Ultralight Microwave

We are back on trail... yeehawww! While our awkwardly timed break from hiking was  necessary, I do admit I was getting a little agitated upon our final day off. I think this was a combination of constant travel, little rest, and last minute errands, that made for a very grumpy Gavin leaving Philadelphia. But upon boarding the 6:30 MARC train to Harpers Ferry all of this agitation immediately turned into excitement once again.

"That sandwich was good but not 12 miles worth of good"

This may have been the “honeymoon effect” at work, but our first few days back could not have went better. I will give you all some of the highlights and try not to ramble. Harpers Ferry this time of the year is a ghost town. We woke up late at the towns inn. We were extremely excited about this, since this particular hostel had been featured on Gordon Ramsey’s Hotel Hell. It is just as quirky as portrayed on TV. After a few laps of the town we realized there was only one coffee shop open, selling an extremely satisfying breakfast sandwich. We gobbled it down and made our way to the Appalachian Trail Conservancy (ATC). We took our photo at the headquarters and had it inducted into the 2018 AT yearbook. We are the 7th and 8th people to attempt a flip-flop thru hike this year! Our hike had officially been documented and we had finally been released to the trail.

Yearbook photos for the ATC

Our first 3 nights were amazing primarily because of the locations we ended up sleeping. Night one we lucked out when we decided to hike an extra few miles to the Blackburn Trail Center. Here we scored exclusive access to the hiker cabin which came furnished with a wood stove oven and pre-chopped wood.

It was a cozy night indeed, and the decision to hike more miles felt like a wise one. The next day we stepped into familiar territory as we hiked through the 13 mile section known as “the rollercoaster” for its numerous pointless ascents and descents. It felt as if we made short work of this “scary” part of the trail, and we got to camp at an old favorite camp spot Buzzards Hill.  Day 3, while we did not hit our ambitious mileage for the day we did just generally have a great time. Once we realized we were moving slowly (maybe "the rollercoaster" had its way with us after all...) we embraced a relaxed and carefree way of hiking. A gem from this day was our new song “everybody was ridge line walking” set to the tune of “kung fu fighting”, with plenty of inappropriate ad lib verses thrown in. At the end of this day we unexpectedly ended up at a beautiful brand new shelter! We were the fourth people to use it this year. And again, had it all to ourselves.

Now I know that there will be, and has been tougher days on the trail than these but they did make me feel as if we had made some right choices in life at the time. The passing of my grandfather was always looming over our choice to go off the grid for 6 months and was always going to pull me away from the trail whenever it happened. However I am glad that I was able to honor him at his funeral and am thankful for how his death has forced us to approach this journey with new eyes. These 3 days would not have been so special if we were fighting with dozens of other hikers to enjoy these places, which is exactly what we would have been doing had we not reshuffled our schedule and decided to flip-flop. A blessing in disguise, I am very grateful.

And now a couple of notes about off-brand Nutella. I definitely went too hard on the portion sizes of this product in the first few days back on trail and to be frank... this stuff just blows right threw me. It has provided me with far too much on-trail potty training in the last week. Secondly it completely freezes when it is cold out, so unless you have an ultra light microwave handy at all times it is unspreadable. We will not be relying on this product nearly as much as I anticipated in the future.

Common trail marker in the SNP

We are now headed through the Shenandoahs. The trail is well maintained and easy to walk on. The sites on top of the mountains are breathtaking. A definite highlight was being on top of Mount Marshall in the middle of a light sleet storm. There was not much to be seen from this peak, but the trail was illuminated by the sleet sticking to the ground and it just felt really cool to be smack bang in the middle of an icy cloud. Also... we saw a bear! We were rounding a corner of the trail near Hogback overlook around 5 pm when all of a sudden I see a medium sized black bear get up abruptly and clumsily run away. We must have scared the bejeesus outta him/her. I am so glad that this happened on our first day in the park(an active black bear habitat), because it immediately erased my paranoia of running into these creatures. It has actually made me look forward to seeing them... as long as it is not right next to my tent. That brings us up to date. After a “nero”(near zero miles), a big burger in town, warm night in a bed, restocking, and some quick research on black bear behavior (our paranoia is not quite vanished) we are headed back to the rain and snow until our next little return to society. Catch you all on the flip side! Or the flop side?

Better photos of breathtaking views to come... as soon as our phone batteries stop freezing.