9/16/2003 ~ 19.4 miles hiked

My shoes really worked against me today. They were pretty dry when I started, but due to the wet grass and fog, they were very wet again in short order. Because of the constant wet and the nature of the metal lace holders on these shoes, my left foot is being torn up.

Rice Field Shelter's setting is beautiful. I stopped there for lunch, and could barely find it for the fog. In a few minutes, the wind blew the clouds and fog away and I could see everything. It was really stunning to see the whole high meadow appear in front of me out of the grey.

Symms Gap Meadow is also pretty, but it's no match for Rice Field. In Symms Gap, I was disappointed to see that *all* the apples on the trees were blighted. And there were a lot of them too.

The blazing between Rice and Symms was really terrible. Part of the problem is that there are a lot of trails on the ridge. While I could follow the ridge all right, I lost the trail repeatedly and had to back track more than once to make sure I hadn't missed a turn off the ridge. One power cut in particular was extremely difficult to cross due to very high burrs and no blazing when you come upon it. Maybe there's a post buried in plants, but if not, how the hell am I supposed to know where to re-enter the woods without looking along the entire power cut for an entrance!?

Pine Swamp Branch Shelter is very close to the road, and I really didn't like that, so I moved on to an unused area out of sight.