Oceanic Wilderness

Well, I managed to find a computer and didn’t expect it. There’s an Exxon gas station where we are at with two computers! Sweet! It’s a rainy, kinda cold afternoon and we made it 4.5 miles from the last shelter into ‘town’—aka: a highway, two gas stations, a restaurant and a motel. Surprisingly the gas stations have a good resupply; I think they are used to hikers! We aren’t the only ones staying in ‘town’ for the day, several others are ‘neroing’ it as well. Since leaving Damascus we thought we were going to battling nasty thunderstorms and they ended up holding off until late Saturday night and then some…

This was an awesome walk right out of Kincora. I wished the whole day was like this. Pulling up a campsite and having Chris fish while I read would have been perfect.

Not sure why no one has put up a sign yet. This serves as the border into Virginia!

My friend Amy and I at Kincora….nice to meet people along the way. We’ve ‘known’ each other for like 10 years online!

yes, I am a big nerd. 😉 That’s 400 miles at a stream.

My friends, we have reached our fourth state…rather, commonwealth, of Virginia. We have 500+ miles to walk in this state and I am hoping for some better terrain in a few hundred miles. The rumors are that around Pearisburg things start to flatten out until somewhere in PA…and by flatten out I mean, not a lot of steep climbs—not Florida flat. Let’s see, when we left Erwin over a week ago I thought I’d get a chance to write again at the Kincora hiking hostel in Hampton, TN. No computer, so no writing. The climb out of Erwin wasn’t too bad, mostly pleasant along a nice stream and then up to…

Yesterday we pulled 20 miles to get into Temple Hill Gap so we could do 4 miles into Erwin this morning. We woke at 6:30 and rolled into Uncle Johnny’s hostel at almost 9am. Ahhh, we relaxed for a few hours, showering and doing laundry and then caught the lunch shuttle into Erwin. The trail doesn’t go through Erwin, it’s a few miles off and Erwin is also spread out, but we ate at a pizza joint on the outside of town and then walked through town, quaint cute houses that I imagined myself living in, and then into the old-tyme downtown and other areas. We had some Sonic for…

So far the best place to camp and with the best views. I recommend camping there if you can handle the wind…very, very windy. Some guys ‘cowboy camped’ in their sleeping bags under the stars.