11.3 miles hiked between 1pm and 7:30pm

Why is this always harder than I remember? Always.

Today I hiked from Trout Creek, VA 620, where I left off last June, to a blue blaze near the top of Sinking Creek Mountain. This involved climbing 1575' and traversing Brush Mountain, past the Audie Murphy Monument (which is not very interesting, actually), descending into the Craig Creek Valley and then climbing another 1500' of Sinking Creek Mountain. I saw more thru-hikers than I expected, and I met quite a few people today including three section hikers.

It rained lightly off and on all day, and it's raining right now. I hope it's not raining in the morning. It's such a pain to break camp and pack up in the rain. It's also anti-motivational.

I stopped at Niday Shelter for dinner, so I have nothing to do but sleep. I hope the weather doesn't make me sorry I didn't just stay at Niday, but I really like the idea of having most of the climb out of the way. I don't perform very well until afternoon, for whatever reason.