Day 96

Today was a good day. I woke up early and for the first time on my new sleeping pad. Yes, I decided to toss my old pad instead of trying to figure out where the slow leak was. That’s because I’ve originally wanted a regular/wide pad but it was sold out everywhere locally and online. The regular mummy shaped pad I had made me feel like I was always rolling off of it. When I saw the outfitter in Front Royal had the wide rectangular pad, I grabbed it. It hurts to have spent another $200 on gear but, oh is this pad nice! So wide, I can stretch out. It takes up almost half the space in my Zpacks Duplex but since this tent is just for me, it’s perfect. I hiked for most of the day with Zipper and Donuts. After somewhere around 9 miles, we came up to the “Entering the Roller Coaster” sign. This whole section is one big climb with a descent over and over. Within the Roller Coaster is another sign that made us all very happy and proud of ourselves. That is the 1,000 miles marker. I don’t think it’s really hit me that I’ve walked 1,000 official AT miles (not counting all the side bonus miles). I’m almost to the halfway point! This being Memorial Day weekend, the Roller Coaster is full of people! There are roads that people can drive up, park and day hike or just come out and camp as “weekend warriors.” I was starting to worry because there were so many people out here. I easily passed over 30+ people just out for a night or two or just for the day. (They all smelled like cologne or laundry detergent. It’s amazing how strongly I can smell it. I could hunt down a day hiker by easily following their scent for hundreds of yards away.) Luckily, the area I planned to stop at to camp was a large camping area near a creek and it was amazingly empty when I arrived. It actually ended up being just us thru hikers. I’m camped here with Zipper, Donuts, Wasabi, Fancy Pants and Richie Danger. Donuts packed out a couple 8.2% Dopplebock beers and offered me one as a celebration beer for hitting 1,000 miles and because we are less than 4 miles away from exiting Virginia and into West Virginia. Woohoo! We met a day hiker named Andre who talked with us for a while and offered to take our empty beer cans so we didn’t have to pack them out. Definitely appreciated that! The roller coaster has been rough but it was a good day. I’m planning on doing somewhere around 16 to 18 miles tomorrow. I have a few places picked out where I can stop. They will all set me up to get into Harper’s Ferry on Tuesday pretty early so I can have a full day to get chores done and then I’ll have a zero on Wednesday to enjoy the sites and museums. I will also get to the ATC HQ so I can get my picture taken and sign my trail name so it can be added to this year’s “Class of ‘22” book for the archives.