Day 69

I hiked 21.4 miles today. The day felt like it practically flew by, it was a good hike today. There was trail magic today right at lunch time so it was perfectly placed for me to be there awhile and rest. I got my feet wet today when I was trying to cross a swampy area on some small logs I lost my balance and stepped in the water and mud, oof??. Last night at like 2am I heard some rustling leaves and quiet grunting close to my hammock and it kept going for what felt like a long time then it walked by the opening on the feet side of my rain fly and I shone my light on it and it was a porcupine I was kinda relieved that it wasn’t a bear. I met a guy yesterday who knew my grandma and one of my coworkers, he goes to Petra. He told me he is helping out a guy who is going to try to break the speed record on the Appalachian trail. Then today the guy passed me jogging down the trail I wasn’t sure at the time if he was the guy but he looked like he was training. A little while after he passed me I caught up to him again because he stopped to stretch a little bit then I asked him if he was the guy attempting to break the speed record and he said he was which is super cool because I can’t even fathom attempting what he is attempting to do. So it was cool because we actually talked for a little bit while we hiked then he took off again. Yeah, it’s still mind boggling what he has to do to break the record the guy said he has to average 53 miles a day which is insane because I’m not even averaging 18 miles a day, its just insane. He is going to start June 1st and has to get done in 41 days so he’ll honestly probably get done before me if he gets it done. His name is Kristian Morgan and he is going to be live tracking it I guess so if any of you want to see that he is on Instagram and I think he said he has a website too. But yeah, I’m looking forward to tomorrow.