A stealth campsite at mile 457.7 into Damascus, Va, (1,927 feet) and mile 470.7 for a 13 mile day!

Meet Virginia!!

Today we went into our fourth state! That means we have ten more to go before we are done. Virginia is the longest state on the entire Appalachian Trail at 550 miles. It may be long, so long that through hikers for generations have said that you will get the,”Virginia Blues”, by the time you’re done with this state. The cool thing about Va. is that it has some pretty cool sections to hike. The southern section is about 250 miles and there’s, Grayson Highlands, McAfee Knob, Dragons Tooth, Tinker Cliffs, and Peter Mountain.

Along the way we passed one of the original AT shelters, it was built in 1934, McQueens Knob Shelter (3,849 feet) mile 459.1.

This is an abandoned shelter that is not to be used except in the case of an absolute emergency, and even then, Abingdon Gap Shelter is a short walk away, at mile 460.5.

We stopped for a bit at Abingdon Gap Shelter to load up on water since it was about 8 more miles to town with no more water sources. I sat and drank a liter of water, loaded my 1 liter bottle and then filled my 1 liter water filter as well, so, basically carrying 3 liters of water out of there!

Three miles outside of Damascus, Virginia we came to the state line!

We walked down hill the next three miles into Damascus and then from there, I went to meet Suzanna and Kelly went to the hostel where she was staying.

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