Yes, to the one person – no names, but the initials are my brother Eric – yes, we have been keeping up the hikes oddity if not the hikes recording.
Just for the rekkid, brief synopses of the walks of those weeks:
October 27: Chestnut Ridge Loop Trail near Roanoke. The easiest 5.4 miles around on a pretty nice day.
November 2: The veteran hiking couple, looking to walk to the Audie Murphy Monument from the other side than their usual, instead hikes the wrong way from Va. 621 up onto the ridge for about three miles before finding a rock to eat on. About 6 miles total.
November 9: Appalachian Trail from Salt Pond Road off the Blue Ridge Parkway to Fullhart Knob Shelter and back. 7.6 miles. The veteran hiking couple walk the “other” way to a frequent destination and actually go in the correct direction!
November 17: Easy cheap urban walk from home to Roanoke Memorial to visit baby Ava, who would be home in a few days!, then on downtown to dinner and back home. About 5 miles of delights.
November 23: About a mile of Hollins University campus looking the alleged entrance point to the new section of Tinker Creek Greenway to Carvins Cove; the Tinker Creek Greenway from Plantation Road to Carvins Cove, About 5.8 miles total. Nice lunch at Hollywood’s.
November 30: Applachian Trail/Mau-Har Trail to Campbell Creek Falls and back; about 7 miles. The Day Hiker took this one off as I drove north to the Three Ridges area with sons Eric and Carl and grandsons Aden and Matthew, the four of whom were headed toward the Maupin Fields Shelter for the night and a descent of The Priest the next day. At the parking lot at the Tye River as we arrived, there were close to a dozen cars, which, we all agreed on the ascent, all looked like day-hiker cars. Upon my return to the lot near 4 pm, the last two cars other than mine were pulling out; the overnight hikers reported the next evening that they had indeed had the shelter to themselves.
December 7. “Hey” Rock via Appalachian Trail from Daleville and back. 5.6 miles. On this, a long-time easy favorite, the Greatest Day Hiker Of Them All apparently felt a need to assert her status a bit after this series of easy weeks, leaving me in the dust–OK, the mud–several times over on the way up to the spot where the AT goes out onto the rocks to look down on Carvins Cove, where lunch was good and the sun came out briefly.
