May 28, 2024 4 min to read

AT Blog: 45 through 46

Resting and Seeing Old Friends

Day 45:

Wake up with the sun. Turns out Wildgame and a new guy (well new to me) named Righty were camped nearby. Wild game got in around 10 PM and didn’t want to disturb the shelter so he camped down the trail. Righty was camped a mile back and also came for breakfast.

We catch up some and get some more jerky Wildgame made and eventually head out. We have an easy 8.4 mile hike to Pearisberg and it’s mostly downhill. We get to see Angel’s Rest, an overlook over the entire city, which is pretty neat. After a very steep climb down we make it to the road. We call the Angels Rest Hostel and they send a shuttle to pick us up.

The hostel consists of various buildings with different purposes with 3 full bathrooms, 2 kitchens, a laundry room and then various private rooms with a main bunkhouse where we are. We are some of the first to check in for the day so we get good choices on bunks.

Once our stuff is down we go out to Dairy Queen to get a proper lunch. Taxi gets some Chilli Cheese Dogs while I get a burger and onion rings. We also of course get dessert, I have a brownie sundae and a milkshake.

We then go into the food lion to get all the stuff we need. I try my best to get enough snacks, which always seem to be running out faster than meals for me.

We take our food back to the hostel, then start cleaning up and sorting stuff out. I have to take the various food and repackage it to fit into my food bags. I have one for snacks on the outside of my bag and another for meals in my main bag. After we do everything we just chill out.

Around 4:50 PM, Waywalker, Tigger and Lobster show up. They did a 24 mile day starting before the sun to catch up with us today. After they settle in we all go to the Mexican restaurant. I meet/reaquent myself with Huge, Footprint and Hobbles who have been with the others the past several days.

After a good meal we split up to handle stuff. I went to walgreens to get some sunscreen and better allergy meds (pollen season is arriving in VA) while they go to ressupply.

Taxi and I are kinda shocked that they plan to go another 20+ miles today and let us know their plan to average 18.5 miles a day from now on to get to Harper’s Ferry in 21 days. I can’t imagine having to hike 24 miles then stay up another 7 hours just to clean up then have to wake up a few hours later to hike again.

Day 46:

Getting prepped to leave the hostel is not too much of a hassle. Use the restroom one last time stuff away your few belongings and then head out.

Despite what the others said, Taxi and I are the first ones out on the Shuttle and hit the trail around 7:30 in the morning.

The first few miles are glorified road walks. As in we are in the woods for a short time then walk on the road and back again. The highway is pretty busy but we have a sidewalk for most of it. Eventually we take stairs down and below the highway, and get back into the woods.

This is our first big climb in a few days so it takes getting used to. However, we make it to Rice Field Shelter at the top of the ridge. This 10 mile section of the AT runs along the Virginia/West Virginia border, and we can see into Peterstown. The entire time we are walking along a ridge so no huge elevation changes.

There is a small section that has ropes cutting it off to the side due to forest road construction, other than that we enjoy beautiful views the whole time. Eventually the AT turns south away from the ridge and WV and into the Pine Swamp shelter.

I’m the first one in (well technically Hobbles got their a minute before me but he is pushing on) and I get to prep food and stuff before Taxi arrives. Later Tigger and Huge arrive and a bit later Lobster, Waywalker, Tadpole and Footprint get there. There is also a few other people who show up.

The shelter has a cold small stream nearby we dip our feet in and relax. While there is no signal at the shelter I get one bar at the privy which I text my parents at.

Eventually I head to bed.