June 14

Hightop

I was last to leave the shelter.  Chose to sleep there last night instead of try to fiddle with my hammock set up the first night out.  Another beautiful morning, and the rocks up on the summit of Blackrock Mountain were as amazing as I had remembered.  Still hacking and coughing my way down the trail, but my energy levels are still high.  I've been listening to some music on my new mp3 player.  A friend of mine back in town hooked me up with a bunch of songs.  Breezing down the trail.  Rockin' out to some awesome dubstep, trance, and electo-house music courtesy of DJ Stroud.  I used to be somewhat opposed to the idea of listening to music on the trail.  In SNP though, I've already seen what there is to see.  Also, the tunes drown out any noise from the Skyline Drive.  The only downside is that I probably have walked right past some of the wildlife in the park without even noticing.  Oh well.  It's really helping me bust out the miles, and since I'm pretty much hiking alone now, it helps the time go by.  I stopped for a lunch break at Loft Mountain, and grabbed some liquid refreshments from the campground store.  Still made good time this afternoon, but it feels like my right calf is starting to cramp up. Had another pretty long stretch with no water, so I filled up at the ranger station at Simmons Gap, 0.2 off the trail to get me through the late afternoon.  I remembered this next section from last summer, and back then it beat me down.  This time around I did really well with it.  Nothing like a 800+ mile warm-up to get you in shape.  A pretty big climb, by SNP standards at least, of 800 feet or so, then back down the other side of the mountain, put me down at Powell Gap.  When I got to Smith Roach Gap I started the climb up Hightop Mountain, the third highest peak in SNP.  At the sign at the start of the climb, someone had left a couple sodas, so I grabbed a Coke and packed it out to enjoy later at dinner.  The climb up Hightop was pretty tough.  Easier than I remembered from last year, but probably the toughest climb in the park so far.  Got to the shelter, filled up my water bladder, and cooked some dinner.  Mashed potatoes and salmon.  Yeah, I deserved that today.  Right calf is still bothering me a little bit.  I got a fire going, and talked with some of the other hikers there.  Many of them were at the shelter with me last night too.  They all get up early and start hiking, but we end up in the same place at the end of the day.  Still haven't seen any bears.  Seems like I'm the only one that hasn't.  One hiker wrote in the shelter register that they had seen 8 in one day.  Oh well, if I've seen plenty in the park before.  Maybe on this hike I'll have to wait to NJ to see my first.  21 miles.  Day 2 in the Shennies.

Concrete signpost in SNP.