August 28-hiking alone

We decided I would represent the team and hike 20 miles while Gravity takes another day to heal. I would only carry the minimum in hopes of getting all 20 miles in one day but have what I needed if I had to spend the night in the woods.

I hitched a ride and was on the trail just after 7-the weather was calling for possible showers and then clearing by 3 in the afternoon. I was a little un-EZ going out on my own and the skies were dark. I've hiked 1900 miles with Gravity other than 10 miles in Pearisburg Va while she had dental work done and 3 miles in VT where I volunteered to run to the cafe and order mounds of food before it closed.

The first few miles were straight up and I was using all fours so right away I knew Gravity did the right thing. Upon reaching the top I saw the ski lift and just beyond a very large viewing deck at least 16 ft off the ground. I ran up to look and saw nothing but dark clouds. I pushed on to about the five mile mark where I was able to fill up with a liter of water. I thought about the salami and pepper jack cheese sandwiches Gravity made and decided to have one for breakfast but discovered all I had was a 1/4 bag of Lay's Potato crumbs. Decided I would save them for later when I might really get hungry. (Salami and thick sliced cheese is currently my favorite hiker food.)

Now I was getting some strong winds and sideways rain. Luckily I went back into the heavy bush that protected me. I decided that I would just keep a steady pace only stopping for water to get this hike done ASAP. I figured 10 hours and 7 start time should bring me in around 5 pm. I went.atop of Mt. View or High can't remember and became confused where the trail was going-when on top with little growth it is sometimes difficult to see where the trail goes. I started to feel a bit panicked but after retracing my steps I was back on track. Nothing worse than being lost except being lost alone on a nasty day.

I came across a sign for a shelter and remembered that was at the 12 mile mark-that was encouraging only 8 to go. I just kept a good steady pace all day. By the way I was sopping wet the whole time-brushing up against wet pine trees is like walking thru a car wash.

As I was coming down off the last mountain of the day I saw a shelter and decided to take a quick rest, snack on the potato chip crumbs and check the book to see what was left. Happy to see 1.9 would get me to the road. The path was fairly flat and smooth but crossed a river about 3 times while hiking out beside it.

At the road I went down to the White Mtn Hostel and Lodge where we shipped ourselves a resupply pkg.
After stuffing my back pack I was probably back up to my regular 40 pounds. Now I was 4 miles from town and Gravity. I asked the owner if she could run me to town but already had 4 hikers so now I had to hitch in.

A fair amount of cars zoomed by me and I was getting discouraged-if Gravity was with me we would already be in town. After 2 miles a nice gentlemen picked me up-turns out he volunteers to maintain a section of the trail.

Gravity was happy to see me about 7 pm and i was happy to see her. it was a full day. The hike itself took about 10 hours not bad for wet conditions-I only wiped out once on a catwalk.

EZ