TRAIL DAY 66
Tue, Apr 26, 2016 Theo greeted me as I crawled out of the tent for another short hiking day not unlike those before Erwin and Damascus. We’d be going to Marion, Virginia today where I had planned to swap winter gear for summer. Next trail stop would be VA 16 and the Mount Rogers Visitor Center, just 0.2 miles beyond Partnership Shelter, a very unusual shelter with unheard-of amenities.
PB and Justice were at the shelter. I’d last seen them at the start of Grayson Highlands. Justice passed me when she took pictures of me dunking in the stream. You never knew if you’d see familiar hikers again and it was always a thrill to find each other “down the way.”
A picture of PB and Justice tending to the tasks of trail logistics brings back the nitty gritty of hiking the AT and the comradery that becomes a vital part of the adventure. A body can get really nostalgic as the wealth of information and experience buried within comes to the surface. May this writing leave something of the experience for my family, my progeny, posterity and any tender soul and dreamer who happens upon my words.
In the Visitor Center I took pictures of two books that interest me. AWOL on the Appalachian Trail by David Miller, author of the popular AWOL Guide and Becoming Odessa by Jennifer Pharr Davis, for a short time, was the fastest AT thru-hiker. Records from hers forward are these:
Jennifer Pharr Davis: South: 46d 11h 20m: finish 7/31/11
Scott Jurek: North: 46d 8h 7m: finish 7/12/15
Karl Meltzer: South: 45d 22h 38m; finish 9/18/16
Joe McConaughy: North: 45d 12h 15m; finish 8/31/17
I would see Karl just before noon on the north side of Bromley Mountain in Vermont on August 15th. A month later he’d complete a thru-“hike” that took me 173 days, not counting zeros. More power to him. I was nowhere near his camp. He was building skyscrapers with his bare hands while I was sitting on the porch of a retirement community drooling ice tea down my front.
But then, I was happy to be taking whatever time it took to get to Katahdin – so long as they didn’t close the mountain before I got there.
But that’s for later. Back to Marion, Virginia.
The free bus came in time and we all took it into town. I got off at the Travel Inn. I’d made a call from the trail a day or two back. It was run by an Indian couple as were so many along the trail. My room was at the back left corner, accessed through a narrow hallway at the near left corner of the U-shaped Inn. The office was in the middle of the long base of the U.
I settled in and went across the main drag to the Roadrunner Market to get goods for lunch and stake out resupply items. As usual, Theo did not hesitate to make himself at home.
Back at my room, I got out all my gear to dry over fence rails at an empty pool in front of the Inn. I got quarters at the front desk for the laundry at the back left of the Inn on the ground floor. In a few trips I had clean clothes. By late afternoon, I had dry gear. I set aside winter stuff to be mailed home in exchange for my summer gear which Bon shipped off for the Travel Inn from home. It did not come on my arrival date so I would end up staying an extra unplanned day which I would put to the best use I could. Wasting time was not an option.
Mi Puerto, a Mexican restaurant not far west on the main drag was recommended for supper. I’d eat there both nights. The food was Inexpensive and good. I had Beefeaters Gin on the rocks and then a beer with dinner. The time was relaxed and easy. Off the trail in real comfort.
When I paid my tab and got up to leave, I passed someone who looked familiar and recognized me. It was Glider! I’d last seen him at BBR where he told me about his wood turning and I’d be frustrated on the trail trying to remember the name for the technical and complicated craft he taught all over the world. So I asked him and he told me and again I have forgotten – only because I knew I would not!
Sadly, Glider had to go off the trail for a pulled muscle.
A long way back there were two huge trees that had fallen across the trail and you had to raise your leg high to straddle them one at time. Soon after passing them, I saw a couple of hikers waiting by a road for a ride as I crossed. They were late 40s or early 50s and one of them had pulled a muscle in his groin going over those trees and had to go off the trail.
“Go off the trail.”
Horrible words. You never wanted them to apply to you and you felt real sadness for those to whom they did apply.
Well, now they applied to Glider. He admitted that he’d been “gliding” too fast and that’s what caused his problem.
The trail is such a warm and wonderful thing for those inclined to its challenges. It’s not a walk in the park. It’s a major undertaking. To encounter a hiker who has been wounded enough that he or she has to “go off the trail” is not unlike seeing a wounded puppy by the side of the road after an accident. You carry the wounded hiker with you in your good fortune – in your ability to hike another day toward the finish.
Back at my room, there was TV as in all the motels I stayed in. I probably saw a total of 2 hours of TV the whole time. My mind and focus were elsewhere and would be for months to come.
Tomorrow’s events are coming to mind. But for now, I can smell the room and just about tell you what I ate for lunch at the desk in the far corner of my room. Bathroom door a hairpin turn to the right as you entered. Fridge beyond the door. My pile of winter gear on the floor beyond the fridge. Bed straight ahead inside the door with a table door side.
I crawled in under the maroon spread and took to never-never land.
Day #66 Stealth site > Mount Rogers VC (Marion, VA) 5.4 miles