Day 56 (Saturday, June 7th) - Back on the trail; Cross Ave., Pearisburg, to Rice Field Shelter

View from Rice Field

Today's Miles: 7.20
Trip Miles: 638.10

It was a beautiful, sad, long day. Beautiful because I was able to spend some time with the sweetest person I know, sad because she had to head back home, and long both because I miss my lovely wife already and because the trail out of Pearisburg has been rerouted.

After too short a visit, Amy dropped Mike, Natalie, and me off at the Food Lion for resupply before her four hour drive back to Richmond for her flight. With all the Mountain House dinners and the delicious snacks she brought us we didn't need much for the next few days. She also brought the replacement Fly Creek UL3 tent body, a new summer sleeping bag, and some new (smaller) clothes. There may be richer, smarter, and better men than me, but there's no man more fortunate when it comes to having my best friend as my wife. Thank you, Love. *You are so welcome, Honey! I would also like to thank Natalie's mom, Linda, for sending us some Amish made whoopie pies; delicious!

We got on the trail at 4:20pm. Andi and Yvanna had texted me on Thursday that the trail had been changed north of Pearisburg. I looked online and saw that they had made the change for a new gas line. There was no info about any milage change, but they indicated that it would be white blazed, so I figured we'd be fine.

Finally it made to Rice Field!

Following the trail wasn't a problem. Knowing where the heck we were was. No signs, landmarks, water source blazes (blur blazes), nothing but the white blazes indicating the trail. We hiked for three hours and 80% of it was uphill. The new trail was in good shape so the steady climb wasn't too bad. The real problem was, we and no idea how many miles we hiked to rejoin the old trail. I'm guessing the new trail added at least two more miles on the new trail. Maybe the Administrator can find something online. *Sorry, My Love, not much info online other than that part of the trail is being relocated 

The long day ended with some beautiful views of an orange sunset across an open field. I got a fire going on the windy ridge top where we set up camp and we finally ate at 9:30pm. It's almost 10:30 now and I'm listening to the wind play with the rain fly. I'm trying out the new sleeping bag and pad and hoping for sweet dreams.

Night all.

P.S. I'll be using the mileage from Awol's AT Guide and we'll figure the real miles later.

M&N, Rice Field 

Sunset, Rice Field