Backpacking the AT - Day 9

 Saturday, October 19, 2024

It was a quiet night at camp last night, (almost too quiet) and we were up with the first sign of daylight. Today's breakfast of choice was coffee and a mini pecan pie.  So good!

We only had 12.5 miles to go today, but we were ready to head out a little after 8:00am. We had really enjoyed this shelter and surrounding area-I'd say it was the nicest one we have stayed at so far on the AT.

I would just like to note again that this was such a nice privy on trail! Check it out!  (Yes, that's a doorbell!)

Once again, we were following those white blazes and immediately the trail began to climb. And climb. Oh, and there were rocks for added fun. Thanks to all the uphill hiking, we stopped early to shed many layers of clothing. 

After just a couple of miles, we reached Chimney Rock. We decided to drop our packs and go check it out. 

This was our best overlook of the trip! You could see for miles, the sun was warm, and the fall colors were amazing. 

We made our way back to the trail and hiked along amid a little patch of pine trees, which reminded me of Michigan. 

And then we were back to the rocks. So many rocks. Rocks uphill, and rocks downhill.

We started talking about food. Pizza.  Mexican food.  Juicy burgers.  And showering!  We hadn't had showers since Sunday, and this was Saturday!  Our little tent baths every evening were okay, but man, would it be amazing to have a proper shower!  And clean clothes!  I think my pants were so dirty that they were close to standing up on their own.  Yuck!   And that led to us changing our plans entirely. We decided to end our trip at Caledonia State Park, rather than hiking two additional miles past that to the next shelter and then backtracking to the park and shuttling out in the morning. We contacted our shuttle driver to see if he was available, and he was! We planned to meet him in just two hours. We had four miles to go and no time to waste. 

We hiked on, over the rocks and through the fall colors.  All we could think about now was showers and food. 

We reached the state park right on schedule and made our way to the main parking area.  Just like that our Appalachian Trail adventure was over.  In nine days, we had hiked through four states, covered 114 official trail miles, and climbed 24,045 feet.  We felt strong, we felt accomplished, we felt badass.

Our driver, Mark, arrived just after us. We piled into his car and headed back to Front Royal to pick up Kara’s car. Somehow, I was selected to ride in the front seat with Mark.  Mark was quite the character and talked my ear off all the way back. We had in-depth conversations about competitive board games, as well as the history of Star Trek.  Let's not forget when we took a musical break where he cranked up the music so we could all listen to his favorite song (that was about ten minutes long.)  He was a great guy, though, and very knowledgeable about the trail, and we would definitely use and recommend him again! 

Once back in Front Royal, Kara discovered she had a semi-flat tire due to a nail. It was after 4:00pm on a Saturday, but she was able to find a little shop who fixed it up quickly. Thank you to Ron's Tires in Front Royal!

Misty, Kara and I hit the road and found a hotel a couple hours away. We needed Mexican food badly, but didn't have time to shower before the restaurant would close, so we went in all of our filth to dinner and then headed to the hotel for showers. And if you're wondering, yes, they were the best showers ever.  

Daily miles: 10.22

Time on trail: 5:26:46

Elevation gain: 1729 feet

This brings our trip to an end.  Will there be another trip?  Yes!  We plan to do a couple long sections per year, and slowly make our way up and down the entire Appalachian Trail!  Stay tuned for our next LASH!  (LASH = Long Ass Section Hike)

Backpacking the AT - Day 8

 Friday, October 18, 2024

Raven Rock Shelter to Tumbling Run Shelter

Northbound miles 1062.7 to 1075.9

I started my day with a mini apple pie (thanks to our trip to town the day before) and some coffee. With only 13 miles to hike the day, we weren’t in a hurry to leave. We had gotten in the habit of rising with the sun and going about our morning tasks.  I think we are getting good at this backpacking thing!

Eventually, we packed the rest of our belongings away and hit the trail. Our first destination was High Rock Ledges. Unlike most high points we’ve visited, this one was also accessible by car. And where there are cars, there are people. And seemingly, where there are people, there is trash. There was litter everywhere! Not cool. Not to mention, the entire rock area was covered in spray paint. What a shame!  The view, though, was pretty great!

The next three miles were mostly downhill and they. were. rocky. If there was a theme for this trip, it would be ROCKY. It was a slow go. 

We arrived at Pen Mar Park mid-morning. After searching for any kind of power source to re-charge our dying phones and watches, we discovered that the bathrooms had outlets, so we decided to take some time to charge our electronics. We sat in the warm sun and ate some snacks while we waited. This was a nice little park, filled with locals as well as hikers.  

By noon we were ready to take off again. We had a little over eight miles to go to reach our shelter. 

Right away we came to the Mason Dixon Line and the Maryland/Pennsylvania border. 

Oh, and then there were more rocks!

Finally, the trail evened out a bit and we kicked it into high gear. The days had warmed considerably, and we had shed many layers. It was such a beautiful day!

As we entered Old Forge Park, we crossed three bridges, the last of which was questionable. We crossed that bridge one at a time!

And then we came to a little building whose only purpose was to offer us fresh, potable water. Yes! We were so appreciative of these water sources along our way.  We filled our bottles and continued on. 

We arrived at Tumbling Run Shelters before 4:30pm and took our time getting settled. This was by far the nicest shelter area we have seen. Aside from the main shelter area, there were several options for tent camping.  There was even an outhouse with a doorbell, toilet paper, and hand sanitizer!  We opted to set up camp in the group camping area, where there were many flat tent pads surrounding a fire pit with benches. It was perfect. 

