A 6 a.m. meet up is early in anyone’s book. But because of the 20 miles to be hiked this was necessary. Yesterday involved two options for the hikers, a 15-mile loop and an extended 20-mile loop. That’s a long way in case you’re wonderin’.
The team met at Total Wine and then headed west on 66 to 81 for a meet up at the Exxon at exit 283. Coffee was replenished, and I got myself a very nice (it turns out) locally made strawberry and rhubarb fried pie as a post-hike treat. We then headed towards the hills for about 20 minutes and parked up.
Once all gear was in packs and boots on the scouts went through the usual pre-game ballet of orienting maps and doing various impressions of a Saturday Night Fever dance when asked to point in the direction that they think we will be leaving the parking lot. As always, by chance 25% of them got it right, but not knowing who they are or why, it didn’t help expedite our departure. After we told them (for the 20th time) to turn the map over and read the first line, “head up the fire road” that gave most, but not all, the information they needed.
We eventually headed off at 8:20 and began a lazy meander to the base of Big Schloss. The climb up was a definite conversation killer and with the rising temps causing little salty rivulets to begin running down faces and other parts of the body we certainly realized we were in for a good days work. Once at the top we headed south towards Big Schloss (in order to make the various hike distances a couple of out-and-backs were added on) where there were some great views. Because of all the rain parts of the trail were pretty overgrown with lush green vegetation and with the temperature now hitting the mid-80s, in the exposed parts is was quite steamy.
It was a pretty relaxed walk north along the ridge where at times your feet straddled the VA/WVA border. Distant rumbles let us know something was coming our way. We stopped at a spring for lunch and that’s when the storm hit. Luckily or unfortunately, depending on your point of view, the rain only lasted a few minutes, but it was enough to cool us down. Water bottles were refilled from the spring (using a filter of course) and then we saddled up for the rest of the day.
About a mile later we reached the intersection where the 15 milers would head home and the 20 milers would do a 5 mile out-and-back to Half Moon Overlook. If you ever get a chance to go to this overlook, please do, it’s amazing.
The 15 milers headed back down to the parking lot and were comfortably in their cars by 4:15 p.m. and going home, a job well done. The scouts were Brandon P, Teddy W, Brandon C, Jordon C, Jack C, Jackson F and James R.
About 2 ½ hours later the 20 milers rolled into the parking lot. Tired but happy. This was not an easy route but thankfully they had some pretty cool payoffs with the views from the top of Big Schloss and the Half Moon Overlook and managed a very respectable 2 mile an hour average. The scouts who completed this hike were Odin M, Helen F, Luke F and Jonathan R.
The old people joining the scouts today were Shelly, Lauren, Clay, Mike, David and me.
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