TRAIL DAYS 2017 + TRAIL MAGIC // DAY 3

And finally I'm on to the last bit of Trail Days: Sunday. I woke up before everyone else and was starving and was happy to have a little alone time, so went to Mojo's Café as everyone slept in.

On my way there, I walked through town and was pleased to find that the "Cool Bus" is still around!


Overall, Damascus was pretty quiet, but as soon as I got to Mojo's I found a big crowd. I got the same breakfast as the day before and sat on my own, as I watched everyone in their Sunday morning dazes.

As I finished breakfast, Waterfall popped in and was actually on his way out of town so I walked out with him and said goodbye. After, I found Splinter, Boyardee, 11:30, and Pockets who were going to drive to the Cracker Barrell a few miles away. I decided to stay in Damascus and pack up and wander around.

On my walk, I popped by the Yellow Deli for some maté. Their maté pretty much revived me while I was on trail. I had hiked 90+ miles of mountains in about 3 days and could barely stand up when I got to the road to hitch to the Yellow Deli. At the Yellow Deli, I spent 15 hours eating lots and drinking lots of maté too. Through some sort of miracle, somehow the next day I was literally running sections of the trail. 20 miles in less than 8 hours!

After some maté, I grabbed my backpack (and rental car), and then drove to Bland, VA to meet Boyardee, Splinter, and 11:30 to do some trail magic! 

The day was pretty foggy and it was funny because it was the same exact weather I encountered at this spot last year. We had a few hikers come by and had so much fun chatting with all of them.


Here's Roar, 11:30, and Sushi Roll! We all had such a fantastic time talking with Roar and Sushi Roll who are thru-hiking this year and met each other on the trail. Roar was British and Sushi Roll was from Wisconsin.


We made sure we brought lots of goodies. I picked out the Sprites, Splinter picked out the Mountain Dews, and Boyardee and 11:30 picked out the Sutter Homes haha

After a while, Splinter and I had to head to the airport to catch our flights home. We cut it sooo close with bad weather and traffic due to an accident, but we both made our flights in the nick of time.

Cheers to another successful Trail Days!

TRAIL DAYS 2017 // DAY 2

Day 2 of Trail Days! After going to bed late the night before, I slept in my tent until nine the next morning. Everyone seemed to be getting up around then.


The gang then headed off for breakfast at Mojo's Trailside Café, a place that I absolutely loved while I was on trail last year.


Of course it was packed, but it was nice being back in a place I spent so much time at during my hike.


I ordered one of their wonderful, huge cinnamon rolls and an egg sandwich on a bagel with salsa. Even though I wasn't hiking, I found myself incredibly hungry and was glad I had room for both because they were both so tasty!


After breakfast, we headed to the Trail Days festivities. Gear booths, carnival games, auctions, etc.


We found the Hiker Yearbook school bus!


And a funny shirt. It's funny how spot on the shirt's answers are!


And a fun pirate hammock!


After, we headed back to camp for a bit to freshen up (or fireball... whatever) before the hiker parade!


We found the AT class of 2016


And signed the banner. Just want to say how good it is to be Olive Oil.


And headed off into the parade through Damascus!


That is until it started pouring! Like POURING!


We ended up hanging out in a soap makers tent. For like an hour. Me, Splinter, 11:30, Boyardee, Mogli...


Not Waterfall though. He figured since he was already wet, he'd stay wet.


The tent across from us started flooding which was a bit sad.


Finally the sun came out! We stuck around for the talent show which was a lot of songs.


We maybe brought beer even though we weren't supposed to. Also, Boyardee got his beard braided.


We also met some of Pocket's friends.



And tried on Waterfall's hats.


After the talent show we headed off to dinner, but the craziest thing happened. We witnessed a hiker wedding!! The bride and groom met at the Hawk Mountain shelter (Mile 8 of the trail) this year, hiked with each other to Standing Bear, a hostel around Mile 240, started dating there, and then hiked another month or two together and just decided they'd get married. I know this sounds crazy. It is crazy! But as I mentioned in Day 1's post, trail time is so different. I have people I hiked with for two weeks who feel like brothers and sisters. I've hiked with someone for a day and told them my life story. It's so great.


Anyway, the wedding was quite a spectacle. The officiant wore a bathrobe and smoked a cigarette the whole time, the bride and groom shotgunned beers instead of kissing each other, it was just soo good. "Til Katahdin or death do you part."


Just look at them!! <3

Also I really appreciated that the guy's trailname is Extra Virgin. Partly because he got married lol, but mostly because that was *almost* my trail name :x. I carried 25.3 fluid ounces of olive oil into the Smokey's and two 19 year olds I had recently met thought I should be Extra Virgin, but I decided I'd have to shut them down before it stuck so went with Olive Oil.


After the wedding, the gang went off to dinner. I passed this sign and still think it's funny.


We put our names down for dinner and then I had to go move my rental car. On the way to move it though, I crossed the scene where the wedding had taken place and they bought a birthday cake at the grocery store and everyone was eating it by hand and obviously I took a piece when they offered!


