Kevin's AT Thru Hike

Day 108, Saturday, 7/2 – It was raining when I woke up, so I took it slow and caught up on the blog. The rain stopped around 9 which is around the time I started to hike.

Even with the rain overnight, it was crazy hot. I really don’t do well hiking in the heat. I sweat nonstop. Hopefully it cools off as I get further North. Besides the heat, the hiking was nice. The trail wasn’t too rocky or too steep today, and I had some nice views. The raspberries and blueberries are also starting to become ripe, so I was snacking as I passed the berry bushes.

I got to a road crossing around lunch time and ran into trail magic. Tin Man’s family had brought out pulled pork sandwiches and hot dogs. I spent a couple hours kicking it with Tin Man, Corgi, Slooper, Sherbert, Spice, and Orbit. They’re a very welcoming group and pride themselves on their ability to get other hikers to stop hiking and hang out.

Towards the end of the hike, I heard a storm front coming my way. There was a lot of thunder, but I was so hot I didn’t stop to put on my rain jacket. The rain came, and I was instantly soaked through. I should have put my jacket on for the brunt of the storm, then taken it off when the worst of it passed.

I was originally going to hike an additional 4 miles to a shelter, but the rain slowed me down. I saw that there was a pizza shop a half mile off trail, that also allowed camping behind their restaurant, so I decided to stop there for the night.

I hiked 18 miles to Corrado’s (Mile 1437). I was eating a few slices of pizza when Margaritaville came in. She grabbed a slice, sat down, and ate with me.

I set up my hammock behind the pizza shop in the only viable hammock spot, which happened to be among a bunch of poison ivy. Then I went back into the pizza shop to blog and charge my electronics before heading to bed.