2017 Appalachian Hike

Slept well last night in the bunkhouse. 

I met a nice guy that is hiking with his dog. He and the dog stayed in our bunkhouse. His name is King James and his dog is Moja. He got the name King James because of the big Bible he’s carrying in his pack. He is also carrying a fly rod and net. He was fishing last night in the stream next to our bunkhouse. It was full of trout. His dog has a pack also. 

The owner got up early to make coffee for us and give us a ride back to the trailhead. 

We needed to start early because of the rain in the forecast. We wanted to make sure we got to the shelter before it filled up. So we hiked pretty hard. 

Today was a very beautiful and very difficult for a mile and a half section. A very high , rocky, exposed technical section. Some pretty scary scrambling on the rocks. The descent was particularly difficult for me. I couldn’t keep up with Deb in this section. She’s much better at negotiating the technical rocks. 

1. We made it to the shelter around 1:30 and claimed our spot. There was already two hikers here. Gabe and Galaxy. Seabiscuit and Engineer showed up about an hour later. This shelter only holds six. 

It was just starting to rain and thunder as we arrived. We were almost running to beat the rain. It sprinkled for a bit then quit. Sounds like there’s more coming. 

This shelter has a fireplace and Gabe and I gathered wood and He built the fire. 

We are guessing we’ll be hiking in the rain tomorrow morning to go meet Doug so Deb can go home. The good thing is we aren’t going to be breaking down our tents in the rain.