Appalachian Trail Day 83 – Boiling Springs – Cove Mountain Shelter

Appalachian Trail Day 83

Day 21, 05-21-01

Boiling Springs – Cove Mountain Shelter

21.6  miles, AT  –  1123.4  1200 feet

10:20 AM 6:30 PM  ,Day 15 Rain

I attempted to sleep on the couch at this hostel but the middle cushion was so worn out it caused the others to cut into my sides.  I ended up on the floor.  I slept well though.

The people who’s house we stayed with son was seriously handicapped.  He was screaming in the morning because he didn’t want to take a bath.  Then it was not wanting to eat breakfast.  They had their hands full with him.

Breakfast was bacon, which was either under or over cooked and sometimes both, eggs and hash browns.  Vice and Disco did some of the cooking but it wasn’t the greatest.  It wasn’t their fault.  The whole experience was odd.

I bought a bunch of candy and two sodas, shipped the snake skin I found home and hung out at the Appalachian Trail Conference office.  I weighted my pack at the ATC and it was 34 pounds.  I only had two days of food.  We ran into Al and his friend there too.

Hatman, Happy Feet, Tangent and I headed out together.  12 miles of flat farmland.  At lunch Al showed up again.  The rain started to get really bad around 5 PM.

We expected to meet up with Vice and Disco at the shelter but they are not here.  There is another shelter not far from here, so maybe they are there.  I was soaked to the bone when I got here.  Everything is wet and there is no chance of drying it either.

My left foot is acting up.  The outside part hurts whenever I don’t plant it flat.  I hope the rocks of PA don’t make it worse.

Scatman 2011- This day went from sunny to crap.  It started off bad and end bad but the middle was great.  I was really starting to enjoy hiking with the group I was with.  Though the day wasn’t the greatest day on the trail it was still a day on the trail as we would say out there.  On the way out of town I stop at the ranger station to report the weird guy and they pretty much blew me off and didn’t take me seriously.  Later I found out he was a released mental patient.  He reportedly showed up at a shelter made himself at home like he was going to stay the night than he left only to come back at like 2 am and start a fire.

An older couple said he left the shelter they were at to walk the 4 miles to the next one and something like 5 hours later he showed back up.  He busted out his 9″ long knife and said it was for opening his weenier dogs.  The couple said he next slept the whole night and neither did they.

No photos were taken on this day.

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Scatman

Get out there!