Day 14 on the Trail

It's hard to believe Dave has been on the trail for two weeks.  Here are his comments from yesterday, his 14th day of hiking.

As of 6/2511:
Miles today - 12
Miles to date - 156.4

First I have to correct something.  I said the motel where Dave plans to stay was 30 miles away.  Actually, it was 42 miles away from where he was on Friday, and 30 miles from his Saturday campsite.  I looked at the wrong row on the schedule spreadsheet he left me.

Dave said he had another hard climb on rocks (and we thought he was through with the rocky section!) and is TIRED.  As he gets closer to the motel, he gets even more eager to find it.  He's thinking he will take a "Zero Day" which means 0 miles of hiking and spend two nights at the Bear Mountain Bridge Motel.  It sure sounds as though he needs a day off!

At least he had a sunny day with no rain.  His boots are still wet, though.  In an attempt to keep his feet dry, he hung his wet socks on his backpack so they would dry as he walked.  As soon as they were dry, he switched with the wet socks he was wearing, and hung the alternate pair on his pack until they dried. He went through this routine a few times and said it worked fairly well.  He really needs his boots to dry out, though.  Not all the shelters have a fire pit, and with the rain and wet trails, it will take a while for them to dry.

He caught up with two of his trail friends, Arthur Dent (taking the name of a fictional character I had not heard of and had to google) and his female companion Raindancer, whom he met on the trail.  Hmm I wonder if she is bringing the rain?  Raindancer is going to graduate school in the fall and has a goal of finishing the trail by mid-August.  They intend to set a fast pace.  Dave enjoys their company but does not know if he will be able to keep up with them. He plans to finish by Sept. 12.

The three of them took a little side trip to get ice cream.  First Dave had a root beer float, then he had rum raisin ice cream.  What a treat!

I had a really fun visit with Megan - we shopped and ate out and talked - until she left Saturday afternoon, and I decided it was a good time to cut the grass in spite of the 95º heat.  I had forgotten to plug in the mower after last week's mowing, so it ran out of juice before I could cut the back.  Oh darn.  Instead, I picked up debris from our very short but fierce Thursday night storm.  Do you know how many pinecones it takes to fill up a trash barrel?  A lot.  That's how many I picked up. The other barrel I filled with broken branches.  Hmm compared to what Dave is doing, this is a walk in the park!