5/16: Day 47 (Dawn)
Zero at the Osborne's.
Friday morning we woke from a wonderful night's rest at the Osborne's. They opened their kitchen to us, so we sipped on some hazelnut fresh brewed coffee and ate some cereal. We chatted with Beth for a little bit while watching the local news. At this point, Beth and Josh had invited us to take a zero at their house but we politely declined. We didn't want to impose on them any more than we had. Beth took us to the trail head three or so miles away front their place. We prayed with her and said our good byes. As we were walking up the mountain we were rejoicing in the kindness that family offered to us and the faithfulness of The Lord to watch over our well-being. We stopped to discuss calling Beth back and seeing if the offer to take a zero at their place was still on the table. She enthusiastically renewed the offer. Since she was at work we walked to her house three miles away. She let us borrow one of there spare vehicles to go to the store- a little black mazada named Rosey. It was awesome! I was able to drive and after not driving any sort of mobile device for a month and a half it was a treat! We got back to the Osborne's and made some egg and cheese sandwiches, and napped for a good portion of the day. After Beth returned from work, we went with her to her son's baseball game. It was such a great evening! It was quite chilly, so the three of us cuddled under a blanket while cheering on Giles County high school varsity baseball team. After, Josh met us at Macado's, and they treated us to a nice dinner. We drove back to enjoy our last night at the next best thing to being home- The Osborne's house. A huge thank you to them, and we look forward to keeping in touch and hopefully hiking with them sometime!
5/17: Day 48 (Dawn)
20 miles. Mile 632 to 652
Pearisburg to the Captains.
Saturday morning started out with some delicious hazelnut coffee yet again. We sat around and chatted with Josh for a bit before he dropped us off at the trail head. We said our goodbyes and continued on toward Maine around 10 in the morning. This time we left fully satisfied. We had enjoyed a slice of Heaven-similar to being home. There is such a remarkable difference in staying with a family in a home rather that a hotel room where you're basically confined to the sole space you rented and not much more. We delighted in that temporary oasis; however, it was time to continue the mission. Also to note for today, it is our anniversary!! Our marriage has turned one year old. A couple exciting things about the day, we were able to enjoy a nice hot breakfast at the Osborne's-- egg an cheese toasters which are our favorite. The other exciting thing is we started sharing a toothbrush. Ha! Yes, we seriously did. Jeremy must've left his toothbrush at the Osborne's which is odd for him because he never loses anything. It was a humbling experience, and a whole new level for our relationship. Before we started the trail we joked that in order to go ultra light weight we were going to share a toothbrush. Well, it seems our self-fulfilling prophesy came to pass.
Throughout the day we were giddy to celebrate our first year of marriage on an adventure of a lifetime. This year has been nothing less of amazing. The Lord has prospered and kept us above our wildest dreams. He is so faithful. We look forward to the next years to come. Who knows, we might be climbing Mount Everest by our 10 year. May 17th would fall in that perfect window of opportunity where the jet stream isn't blowing treacherous winds of over 100 mph. Needless-to-say, we look forward to our future together in The Lord. As far as the rest of our day, we hiked on to what is known as the "Captain's". It's located on the trail about 1.5 past the Pine Swamp Branch Shelter across a roaring creek; that being, you have to ride a zip line across to get there. Plus, there is free pop! Sign these hikers up for a zip line am free pop! We successfully crossed the creek and enjoyed some knock-off sprites with our pasta side dinners. It's was the hikers perfect ending to hiker's perfect trek in the woods.
5/18: Day 49 (Dawn)
22 mile day. Mile 652 to 674
The Captains to one mile before Sarver Hollow shelter.
