Day 3

Rockfish Gap to Calf Mountain Shelter 7.9 miles

We awoke to find that you need exactly five pounds of ice to keep 1/2 pound bologna, 1/2 tomato, and cheese spread cold for the evening. In the overnight, a new couple had pitched a tent close to ours. We went over to have breakfast with them. Their collective trail name was French Blah Blah Blah. "Well, we talk a lot. And we are French. So...yeah." They were actually really nice, but they made me feel bad. They were being typically French. They had brick oven fired multi-grain bread, Nutella, sprouts, and other healthy things. We had fake cheese and bologna... C'est la vie. Anyway, Dorian, as the guy was called just happened to have a list of all the shuttle people in the Waynesboro area. I gave one a call. Roy said he would meet us in 20 minutes. That was easy!

I sat on the curb and watched cars pass by. It seems that you can tell the hikers from the non-hikers even by the vehicles that they drive. Hmm. Old Ford Ranger. That's not a hiker. Chevy Suburban. Nope. Not a hiker. Dodge Caravan. Not a hiker. I see a Subaru wagon a mile down the road. That's Roy! It sure was. Roy gave us a ride directly to the trail and then drove away to continue on with his day. What a great service!

We walked up the hill to find an older gentleman walking down. We learned that he had started the trail at Amicalola Springs in Georgia and was headed to Harper's Ferry. For the next several days, we had the same schedule of shelters, so we imagined that we would get to know him a little better. We were both looking for the self-registration kiosk where we were to get our backcountry camping permits as required by the Department of the Interior. The permit wanted to know the following.
Name:
Address:
Emergency Contact Information:
Anticipated Shelters and nights spent at each:
Primary method of Travel: (On the hiking only trail)
Number of stock or pack animals:
Number of Watercraft:
If only I knew beforehand that I could have brought my donkey and speedboat...

In the middle of the day, we descended a steep slope and had a rest at the side of Skyline Drive. Mostly every car that passed waved at us. It was nice to be famous. As we were sitting there playing with slugs, there was quite a commotion on the trail behind us. A group of about 10 guys wearing kilts came down the hill, apologized three times each for disturbing us and then continued on their way. We assumed this meant that there would be no room in the shelter when we got to it.

We got over the top of Calf Mountain and arrived at the shelter which was 0.3mi off the trail. There were two men and a dog, plus all the kilted men who turned out to be Eagle Scouts (of course). We made our tent and felt safe, actually, that there were so many people around. Dinner was eaten and morning followed. The fourth day.