unnamed campsite to old orchard shelter

the wind continued all night. small sticks rained down on my tent, and just as i was settling in for the night a fairly sizeable one clipped the tent. i spent some time reminding myself that i had taken a good look at the trees above my tent and had evaluated them with the wind in mind, and there weren’t any spots that looked safer.

i woke early, at 05:00 when lyric came over to wake me up. our plan was to hike to rocket’s camp to see the sunrise. i packed up, skipping breakfast in order to get on trail. as we started hiking i took a few bites of cheese i had left over from lunch yesterday. the uphill soon made it impractical to eat.

we saw the beginnings of a sunrise, and then nothing as the sky was grey. we made it to rocket’s camp just as he was finishing packing his tent. he hadn’t had breakfast yet, so we found a spot out of the wind.

post breakfast the 5 of us hiked together pretty much all day. it was a tough day for me. my new xero shoes that i’ve been looking forward to getting seem too narrow. they weren’t when i wore them in the fall to make sure they fit well. in addition, the trail was particularly rocky today, which always takes it’s toll.

we decided to summit mt. rogers, the highest point in VA. it was .6 mile off trail and didn’t have a view, but it was so close, it seemed silly not to.

on the way down, where there was a view, i took a video note for my granddad who turned 103 on monday. i had hoped to send it sooner, but damascus was busy, and. views lacking.

we stopped for an extended lunch at thomas knob shelter. i’m not really sure why, lunch just took an hour and a half before we were all ready to go. despite all weather reports calling for 65f and dry, it rained for a half hour, stopping just before we hit the 500 mile mark. there was a small dance party to the “i would walk 500 miles” song before we continued on and into grayson highlands.

i’ve been looking forward to the highlands for the entire trip. it’s draw is that it’s full of wild ponies. the terrain and views were also pretty spectacular. over the next 6 miles we went through numerous gates and turnstiles, and on both sides of all of them were ponies.

there was some rolling (and those are some clean hooves):

and there was a baby:

and there was salt licking:

we eventually got to a place called the scales, a corral and took a snack break. while we ate, i saw a hiker travelling at great speed wearing a white long sleeve shirt catch up to maestro, who was just entering the corral. it was kick! he had motored all day and caught up to us! apparently the surgeon that refused to do the surgery referred him to a podiatrist due to the fact that the x-ray didn’t clearly show a thing to be taken out. unfortunately the podiatrist didn’t have an appointment until july, so kick just got back on trail and planned another 30 mile day to catch us.

the last 4 miles were spent traversing yet more gates and turnstiles and seeing even more ponies. i don’t actually get what the fences and gates are doing since there are wild ponies on both sides of all of them.

we reached camp pretty late, around 18:30. thankfully there were tons of tent sites, you just had to keep an eye out for horse poop. we set up, had dinner, and pretty much went straight to bed.

some additional photos from today, including many of ponies for hackett. :)