Miles Hiked: 13.2
Miles Left: 1521.2
Ending Location: Mile 664.1, VA 632, Comfort Suites Hotel, Blacksburg VA

The hike today started out with a zip line ride across a stream to visit “The Captain’s”. It’s the home of a local resident who offers his yard space for tenting and provides trail magic. Oh and of course there was the zip line ride to it! Once across I was accosted by his three very large dogs who wanted to play but were not well trained. They jumped and gnawed on everything which made it difficult to make it to the back of the house to grab a soda. I wasn’t originally planning on drinking anything but the Captain had met me as I crossed and insisted I take one before stating he had to take care of a snake that needed shooting and left. It’s kind of hard to say no at that point.

Owl had stayed on the other side of the river to rest his feet as his new shoes were giving him all sorts of problems. So this is what he saw: I crossed the river, talked briefly with the Captain, and then went around back. The Captain then went into his house, grabbed a shotgun, walked around and then fired it….

Luckily I survived and made it back across the river. Owl and I then had a fairly lengthy discussion since his shoes were really tearing up his feet. We decided that he would head back, skip this section, and let his feet heal up. I would them continue on hiking by myself.

The hike itself was pretty rocky for the first half and then smoothed out later on. I met another through hiker halfway into the day who was limping and complaining about his knee. It was bad enough that he was worried that it was going to end his trip. I commiserated with him and offered him a ride into town. At that point he complained that his knee hurt so much it took him over 12 hours yesterday to hike over 20 miles. It was all I could do to bite my tongue and not say that might be the root of his problem. Regardless, he didn’t want to get off the trail so we parted ways.

The rest of the hike was fairly uneventful. In the drive back we stopped by the University Mall for some more frozen yogurt and to eat at the new Mongolian place there. The frozen yogurt was great but the food wasn’t anything special. Then it was back to the hotel room for the night.