Packing up after a rainy night taking cover under the Bailey Gap shelter. The shelter was surprisingly empty…most hikers are off trail in Damascus for Trail Days. It should be pretty quiet out here until Monday.

All the rain last night turned the trail into a muddy river…the first couple miles were especially slick with lots of moss covered rocks.

Up in the clouds and fog this morning…

but by the afternoon it was a beautiful day.

Walking through the Virginia farmland is a nice way to change up the day.

Wildflowers are starting to bloom.

The Keefer Oak is the oldest oak on the AT, and it’s huge!

A stiff climb at the end of a long day got us up onto the ridge with great views back toward the farmland.

Home for the night is the Sarver Hollow shelter. Only two other folks showed up (trail days effect plus it’s 1/2 mile off trail down a steep hill).

Always a bit alarming to see a sign like this…then we passed a landfill !

Hard to believe the weather was completely socked 2 hours before when we left Pearisburg this morning (1/2 mile visibility).

View from inside the Rice Field shelter where we stopped for a break / snack.

Leaving the shelter over the cattle stile. One of the best settings for a shelter I’ve seen so far!

We haven’t officially entered West Virginia (~400 more miles), but we hiked along the border much of the morning.

The view from the ridge looking into West Virginia

Some brief Rain showers came in the late afternoon. This is the bridge over Stoney Creek

LK sporting his poncho and Quasi-Moto look.

We saw a lot of folks slack packing southbound today as people are getting ready to head to Damascus for trail days (along with 25,000 others). The benefit to this is that there was only one other person at the shelter tonight 🙂 Time for bed…good night!