Stephanie's Trail Journal

Sunday June 6th

Beginning Point: Lost Mountain Shelter
Ending Point: Wise Shelter
Daily Mileage: 17.3 Miles
Total Mileage: 492.0 miles
Weather: cool, not too sunny.

Out at 8:30 am. Trying to keep track of calories consumed during a day.

Moved slow today despite low mileage yesterday and 2 zero-mile days in town. Dan theorized that the number of zero days is negatively related to hiking performance on subsequent days (thus explaining my slow pace these last 2 days!).

We had big plans for a 20-mile day today and came up a little short. We had at least 3,000 feet of climbing though, and lots of rocks, boulders and gravel underfoot. I am not looking forward to Pennsylvania! These rocks are hard on the feet and knees and I swear they jump up and trip me. These mountains are alive, I tell you! On a daily basis I nearly twist an ankle and my trekking poles routinely are caught in rocks or tree roots, causing me to wrench my shoulder nearly out of socket. But the scenery sure is nice.

Also, I think this mountain must be leaking water from every crevice big and small; we had so many stream/springs running down the trail and crossing the trail that I stopped trying to avoid getting my boots wet and just stomped in every puddle. Throw caution to the wind! Besides, I just treated my boots with a new coat of boot-wax so they should be watertight for a while.

In the afternoon the weather improved some. We took photos at a solar composting privy at Thomas Knob Shelter, including a funny one of me pretending to be caught by surprise while seated on the throne. Just as we were leaving Thomas Knob, a deer approached us and so we were quiet and snapped some photos of her. Then we realized that this deer was accustomed to handouts and had no intention of darting off. And we thought we were special...

Later in the afternoon we came upon a rhododendron grove that was in full bloom - such a beautiful sight with all those magenta blossoms! They aren't supposed to bloom until late June.

And then the highlight of the day... Grayson Highlands has feral ponies and we saw 3 packs of them. We got some good photos of the first set. These fellas weren't very interested in us as it was dinnertime and there was lots of grass to eat. The second set was apparently bored of field greens and thought they would se what kind of goodies they might from us. These ponies are shorter than typical domestic horses; they look you in the eye. At first I thought it was cute, the way they licked my open hand. Then they figured out I didn't have any treats for them and things got a little ugly! One chewed on the gaiters I had fastened to the back of my pack while another thought my watch looked tasty while a third snuffled around the baskets on my trekking poles! Pretty soon I was running away from the ponies (one chased me) and pleading with them not to eat my things. Dan and Stephan didn't help - I think they were laughing too hard.

www.hikingat.com

Posted by steph at June 14, 2004 02:49 PM