Day 50 - Wednesday, April 14, 2021

Day 50 - Now that’s a milestone in itself 🥳 - who would have thought? A year and a half ago I was saying to Jim...”are you crazy 🤪”? Not to mention, we have over 500 trail miles under our belts. But we still have a long way to go. I won’t start getting too excited until we’re pushing 1800+ trail miles. Staying optimistic 🤞🏻 and looking forward to some unforgettable memories and lifetime experiences!

We can expect cooler temperatures the next few days with daytime highes in the low 60’s and nighttime dropping into the upper 30’s 🥶. Think we might pass on any camping that was planned 😬. Ahhh... the beauty of slack packing 😉 😂.

Today we are hiking from Laurel Creek, VA 615 (584.9 NoBo) to Walker Gap (571.2 NoBo) for a total of 13.7 miles. The next couple days we will be hiking at elevations over 4000 ft. That means two things - longer ascents and descents 😦🥵.

We began hiking at 7:30 am. The temperature was 38° with partly cloudy skies. Forecast calls for intermittent showers today so we will see how that plays out 🥴. The infamous “Sunny” did say “There will be days when you’re gonna get wet....”. Darn you Sunny!




Sunrise in the Virginia Mountains 🏔.






Sections of the trail was “ridge running” again today so that means rock scrambles and uneven footing 😬. 




This  is “Mission Dee” section hiking through Virginia. Her husband drops her off then picks her up. Her “mission” is to spread the good word. She gave us a trail blessing before we parted ways. I’ll take everything I can to make it to Springer & Katahdin 😉🙏🏻.






The Jenkins Shelter. We stopped here for lunch. Then the “Godfather” showed up. 


The “Godfather” is from Fort Lauderdale. Funny thing, the “Godfather” isn’t even Italian 😂. He got the nickname from work 😏. He actually lived in Utica working at Griffiss AFB before it closed. He began his thru-hike February 24th from Springer Mountain. The way we have scheduled our flip-flop we may see many of the same people we have met down here when we go north in June. 



The rhododendrons are beginning to flower. Hopefully they will be in blossom before we leave for our next break. 



This tree literally “imploded” when it fell down. The  ice must’ve put some unbelievable stress on it. 

We finished hiking at 3:20 pm under cloudy skies and the temperature temperature was 70°. It never rained and it got much warmer than expected. The weatherman was 0-2 for today. Guess we’ll just have to wait to see what the weather has in store for us tomorrow 🥴? 


Till next time... Happy Hiking  🥾 

😋



Comments

  1. ErinApril 14, 2021 at 8:59 PM

    Tomorrow here in New York it’s going be cold Friday snow!!! You guys are doing a amazing job!!! Keep the it going!!

    ReplyDelete

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