Hiked 5.2 miles, staying at Grace Hiker hostel.
It rained a lot last night, at least so I heard, I slept through the entire thing. It looked like rain for most of the morning while we hiked to Waynesboro but we never got any. It was a short hike into town. With only five miles to hike today we arrived at Rockfish Gap before 9 am, so no trail picture today. For a primarily downhill hike today according to the elevation profile it sure seemed like there was a lot of up. Overall it was a quick and easy hike. We saw a ton of orange salamanders on the trail today. They were tiny, no bigger than my thumb.
 |
| How did someone build a cabin on this cliff face? |
 |
| Srocket found a salamander |
 |
| And your new National Geographic photo taken by B-Line! |
When we got to Rockfish Gap we were sitting there for about 30 seconds trying to figure out which way we needed to hitch when a car pulled up and asked if we were headed to town. Stanimal, a previous thru hiker, runs a hostel in town. Even though we weren't planning to stay at his hostel, he still shuttled us into town and showed us around. My phone died unfortunately two days ago on the trail, the physical buttons stopped working, so I had to get a ride all the way to the other side of town to get a new one. I was hoping my four year old phone would last until the end of the hike so I could replace it afterwards, but it was not to be. Anyway, Stanimal very kindly gave me a ride all the way over there.
 |
| Me with Santa's Helper |
The town of Waynesboro is very spread out, but it is so hiker friendly that it is incredibly easy to get around. I had to hitch 3 times today to get to various places and I only stuck my thumb out once, and only then for about 30 seconds before someone offered me a ride. After spending a bunch of money at Verizon I did the usual errands like laundromat, resupply, library, etc... I grabbed breakfast at Weazies, a great diner with delicious food. We couldn't get into the hostel until 5, so after continuing with the usual errands we all met back up at Ming Garden for some all you can eat chinese food. As chinese buffets go, it was actually pretty decent and since we got there before 3:30, it was only $7. I also replaced my hiking shirt at the outfitters. Shirts definitely don't last nearly as long when you wear them every day for two months.
 |
| The sleeping area is starting to fill up |
 |
| The hiker lounge with Why Not and our hosts Woody and Irma |
The hostel is pretty cool. It is hosted in the basement of Grace Lutheran Church. No money from the church goes to support the hostel though. It is entirely paid for by the donations of hikers that stay here. It just goes to show that most hikers are totally willing to chip in to keep a great place running. The hostel provides cots and a great lounge area for the hikers. A really nice gentleman named "Santa's Helper" who thru hiked a few years ago will drive you around anywhere you need to go.
We spent time tonight just chilling with the other hikers, though we did takes some time off from that to go pick up a pint of Ben&Jerry's each and get our 1000 calorie desert. Staying with us are DB Cooper, Two Socks, Toast, Rusty Ramps, Lady, Homebrew and Monk. It was great to see the last three again, we haven't seen them for a while and we all had a bunch to catch up on and we finally got to personally thank Lady for the trail magic she gave us the other day.
Elliot we have have been following your Blog and we would like to send you a care package... please update us with an address we could send it to.
ReplyDeleteI sent an email to Kristen (not sure who posted this), we should be in Harper's Ferry in about a week. If that is too close of a time frame I can give you another address further up the trail. Thanks a bunch in advance, we can't wait!
Delete