Sunday morning we broke camp around 8:30 A.M. Today was a bit more challenging. It was extremely rough terrain. As Jeremy would describe, "It was a foot pounding, boot devouring, and knee beating trail" for the majority of the day. By the end of the day we were exhausted. We aimed to go all the way to the Sarver Hollow Shelter but unfortunately as some shelters tend to be it was located .4 miles off the trail. At the end of a brutal day the last thing you want to do is hike almost half a mile downhill just for a place to camp. We had climbed three decent sized mountains totaling well over 5,000 feet in elevation. At this point, anything that didn't count towards the 2,185 miles of the Appalachian Trail, we weren't interested in doing. So, at the bottom of the final mountain to summit we loaded up on water and made the exhausting climb upward. We agreed that the first flat spot we found we would call home for the night. At the very top, about a mile before the shelter I mentioned earlier, we set up camp around 8:30 P.M. Very relieved to call it a night, we did our nightly chores and laid our heads to rest.
It may seem that we had a 12 hour day, but we took quite a few breaks including a 1.5 hour lunch. We saw the largest oak tree on A.T. in the South, the Keffer Oak. The girth was last measured to be 18 feet, 3 inches, and estimated to be over 300 years old. The branches of the tree were the same size as some surrounding decent sized trees. After the tree, we had to walk through a cow pasture. As we were walking, one of the mama cows started coming after me and I yelled at it to get back. Jeremy thought it was slightly humorous as he came to the rescue. All in all, it was an exhausting yet eventful day.
5/19: Day 50 (Jeremy)
20 mile day. Mile 674-694
Sinking creek Mountain to one mile before the Dragon's Tooth.
We've been out here 50 days! We also hiked past the Auddie Murphy monument. He was WWII's most decorated soldier. Today we had to adjust our usual schedule of lunch and dinner because of the distance between water sources. Many things in life and on the A.T.are optional, but water isn't one of them. We had lunch at 11:00 A.M. instead of 1:00 P.M., which I didn't mind one bit. Then, we had dinner at 4:45 P.M., and that was really early for us. After dinner we hiked four remarkably easy miles. We're trying to set ourselves up for an easy day into town the day after tomorrow. We turned down an opportunity to skip a portion of the trail this evening. Two of our new friends got a ride to skip the portion of trail we did after dinner, and just go to the hostel. We've been really diligent to not skip any of the trail. Call us purist if you want, but it's what we've been doing. I have a theory that the worst rules in life to break are the ones you set for yourself. If you break those, all other rules are more easily broken, and that's not a habit to begin. After dinner, we encountered two guys who had just come back from trail days. Trail days is a festival held every year in Damascus, VA. It's basically a giant festival to party and do communal drugs. For those reasons we chose to pass up that event. Anyway, the two people we encountered had decided to bring trail days back to the trail. They had a horn and a flute and played them as they walked. If I was camping with them that night, their instruments might've ended up in the privy. We also climbed a 3.5 mile mountain, 1500 feet in elevation gain, in under an hour. We were behind Scout and Aerie and they set a pretty solid, nonstop pace for us. We decided to stealth camp again about a mile before the Dragon's Tooth. It's been a good day. Much easier than the day before.
5/20: Day 51 (Dawn)
20 mile day. Mile 694-714
One mile before Dragon's Tooth to Lamberts Shelter
Today has probably been our favorite of the trail thus far--our favorite scenic day that is. We started off the morning by summitting Cove Mountain which holds the popular Dragon's Tooth. Jeremy climbed all they way to the tip top of it. I, on the other hand, only climbed 2/3 of the way up. The view was impeccable. We saw where we came from and where we were headed to. The bouldering mile long descent was a bit challenging to our patience. Soon after though, the four foot boulders were exchanged for flat pine needle softened trails, and the sharp blunt rocks were exchanged for isles of blossoming rhododendrons. It was magnificent! Around one, just two miles before our lunch destination, we stubbled upon some much needed trail blessings. The pop, donuts, snacks, and a little candy gave us just the boost we needed to make it to lunch. After lunch we summitted McAfee Knob, a local must see. We took some photos and chatted with friends then proceeded forward to finish the latter end of the day. The last sight of the day was the Tinker Cliffs. They're multiple bluffs and overlooks, all with superb extended views. Before the Tinker Cliffs, a somewhat humorous thing happened. We got a little lost due to my momentarily poor leading. When we were going over some boulders there was an A.T. sign with a wiggly arrow pointing up. Well, there was a footpath that went up then back down. So, I happened to follow the foot path thinking that the A.T. was doing yet another unnecessary and tiring detour. I was wrong. Jeremy wanted to turn around to see where we missed the white blaze. I insisted that this path would lead to it and other hiker's had been here recently because there were pole marks. About 10 minutes into going down a goat path on the side of the mountain with big drop offs, Jeremy insisted on turning around. Sure enough, we were following the wrong man made path. However, it only put us 20 minutes behind and we learned a lesson that was not to be deliberately repeated again. We made it to Lamberts Meadow Shelter and called it a night. It's been a wonderful day and we look forward to our town and zero day!
