Tonight I shall have two dinners

31, 56, 42, hut, hut, hike! These numbers, which sound like a football play, represent the change in temperature I experienced in my first hour and 45 minutes of hiking today.

As you might imagine, it was cold this morning. That made things a tad bit more difficult to do.

I was once again on trail at 7:00AM, knowing it was going to be a long and hard day. I like to cover as many miles as I can before the noon day sun kicks in, which is when my body becomes sluggish and fatigued.

At Virginia route 615, five miles into my hike, I stumbled upon trail magic. Unfortunately, some hikers before me had raided it, leaving me a cooler full of ice. It was a serious blow to my morale.

I spent most of today walking along a ridge. There was nothiong special about this ridge, very few views.

After the trail crosses I-77, it is poorly marked. It took Cookie and I a solid ten minutes to determine which way we were supposed to go. Someone, specifically the person responsbile for that section of trail, needs to go through there and re-blaze that section of trail.

The trail then hopped back on the rdige, where it remained for the rest of the day.

This was a very dry section of trail. I ran out of water seven miles south of the shelter. This made me a very miserable person for the remainder of the day. Cookie offered me ten ounces of water about two miles south of the shelter, which made a huge difference for me.

Once again Sprint has proven why it is the worst cell phone company created by man. Under normal circumstances, I can talk to my dad without being charged minutes because we are both on the Sprint network. Apparently, though, this only applies when I am in my "home network". When I leave this network, the free network to network calls don't apply anymore. It seems I will be switching providers within the next week, gosh darn shame.

Tonight I shall have two dinners. I am feeling lazy right now. Actually, I am exausted.

Good night, and good luck.

Kirby

Ga>ME 2008.