Hiking the Appalachian Trail: Swift Run Gap, US 33 910.1 to Big Meadows Campground 927.1

 None of us slept great in the motel for some reason, but we were up by 6:30, getting our gear packed up and chugging some coffee. Wayne showed up thirty minutes early, and we hustled to get the last of our things together and get to his van. As we were loading up, he pointed out a mountain in the distance. It was Hightop, where we had been the day before! 

On our way to the trail, we made a pitstop at Wayne’s place. He lives in the parsonage next to a small church where he is the pastor of a congregation of about 35. You could tell from his stories that he was so proud to be the leader of that church. In fact, as we visited with people in town, we realized that everyone knew Wayne! He is a really great guy and had been so accommodating to us. 

We bid Wayne farewell at the trailhead and headed north once again. We had 17.5 miles ahead of us, and we needed to get busy. (Unfortunately, my camera was misbehaving for this group shot!)

The morning was not too chilly, and blue skies greeted us. Soon, the sun rose above the mountains and man, was it a nice change from the rain and fog from the days before. 

After a long climb up, the trail somewhat leveled out and we cruised through a bunch of miles, only stopping now and then for quick pack and snack breaks. We met this little guy along the way, as well!

The four of us had some extra motivation today, with a wayside 16 miles in, and we wanted more blackberry shakes! Our destination was Big Meadows, the halfway point of the Shenandoahs for tourists and thru hikers alike.

Our 17.5-mile day seemed to have flown by so quickly.  We made it to Big Meadows wayside earlier than planned and ate smash burgers, French fries, onion rings, Coke, and shakes. It was glorious! There were lots of people here, as it is the most popular stop for tourists in the Shenandoahs. 

A one-mile paved trail led us from the wayside to the campground. The Big Meadows campground was pretty big and had space for everything from solo tents like ours to huge motorhomes. 

The friendly attendant helped us choose a campsite at the back of the park, right near the AT. When we got there, there were so many deer just hanging out everywhere! 

We set up our four tents, with the doors all facing the center. Around us were other tent campers as well as big RVs. Once we were settled, we tried for a long time to make a fire. We all but gave up on it and decided to make some hot cocoa. There was a brief few moments where the fire flared up, but it wasn’t giving off any heat and once the sun set, it got chilly quickly.  This was the highest elevation we camped at this trip, and it sure made a difference temperature-wise!  I hoped the deer wouldn’t invade our camp in the night-they were bedded down so close to us! We settled into our tents and said good night.

 

The hot chocolate seemed to go right through us, and at 8:30pm we all crawled from our sleeping bags to head to the bathroom. The deer were still hanging around our campsite in the tall grass, and we could see their eyes shining in the darkness. We went to sleep, feeling safe and warm in our tents.

Total Daily Mileage: 18.41

Total Calories Burned: 3,801

Hiking the Appalachian Trail: Pinefield Hut 898.5 to Swift Run Gap, US 33 910.1

 The four of us slept all night tucked up close together in the shelter. And when I say "close together", I mean close together.   

It sure was nice to have a night without rain!  Occasionally acorns would fall from above and slam into the metal roof of the shelter and startle us, but we were thankful to have no visits from bears or other creatures. We slept until 7 AM and then slowly crawled from our packs and started our day. 

We packed up quickly, made time for coffee and breakfast, and then it was time to hit the trail. 

We started the day with a big climb with lots of signs of bear along the way. At the first high point we were able to get cell service and checked in with our families. The leaves were getting prettier every day, and it smelled so delicious in the forest.

We only had to hike about 11 miles to get to our destination, but we were faced with long, long climbs all day. Why does it always feel like the ups take forever and the downs go by in a flash?!  The views from the mountain tops left us guessing at what was below.  That thick, misty fog was still hanging around up on top Hightop Mountain!

Before too long, we were making the big descent down into Elkton.  It's always a bit of shock to see how nice it is down in the valleys when the weather up at elevation is so different!

 We came out to Skyline Drive at Swift Run Gap.  This is where our shuttle driver, Wayne, was going to meet us!  It was day four, and we were ready for showers, clean clothes, and a resupply of our food. We hung out for a few minutes to wait for him, thoroughly enjoying the sunshine.