5/21: Day 51 (Dawn)
9.5 miles. Mile 714.6- 724
Lamberts Meadow Shelter to Daleville/Troutville, VA
We woke up this morning at 4:30 A.M. to break camp no later than 6 A.M. Hiking early morning has many more pros than cons. One of positives are walking in the coolest part of the day. It's the difference between some brow and back sweat versus blisters popping up on your skin because the backpack straps are rubbing their way to the bones from the massive amount of salt sweated creating a sandpaper type feeling against your skin. Another is walking into the sunrise. The bird are singing in symphony as the sun gleams through the trees and nature stirs awake. A couple more are arriving at the destination much earlier, and being able to see where everyone stealth camps. The only negatives are waking up when it's still dark and the massive amounts of spider colonies that are deported from there natural habitat to your face, clothing, and pack. Overall, we'd much rather break camp early morning but sometimes it's difficult if we get to camp late the previous night. We made it to town by 9:30 A.M. When we got there we headed straight to the post office. Jeremy had a new pair of shoes that have been waiting for him for five or days. They were a tad small so we sent them back and we'll get the new pair tomorrow. He's super excited though! After the post office we got a ride to the local outfitters from a high school kid. We got some new socks to prevent anymore foot sanding from our current salt and dirt coated socks. From there we headed to the Three Lil Pigs BBQ restaraunt that all the hikers were recommending. We weren't as hungry as usual, so we split some chicken tenders spun in BBQ sauce with buffalo chip and sweet potato fries with honey ketchup. YUM! It was just as everyone said, absolutely delicious. The waitress told us she was going to bring some banana pudding that they give complementary to the hikers. I don't like pudding but this was amazing. It had chunks of bananas, topped with whipped cream and served with vanilla wafers. We were very appreciative. Afterwards, we headed to Krogers to resupply for the next four days of hiking. We got a ride to our hotel with Bear Bag and his girlfriend Kelsey. Big thanks to them! We checked in and enjoyed a long awaited shower. After we headed to the truck stop to wash our clothes. We were in the laundry room and realized how expensive it was just for one load of laundry and I made the comment, "Well we'll know for next time." Jeremy laughed and said, "No we won't; We'll never be at this truck stop again." We both started laughing uncontrollably. This is one of the things about the trail. A lot of the time you just don't know until you try. We go to these towns we've never been to, and we have only have access to the things we can walk to. It's a learn as you go adventure. But we love the spontaneity of it! While we were waiting for our clothes we met a trucker named Bryan. He was a really friendly, nice man driving a truck to provide for his family. He's a born again, Spirit-filled Christian, so we got a chance to fellowship and pray with him. It was awesome! After our clothes were done we headed to Crackel Barrell where we had our much anticipated dinner date. Jeremy was so excited! He had been talking about it all day! We ended the evening with some Epsom Salt baths, and sleeping on a comfy bed in a climate controlled room. What a day!
The sign for the Captains
Audie Murphy Monument
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