Day 59 & 60

Starting Mile 844.3

I got up early this morning because I really wanted to get into town. I was hungry and almost out of food. The last few days have been exhausting. At least today I don’t have a 3000 foot climb that I had to do. I was really glad that I decided to stay at the shelter because within half an hour of getting into my hammock it poured down rain. It continued to rain off and on all night. If I had continued hiking I would have gotten soaked. Now I’ll just get soaked because of the wet grass and high humidity. 

I had one little climb to start the morning, but unlike the past few days it was only about 500 feet of gain. I wish they were all like this. Then I just walked along the ridge crossing the Blue Ridge Parkway several times. While I was getting water at a seasonal spring that was flowing great because of last night’s rain, a trail runner passed me and said hi. I continued another 3 miles to where I crossed the parkway again and I ran into the same trail runner. He had run a couple miles past me then ran the road back to his car. He gave me a Gatorade as we talked for a minute. He is one of the Cross Country and Track coaches at Bridgewater College. He was just doing a little morning run. I thanked him for the Gatorade and continued down the trail.

I made my way to Humpback Rocks. I thought about running up to the rocks, but decided against it. Everything was still overcast and I figured I would continue to not have any views. I passed a great campsite on my way down from Humpback Rocks. Shortly after passing the campsite I was crossing some rocks when I took a nice fall. 

I layed there for a minute because my ankle was really hurting. When I got up I could barely put any pressure on my right foot and sat right back down. Luckily another thru hiker came up behind me and stopped to check on me. I tried again and could barely put any pressure on my ankle. We looked at the map and it wasn’t far to get to the Humpback Rocks parking lot. Squirrel, the other thru hiker, took my pack with him and I hobbled to the parking lot. When I got there I was able to find someone to take me into town. 

I was hoping that a night in town would take care of my ankle. By this time my ankle had swollen up. I did a good job rolling my ankle this time. Hopefully a night of rest will take care of my ankle. I’ve done this before and usually the next day my ankle is better.

After a night of icing my ankle and sleep, as well as a pizza delivery, my ankle was still swollen and hurting. I hobbled down to the nearby Urgent Care to get it checked out. The doctor told me that I had sprained my ankle and would need to take a few weeks off the trail. I was really disappointed that this happened. I was having a great time, even with the difficult past few days. I was also so close to home where I was already planning on taking a few days off.

Luckily I was close enough to home that I was able to get a friend to come pick me up and take me home. I talked to my parents and my Dad was going to come out and drive me back to their house to recover (and do a little work that they needed done). I will be taking a little time off the trail and then get back on around the middle of June, depending on how the ankle feels.

I ended up doing 13.3 miles before I hurt my ankle. I’ll get back on trail and should still be able to finish by the beginning of September.

Ending mile 857.6