Rain rain and more rain

Rest days are great however, when you leave town you end up in a hiker bubble (high concentration on hikers). Leaving Damascus was no different. The first night out there were nine hikers, in addition to our group of seven, who stayed at the same campsite. To help us get away from the bubble our group pushed on and completed twenty miles. It was an interesting day as the trail took us through Grayson highland park. The park is home to a large number of wild horses and we were actually fortunate enough to get close enough to pet them! I offered ten dollars to anyone who would ride one but sadly no one took me up on my offer. Nova did however take the prize, sighting eight horses! The day ended with more trail magic consisting of hotdogs and pop...yum!

Trail magic always seems to stop us in our tracks so we (sleeping beauty, nova, puddin, patty cakes, night rider, spanky, and etch-a-sletch) decided to pitch our tents there for the night. That night the wind gusted and the rain fell. Unfortunately, night rider and sleeping beauty both had rain get into their tarp tents and soaked all of their stuff. As a result, they both high tailed it to the next road so that they could hitchhike into town and dry off. I waited a couple of hours to see if the rain would die off (which it never did) and then worked up the courage to brave the elements.
I managed to put in twenty miles that day and was happy to see nova, puddin and patty cakes come up the trail and join me for the night.

I left the group to head into Marion, VA to make some phone calls and pick up a package. To my surprise, and the groups, I was able to catch back up that day putting in another 14miles after 2:30. The terrain in VA is a little more flat and we often find ourselves hiking through farmers fields (with cows in the field). It's a welcome change in scenery.

For the past four days we've had rain every day! Yesterday I arrived in Pearisburg after hiking, sometimes calf deep, through mud, overflowing streams and low lying branches. It was definitely type two fun. Sadly, I am regretting my decision to forgo rain pants. I fully expected the temperatures to be much warmer by now and with all this rain I am officially freezing my butt off. Hopefully, the sun will come out and the rain will disappear....right...the forecast for the next two days is...RAIN! :-)

Well...I am back on the trail this morning. I hope everyone is doing well back home.

Total mileage: 630
Total days: 42

Ps - the picture is what your feet will look like after 550miles. Enjoy! :-)