After moving my rental car, I met everyone back at the restaurant for dinner. The guy on the right was slammered and wanted a pic with the waitress with Jimmy Hendrix looking down on them. It was ridiculous. His wife or date who was twice as slammered took the pic and couldn't figure out the camera for the longest time.


The funniest part of it though was that in the process of trying to take the pic, Waterfall had been sitting in the seat in front of the Jimi Hendrix painting. Instead of just asking him to move, the guy in the picture gave him a dollar to move. Waterfall also ended up getting a free marg because he didn't order one but the waitress accidentally brought an extra. Obviously this crazy luck had to be photographed. Anyway, our dinner experience was kind of crazy (we suspected that the majority of staff was on meth or something of the sort... because when in rural VA...), but we had so much fun and laughed so much. Trail situations are so absurd and make the best stories.


After dinner, we headed back to Tent City and danced around the fire, sat around and hung out and drank more beers, and enjoyed the last night of camping out for the weekend.

TRAIL DAYS 2017 // DAY 1

And I'm finally here to share the start of a slew of life updates. Mid-May up until the past week have been busy and amazing and I'm finally getting a little time to sit, go through pictures, and write a little something to remember them by. Slowly but surely I'll get through these ;)

The weekend after going to New York for Mother's Day, I went to Virginia for Trail Days! Trail Days is an Appalachian Trail festival held in Damascus, VA every year. There are hiker workshops, carnival and art fair sorts of things for townies, hiker feeds for current thru-hikers, camping and bonfires and a hiker parade and other activities for current and former thru-hikers, and it's so great to have a reunion of sorts.

When a few members of my final trail family, whom I summited Katahdin with last August, mentioned they were going to go back to Damascus for Trail Days this year, I hemmed and hawed and didn't know if I'd be able to get work off, but the more I thought about it, I knew I had to go, and yeah, it was so good. I knew it would be, but I didn't know how much it would re-energize me. Being with other Hiker Trash for a weekend and being called by my trail name, "Olive Oil", made my heart so happy.

Here's Day 1 of 3...


Early on the Friday morning of Trail Days, I flew out of Chicago. Yay 4:00 am wake ups. Yay 6:00 am flights...


The flight apparently experienced lots of turbulence, but I had three seats to myself and fell asleep right when we took off so never noticed. Lovely flight, if you ask me.


I flew into Charlotte, NC because that was the closest big city to Damascus. It's still nearly a 3 hour drive from Charlotte to Damascus though. When I arrived to Charlotte, I rented my first car ever!! Of all the things I've done recently that have scared me and made me feel (possibly) like an adult, renting a car and getting myself to Damascus in one piece is definitely one of them.



I made it to Damascus just after noon and met up with my friends Splinter and Boyardee as well as a friend of theirs they met before I knew them on the trail named 11:30. They had already ordered Yuengling's and I ordered one to follow while trying to figure out a vegetarian option. We all caught up about our off-trail lives, reminisced about our on-trail lives, and looked forward to all the coming events of the weekend.



After lunch and a quick jaunt around town, we bought a ton of beer, set up our tents, and caught up some more, just sitting on the ground as we once did upon arriving into camp after long days of hiking. Our friend Pockets soon showed up, and soon I found out that Waterfall would be showing up at night. I had texted him a week earlier and he was unsure about if he'd be able to get off work, but apparently he had told Boyardee in the middle of the week that he'd be coming, and Boyardee decided to leave it as a surprise for the rest of us. Ahh!

As we hung around camp, took in the sights, and we saw so many familiar faces, but also new faces too. That's the great thing about hikers. People come and go and you sit at camp and talk to everyone like you've known them forever. Because of this, "Hiker Time" is a thing. Like I knew Boyardee and Splinter for 2.5 months on the trail, but in hiker time that's like 5 years. It's also why when a trail couple gets engaged after dating for 2 months, it doesn't seem that crazy, even though conventional wisdom would tell you to think otherwise.


I met the guy on the right I met super briefly last year, at Trail Days I think. The girl on the right I'd never met because she's a current section hiker (someone who hikes sections instead of straight thru), but she kept saying "absofruitly" and it was so funny! That's really all I wanted to say about this pic haha.







This is a little more of our afternoon. We walked around Tent City, where everyone sets up their tents, met dogs, and just talked and had beers with other hikers. It felt so good to feel so at home.

ONE YEAR AGO TODAY...

...I started my Appalachian Trail Thru-Hike! I can't believe it's been a year already. It's one of the best decisions I've ever made and even though city life is good, I miss life on the trail so much every day. I think I'll always be itching to get back out there.

3 MONTHS OUT

As of yesterday, it's already been three months since I finished my Appalachian Trail thru-hike. Life off the trail has been great, but I still miss the trail and thru-hiker life so much every day. A fellow thru-hiker recently made this video and it does an incredible job describing some of the post-trail emotions I've felt.

On another note, the pictures above are a few favorites I took on trail. If you'd like to see some more trail pictures, I posted at least one picture for every day of my trip on Instagram. The blog Appalachian Trials also posts amazing hiker-sourced pictures to their Instagram account year-round. Just look through some of those and tell me that you're not starting to think of thru-hiking!!