Wayne picked us up and soon stopped at a little market where we bought diet pop and cheeseburgers. Yum!  We had made a reservation at Country View Lodging just that morning.  The owner was sooo nice and accommodating. Honestly, everyone we had met this trip had been amazing.  We threw clothes in the washer, showered, and hung tents to dry out. Thank you to Misty, Chelsea and Kara for doing the laundry and cleaning and drying the tents while I sat half naked waiting for clean clothes!

Wayne was off on another mission later in the day, but he offered to send one of his sidekicks to shuttle us to town.  Nelson arrived to take us to the grocery store for our resupply, and to El Paso for margaritas and so much Mexican food! Nelson was quite the character, which has been the case for all of our shuttle drivers to date!

Back at the motel, we sorted our food, filled our water bottles, packed up as much as we could, and got everything ready for an early departure. Wayne would be arriving at 7:30 to get us back to the trail. We were all excited to sleep in real beds, if only for the night.

Total Daily Mileage:11.60

Total Calories Burned: 2,501

Hiking the Appalachian Trail: Blackrock Hut 885.3 to Pinefield Hut 898.5

Amazingly, the nine of us in the shelter slept quietly and without interruption all night.  There wasn't even any snoring to complain about!  The wind had picked up overnight and I was so thankful to be warm and dry in the shelter.  The sun began to lighten the sky before 7:00am, but still, the shelter was silent. I didn't want to be the first to move, but I couldn't be in my sleeping bag any longer-it had been twelve hours!

 I began unzipping things, and then Misty followed, and eventually the rest of the campers slowly started to make some movement. As we started to pack up, a woman who had been tenting came up to make breakfast and told us of a bear who had been at her tent in the night. The heavy steps and the breathing were a very similar story to Chelsea’s from the night before. Thankfully, the bear moved off on its own and there were no more disturbances in the night. 

Misty met Far Left, a former thru hiker, who had also been tent camping. He told stories of the AT with the other thru hiker who had been in the shelter. It made me quite jealous to hear their stories!

We had a leisurely morning hanging out at camp but finally got things together and prepared to leave.

The trail heading north from Blackrock Hut is pretty much straight uphill.  We warmed up very quickly and stopped to shed a layer.

We soon summitted Blackrock and above the tree line we were met with high winds and thick fog that made everything damp. I am sure the view would've been amazing, if we had been able to see anything but whiteness!

We continued on our way, and the fog stuck around, making everything seem a little eerie. 

A rice krispie break can always lift my mood!

The trail continued to climb, keeping us above 3,000 feet for quite some time.  Everything was covered with climbing vines up here!

We made the choice to stop at Loft Mountain Wayside, where we dropped our packs outside and indulged in chicken sandwiches, French fries, ice cold pop, and the highly anticipated blackberry shakes, which are a must in the Shenandoahs! We had to take a very steep side trail down to the wayside and back up to the trail afterwards, but it was totally worth it.

Once back on the AT (with very full bellies) things began to get a bit rockier, and we had some foggy overlooks where we could just barely make out the world below. 

I guess all that food had made me a little giddy and one of my many masks made an appearance while we were hiking up a particularly strenuous hill.

I was running low on water, so I followed a little side trail down to a piped spring.  It was quiet and lovely as I had the whole trail to myself. There was a charming cabin near the spring, and I was a little jealous of whoever had the privilege of staying there.

It was turning out to be a perfectly wonderful fall day.  Beauty was all around us, whether we were climbing up, climbing down, or taking in the overlooks.  We even came upon this little stick man when we took a short break!

We made our way to Pinefield Hut, which would be home for the night. We had hiked nearly 15 miles but had the place to ourselves when we arrived.  We decided to once again sleep in the shelter, as our tents were still soaked and muddy.  

Once our sleep systems were laid out, we made light dinners and just sat and enjoyed the early evening.  A couple of hikers came in, but they headed up the hill to pitch their tents. It was kind of nice, though, knowing we weren't completely alone.

Unfortunately, everything was much too wet to get a fire going, so when the darkness began to outweigh the daylight, we snuggled up in our bags and told funny made-up stories.

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We got a little spooked right as complete darkness settled in and ended up arranging ourselves so that our sleeping mats and bags were literally touching. During all the shimmying around, Misty accidentally sat on her bear horn, and it gave a loud blare!

Soon, we all calmed down and got used to the noises in the forest, and one by one we drifted off to sleep. 

Total Daily Mileage: 14.98

Total Calories Burned: 3,469