#17 Waynesboro to Luray

6/12: We had a rushed morning because, per usual when we stay in a hostel or motel, we spread our stuff everywhere to dry/air out and don’t put it back in our packs until the morning we have to leave. Anyway, we were running around trying to make sure we didn’t leave anything, but we still made the shuttle back to the trail at 7am. We were finally in the Shenandoahs! To be honest, it felt just like any other mountain range. It was a great day for hiking though! Partly sunny with a high around 72 :) We hiked up and down a bunch of gradual slopes. The only problem was that if we wanted to camp by water, we would either have to do an 8 mile day or a 20 mile day. By the time we hit 8 miles to take a snack break and fill up on water, we were feeling pretty good, so we decided to do our first non-slackpack 20 mile day. On our way, we saw 2 deer, and that was really cool. There was also a pretty overlook that we stopped at.

We ended up at the shelter in under 10 hours, including breaks! So even though our feet hurt, we made great time. Survivor had some soupy Mac and cheese for dinner and Hawk had a rice side with a buffalo tuna packet. We stretched (a little) and went to bed as soon as we could, because man, we were pooped!

6/13: We slept in because we only had 13 miles to hike, so instead of getting out of camp at 7, we left at 9. We were hiking pretty quick though, and at one point we checked the map and saw that we had gone 5 miles in less than 2 hours. The terrain was even and pretty flat so we could go a lot faster. We saw a really pretty overlook and kept hiking. One of the reasons that the Shenandoahs are so cool is because there are camp stores and restaurants right off the trail. We hit the camp store around 12 or so and grabbed sandwiches, chocolate milk, Cheetos, and ice cream for lunch.

We hung out with Sunshine and Otter for a couple of hours, enjoying the nice weather and the views of the mountains. Then we started hiking again and we came up on a view where we saw storm clouds heading our way. We started walking quicker. We got hit with rain and heard some thunder, but the rain came to a stop soon after. As we were walking on a ridge with a view of the clouds, Hawk saw a lightning strike, and we noped our way down the mountain as fast as we could. We flew down the hill with adrenaline rushing through us. We finally made it to the shelter, not feeling any rain, and it actually didn’t storm for the rest of the afternoon/evening, so the storm missed us. Hawk made ramen, drained the soup, and put on 11 packets of mustard and some parmesan cheese. Everyone around us had many, many comments about the mustard noodles. It tasted good though, so who cares! Anyway, we planned a long day tomorrow so we went to bed early (per usual) and listened to the wind outside of the shelter.

6/14: It was super windy through the night and a stick fell and made a hole in Otter’s tent! Luckily he was fine, and we were in the shelter, so we were fine too, but it howled all night. It was still chilly in the morning, but we hustled out of our sleeping quilts since we had a big day ahead. We were out of camp by 6:45 and started hiking quick to warm up. It was about 10 miles into our day when we came across some trail magic at a gap! The guy there had chili, tons of snacks, carrots and celery with hummus, Gatorade, chocolate milk, and plenty of water for us to fill up with. It was so awesome! We sat in lawn chairs and ate to our hearts content, and then packed out a few snacks for the road. We then had a long hill to climb, but we were energized from the food, so we cruised up the mountain. We saw a deer part way through, and it looked at us, decided we weren’t that interesting, and went back to grazing. It was a beautiful day out! The weather was nice and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky.

We finally made it to our destination which was the shelter 20.6 miles away. It was another big day, and we felt really proud of ourselves. For dinner we ate dehydrated meals- an orange pineapple chicken rice dish, and a chicken curry dish that Hawk’s mom sent us. Thanks mom! There were 3 sisters all in their 60s who were hiking the Shenandoahs named Maps, Flap, and Spork who were all lovely to talk to before going to sleep with the sound of Bard Owls in the distance.

6/15: We got a little bit of a later start because we only planned on doing 12 miles. It was a little chilly starting off, but the sun warmed us up as we hiked. We took a 20 minute snack break at a parking lot and then hiked 1.6 more miles to a camp store where we grabbed some food for the next day and a half. We met Sunshine there, and we all walked another mile to lunch together. When we got to the lodge for lunch, we found ourselves underdressed and much worse smelling than everyone else. The hostess put us in a table away from other patrons and I don’t blame her. The menu had the calories listed for each item and folks, one of the salads had the second highest amount of calories on the menu. Hawk got the salad. We also got dessert on top of that, and we ate a lot of blackberry ice cream (a specialty in the Shenandoahs) and it was delicious.

Then we slowly made our way out of the restaurant. We had some hills to climb on the way to the shelter, which was only 4 miles away from the restaurant, and they probably wouldn’t have been a problem, except that we were very full. We were so sluggish going up those hills. It was a painful 4 miles full of breaks to shake our fists in the air and curse at the wind. Will we ever learn not to stuff ourselves before hiking? Probably not. Anyway, we finally made it, and when we got to the shelter, we saw Zen Dragon and Zorra- two of our friends who we hadn’t seen in a while! We caught up with them and chatted for a while in camp. Eventually we ate dinner. Survivor packed out a turkey sandwich and Hawk ate a ramen bomb. As we were about to climb in the shelter for the night, we saw a bear up the hill in the distance sniffing around the perimeter of the campsites. Zen Dragon was super excited because she’s never seen a bear before, and hopefully she can use her martial arts skills if it comes near the shelter tonight. On that note, time for bed! Goodnight bear!

No bears attacked us or our food during the night, but we did see one this morning! No pictures were taken because we were busy banging out trekking poles together and yelling. He looked at us like we were idiots and kept nosing for food. We hiked 14 miles and are going to spend the night in town and get back on trail tomorrow. Anyway, we’re having a blast in the Shenandoahs!

Happy trails everyone :)