Do-Rag's Fun Facts

OK, I figure it must get a little boring reading about the same types of things all the time. So I tried to think of something at least a little more creative to make reading this stuff slightly more interesting. This post is dedicated to Doug and Megan.

Do-Rag's Fun Facts:

1. I now have a trail name. It's Do-Rag.
2. I have completely just over 1/5 of the trail so far.
3. I have fallen down approximately 12 times. The times I have almost fallen is too hard to keep track of. :) Hiking poles have probably saved my life.
4. At a road crossing, I almost walked up on some guy peeing behind a tree. If I had arrived 10 seconds earlier, it would have been disaster.
5. I saw a wild boar. Luckily for me, it was dead (they can be kind of aggressive). It was uuuuugly! Like a hairy pig with tusks. Whew.
6. I am now officially in Virginia for the rest of my life! VA is forever. They say hikers get the "Virginia blues." Eh, I think it'll be fantastic.
7. I had a blister the diameter of a golf ball on my heel.
8. Often, songs run through my head while I am hiking. What's interesting is the types of songs.....instead of singing stuff I listen to all the time, I find that often I am singing songs that my parents listened to when I was younger.....weird.
9. When I go into town, I eat A LOT. Check out my food consumption (recalled to the best of my ability) in one day while staying at Kincora:

-2 packages of oat meal and one package of grits (approx 500 cal)
-4 fruit and cereal bars (approx 760 cal)
-oatmeal square (approx 220 cal)
-dried fruit (approx 150 cal)
-1 large pizza minus 2 pieces that I shared (approx 1100 cal)
-2 servings of pasta and pesto (approx 600 cal)
-salad with stuff on it (approx 200 cal)
-cheese (approx 150 cal)
-apple (approx 100 cal)
-candy bar (approx 230 cal)
-2 pieces of garlic bread with butter (approx 350 cal)
-pint of ice cream (approx 720 cal)
-carrots and dip (approx 250 cal)

Grand total: approx 5100 calories. SWEET! That's called "hiker hunger."

10. The coldest night so far was approximately 16 degrees.
11. Wild turkey hunting season just opened in Tennessee. Ye-haw!
12. My longest hiking day so far has been 29.2 miles.
13. I've taken 5 showers in 4 weeks. *grin* What can I say? I'm out in the woods, ya'll.
14. I saw a suicide bomber mouse in one of the shelters (there are lots of mice in shelters...they climb on your sleeping bag while you sleep). Evidently he was running around the rim of the shelter with his buddy and then fell/jumped off, hit the sleeping plateform, simultaneously I heard a "bump" and a "squeek," and then he disappeared. I hope he's ok. It sounded like a hard bump, and it was a long fall for a mouse.
15. Pooping in the woods is over-rated.
16. A hiker named Salsa always hikes in shorts, even in snow.
17. One night on the trail, I slept in a barn. OK.....so it was a barn converted to a shelter for the trail, but it was still cool. Check it out:



18. I recently spent some time hiking around Watauga Lake, where Glenn proposed to Cathy. :) Here's a pic of me on the dam. It doesn't really give the lake justice, though. The place was gorgeous.



19. I now know what "vitamin W" is because of Pirate.


That's about it for now. I better get off here before I get kicked off. Have a great week! I'll post again when I can.