi then myself. We could tell it was going to be a hot day. We all hiked separately but kept leap frogging over one another. We walked about 5 miles following the side of the hill and came to mile 97 on the Blue Ridge Parkway. It was the first time we have crossed over the parkway on our journey. The trail at this point follows the Parkway for about 100 miles. Sometimes the trail is very close to the parkway and you can see it through the trees and sometimes you are further away near roads that lead to the parkway. We continued on another few miles and the trail lead to a parking area with a view. The most exciting thing about this parking area is it had a trash barrel. We cheered and started emptying out our trash. Some more Thru hikers came out to the parking area and cheered when they saw the trash barrel. You wouldn't think this would be a big deal but following leave no trace you carry out everything you carry in. This does not mean burn it in the fire pit. When you have gone several days you can acquire a bit of trash and it's nice when you can unload it. We continued on stopping at Bobblets Shelter to fill up on water. We had a stretch of 11 miles with no water. It was going to be hot so we needed to be cautious about water. We crisscrossed the Blue Ridge Parkway a few times. The RC was ahead of me on our last road crossing for the day. When I crossed the road and caught up to them on the trail by the road they were stopped. When I arrived I saw why they were stopped. Across the trail was a 3 foot long rattle snake. I have only seen a rattlesnake once and this was a small brown one. This snake was huge and very green in color. We stood and waited while it looked at us and went nowhere. Finally it rattled its tail and slowly moved off trail. We took pictures and video of it cause what else were we gonna do while standing there. We were finally able to move on and warned two section hikers going south bound to be wary. They were thankful and gave us Reese's Peanut Butter Cups for the warning. We walked on and crossed over VA 43 and the Blue Ridge Parkway was only .20 miles east. The trail at this point banged a sharp uphill. Normally not to bad but in this case it was very hot and the trail was in the open sun and it was 1pm. I was first followed by the RC and the Ompi. When all four of us reached Cove Mt Shelter we looked pretty haggard and felt like we were gonna drop. It was a tough section and we were trying to conserve water as the shelter had no water and we still had 3 miles to go before water. At the shelter we saw Jessie's Girl again who was at the shelter we stayed at last night. She was having her lunch, which was what the rest of us were about to do. We had passed three woman day hiking with a collie and they arrived at the shelter. Come to find out one of the woman had hiked last summer from the West Virginia border to Katahdin and blew out her knee when she went back to leap frog and finish so she is now doing sections. Today her and two friends were doing a ten mile section. They stopped and has their lunch with one of the offering me a hard boiled egg. Oh boy what a treat. This reminds me that when Ompi and I were doing the marathon to catch the RC we were at Dragons Tooth and there was a group of day hikers there. They were talking to us about our hike and I told them a story how I was approaching a road crossing and a caravan pulled in and it looked like trail magic was being set up. I kinda got excited and as I got closer I realized it was just a hiker getting dropped off and they were pulling stuff out of the trunk to get the pack out. Then when I realized I was like oh (sad face). I then proceeded to tell them I never fully understood what hiker hunger was until about 4 weeks ago. One of the guys proceeded to go through his bag and come back and hand us home made teriyaki beef jerky. We were excited. Ompi leaned over and said good job on the Yogiing. I was like wow I did do my first real Yogiing. Yogiing is just like the cartoon yogi bear you see day hikers and or picnickers and you try and get something out of them by telling them how hungry you are or how hot it is. Some people take it to the extreme in my case I wasn't even trying and got something for my efforts. Ok back to today..... The ladies finished up their lunches and left. We were discussing the idea of splitting and staying at one of the cabins at the middle creek campground. Ompi had a resupply package to pick up there anyway she with the heat the cabin had AC. We inquired and they told us the cabin was 45 for 2 people. Each additional person was 25 dollars. Uhm that would be 95 dollars and 2 cabins would be 90. We got the feeling they didn't want to rent the cabins to thru hikers so we decided we would walk the remaining 3.2 miles to Jennings Creek and camp. There was a supposed swimming hole and Ompi could walk up and get his package. We finished up our lunches and pushed on. The day got hotter and the temperature was 94 in Buchanan with a heat index of 101 according to the weather App on my phone. Finally I could hear water in the distance and the trail dumped us out onto VA 614. I was the first to get there and crossed the street went down the small hill, dropped my pack, yanked off my shirt, pulled of my boots and basically dove into the water. The day bathers must of thought I was a mad man but I was hot and stunk. I looked up and saw Ompi crossing the bridge over to the parking area he looked down at me and laughed. That didn't take long he said. I came out of the water grabbed my things and headed over to the parking area where a thru hikers parents were doing trail magic. They missed their son and wanted to see him so they drove 5 hours down and are going to drive the 5 hours back tonight. They had cold drinks, hot dogs, burgers, watermelon, brownies. OMG it was heaven after the day we had. I gorged myself that I didn't even need to have dinner. We got to the trail magic at 5pm and it was perfect timing fit dinner. We thanked the couple profusely and walked from the parking area down a path to a bunch of campsites along the creek. We set up camp and I went with Ompi to the campground to pick up his package and I wanted to do a small resupply for lunches. We walked the 1.5 miles to the campground and without a pack it was a breeze. We picked up what we needed and one of the workers at the camp store offered to give us a ride back. We got back to camp and relaxed while Scavenger and Slosh had a lite dinner. When Ompi and I were walking to the campground we passed the couple doing trail magic who was packing up to leave. They said we have 4 hot dogs and a burger left that we are gonna trash if it doesn't get eaten. So Ompi and I could not let that happen. When we got back we were so full we couldn't eat a thing. We are all about to crash. Staring at us first thing in the morning is a climb from 951 feet here at the creek to 2054 feet in 1.6 miles. That's gonna be fun first light but I guess get it out of the way before it gets too hot. Tomorrow is going to be hotter than today but the saving grace is that we have plenty of water.