We got our fire going and set about making dinner. We had arrived to camp a bit earlier than in days prior and it was nice to be able to relax and not have to rush to beat the sunset.  A couple camp caretakers stopped in to welcome us and give us a head’s up on water availability going north (which was very slim), as well as the opening of muzzleloader season and youth hunt the following day. We would wear our brightest colors!  They were happy to see that we all had bear canisters, but not for bears.  Apparently, there was a pesky raccoon in the area who was a professional climber and had gotten into a few food bags that had been hung on the bear pole.

We hung out at the fire, enjoying the day, and watched the blue sky above us fade. 

Daily miles: 13.19

Time on trail: 6:07:12

Elevation gain 2018 feet

Backpacking the AT - Day 7

 Thursday, October 17, 2024

Pine Knob Shelter to Raven Rock Shelter

Northbound miles 1049.6 to 1062.7

I am happy to report that Kara slept much better and warmer sharing a tent with Misty. We had planned to be on trail at first light, but somehow overslept that plan. I blame the cozy sleeping bag I was tucked into. 

We ended up getting on trail a little after 8am, still with vague plans of making it 18 miles to the Pennsylvania border-we would see how they day unfolded. The hike away from the night’s shelter was a steep one, leading to Annapolis Rocks. 

We planned to refill our almost empty water bottles when we arrived at Annapolis Rocks, but after taking in the spectacular view, we had a little trouble finding the spring. We ended up wasting a lot of time there, walking around looking for the spring, but finally found our water source. Getting water here was a necessity as the next usable water source was many miles away and we were all running on empty.  

After a couple of extremely rocky miles of trail, we made the decision to abandon our earlier plan of 18 miles, and instead hike about 14 miles with a stop in the middle. When I say extremely rocky, I mean extremely rocky.  Also, my watch died during this time, and I had no power left in my bank to charge it.  Womp, womp.  I'd have to rely on Misty's watch!

Smithsburg, Maryland was just 1.6 miles off trail, and we decided pizza and a small food resupply would do us good.  At the trailhead, Kara made a couple of calls to people mentioned on the FarOut app as possible shuttle drivers in the area. Luckily, her second call reached a woman named Linda, who said she’d take us to town for $25 and could be there in 15 minutes. SOLD. I cannot even tell you how excited we were for this little excursion!

Linda was right on time and soon we were piled into her car and on the way to town. She took us to a little strip mall with a grocery store and a Domino’s Pizza. We thanked her, expecting her to drop us and go, but she said she’d wait for us while we ran our errands and then take us back to the trail. We were ecstatic. We ran to Domino’s, ordered a pizza each, plugged in our electronics to charge them a bit, then headed to the grocery store. We had about ten minutes to navigate the store and grab what we needed. We all felt like we were on a television supermarket game show! 

Soon we were back in Linda’s car with bags of groceries and hot pizzas on our laps. We were three very happy hikers. 

We thanked Linda profusely, along with professing our love for her, when she dropped us back off at the trailhead.  Now we just had to figure out how all of this new food was going to fit into our packs!

We ended up cramming food into our bear canisters and every available pocket, eating half a pizza each, and then combining the rest into one box and strapping it to my pack. Just call me Sherpa Amie. 

With our bellies stuffed and our packs very full and heavy, we continued on. We had four miles to our shelter for the night. 

Almost immediately the trail opened up into a green, grassy field and we all started singing The Sound of Music. It was soooo nice to be off of the rocky trail for a bit!  I stumbled upon a pair of glasses someone had lost and I am pretty sure the rule is, if you find glasses you must wear them. We were having so much fun!

The magical field of green was short lived, though, and all too soon we were navigating a rocky trail. 

Up, up we went and then a steeeeep downhill. At the bottom was our next water stop, where we’d get what we needed for the night from a good flowing stream. Although rocky, the forest was beautiful here and I was enjoying myself. 

Throughout our hike we had come across many of these bugs on the trees.  We found out they are called Spotted Lantern Flies, and they are invasive.  Those little critters were everywhere!

When our bottles were filled, we crossed a road and then it was time to climb. We had 1.8 miles to camp and it was nearly all uphill. And when I say uphill, I mean UPhill. So many rocks along with huge step-ups filled the trail. We stopped twice to rest and remove layers of clothing. On and on we went, and I kept telling myself the end would be here soon. 

Finally, the trail evened out a bit and we started looking for the turnoff for the shelter. And there it was!

Raven Rock Shelter is one of the newer shelters on the AT and was very cute, tucked away in the woods. 

Two men were having dinner at the table there, so we waved and moved on a bit further. There were several tent pads scattered about, and we chose a spot with room for all of us, next to a fire pit with benches. Benches! We wouldn’t have to eat dinner sitting atop our bear canisters tonight! There was also a somewhat creepy doll with no head near our tent site, but I told the girls it was our good luck charm and would keep the bears away.  They went with it.

We threw up our tents, climbed inside to get organized and clean ourselves up, and then we set about making a fire. When we had a good blaze going, we dove for our pizza, devouring the rest of it, and happy we didn’t have to cook dinner this night. Misty, as you can tell, was having a grand old time!

We sat at the fire til dark, telling stories and planning for the next day. 

Soon it was time to stash our bear canisters and climb into our tents. Another cold night was ahead of us!

Daily miles: 14.69

Time on trail: 7:33:10

Elevation gain 2805 feet