I slept in until 5:45 since I knew I didn’t have a super long day ahead. There was lots of condensation on the tent walls in the morning, what with the humidity in the air outside plus my wet gear. Luckily I would have a place to dry stuff out later. I packed everything up, ate breakfast standing up, and was on my way. The ground was wet and my wet socks and shoes weren’t that warm but I was still in shorts and a t-shirt from the start.
The walking was easy but not terribly interesting. Much of the day was in the “long green tunnel” of rhododendron trees, where you see only the arch of tree bows over your head and the ground of rocks and leaf litter. The long green tunnel is something thru hikers speak of with dread mainly because it is so monotonous. As someone who spends a lot of my time looking down not just to see where to place my next step but what interesting plants might appear, rhododendron groves don’t offer much other than younger rhododendrons, the odd tuft of wintergreen, or maybe some azaleas.
I stopped every hour for a granola bar since I knew I’d be at the hostel before 2pm and could afford to eat 4 in the morning, but I was still starving by the time I sat down to lunch.
Newman from a week ago (coming off the Damascus detour) passed me saying “Man, you are fast” (not sure why, since he was shooting past me), other than him I saw no northbound hikers. I passed one section hiker going south.
Woods Hole Hostel is down a gravel road from the trail. It has quite a few buildings. I’m upstairs in the bunkhouse, a log cabin built about 50 years ago I think. Alaska and Veto are downstairs (I was discouraged from sleeping downstairs because those bunks are short), and Kim amd Johnny Walker, both of whom I had met previously, are in private rooms in the main building. A few others including Centipede are tenting. Other buildings include a wash house (where I will be headed several times overnight), and a shed with resupply options (not everything I need so I’ll just resupply in town).
I started my laundry, hung out my gear to dry on a clothesline, and took a much appreciated shower. They had a set of clippers so I trimmed my beard, but resisted the urge to trim my hair. I spent much of the afternoon trying to plan the next few days given constraints like weather (rain Tuesday and Wednesday), resupply options, distance between shelters, hostel locations, a 25 mile range where you can only camp at official shelters and campsites, and how far ahead I want to be by Friday. I settled on a plan that would get me 105 miles ahead to the town of Daleville. Alaska and Veto, who met on trail and have been trying to up their miles, have roughly the same goal, but stopping tomorrow at a hostel in the next town (Pearisburg) so their stops are all skewed qp miles from mine. But perhaps we’ll meet up on trail later and our plans will align.
Before dinner, the hostess, Neville, gave a little introduction to the hostel, which was started by her grandparents in the 1970s almost by accident (they noticed hikers coming off the trail and asking to use their phone to find a place to stay and do laundry and thought, why don’twe offer that) and which she took over. They grow their own lettuce in cold frames, and theg served a delicious dinner of pasta with an artichoke marinara, leftover chili, fresh bread, and lots of kettuce. I had three helpings of everything.
After dinner, I borrowed a guitar from Neville and tried to work through a few of the classical pieces I used to play. I couldn’t finish any of them but it was fun to feel the dinger memories returning, and it seems like I could get back into shape pretty quickly with some practice. Something to ponder as a bew (ir renewed) hobbt for when I get home.
Later Kim, Alaska, Veto and I chatted about our plans and about people we had met on trail. The more people I talk to the more the same names start to pop up. They knew Bewman and Flash, and Alaska and Veto remembered Forge (Connor from Day 1). At 8pm everyone was ready to call it a night. It’s quite cool tonight. The pellet stove is on downstairs. I’m not looking forward to my several trips to tge washroom, which will imvolve climbing down a ladder, walking through a dark room, pushing a door open, pulling a second door open, walking through gravel in the dark, sliding a third door open, doing my thing, then reversing that whole process, and trying to rememberbwhich door opens how both goung out and coming back…
In any case it was delightful to spend the afternoon and evening among fellow hikers, and eating such delicious wholesome food (all vegetarian).
