Day 49 - Zero in Blacksburg

We spent a great weekend with Trevor and Daniel.  It was Virginia Tech’s spring game, a day when fans come out to tailgate and watch the football team scrimmage.  We set up a small tailgate near Hillcrest dorm and had a chance to visit with some of Trevor’s friends that we first met nearly 4 years ago.  Many of them are getting ready to graduate so this was our last chance to see some of them and hear about their future plans.  Mike snapped the following group photo of some of the kids.

Going from the left to right, Tory is graduating and will be moving to California to attend Berkeley for engineering graduate school; Alex is graduating and will attend medical school at Temple; John is graduating and will also be moving to California to attend graduate school at UCLA for physics; Cody (sitting behind Trevor), is taking a mission trip for the first half of summer break and then he’ll return to VT next year with Trevor; Chris will be working in Annapolis this summer doing what he does so well, cooking and catering; and Doug, Trevor’s freshman year roommate, is graduating and taking a year to do mission work with the Campus Crusade for Christ.  We will really miss the ones that are moving on and are so happy for each of them.

After the spring game we traveled into Craig County to meet two of Trevor’s hiking friends, Stretch and Zippers, on the trail.  Stretch and Zippers both worked at Yellowstone Park and are in the process of moving to Bozeman, Montana, after they complete this hike.  While waiting for them we met several other hikers, one of them named Raleigh, and were able to give them some trail magic since we had plenty of leftover drinks in our cooler.  Raleigh is a section hiker who plans to hike from Pearisburg, VA to Harpers Ferry, WV over the next 30 days.

After finding Stretch and Zippers we drove them to the Home Place to eat dinner with Trevor, Finn, Finn’s girlfriend, and other Hillcresters.  We had a delicious family style meal of ham, roast beef, fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, green beans, corn, coleslaw, pinto beans, biscuits, and peach cobbler!  After dinner Mike snapped a photo of Stretch, Zippers, Trevor, and Finn before we dropped Stretch and Zippers back off on the trail.  They are now a few days ahead of Trevor and Finn but they are planning to zero in a few days so Trevor and Finn may catch up to them.

I was able to download more photos and videos from Trevor’s camera and have added them to www.trailingtrevor.shutterfly.com  Here are a few that I found particularly interesting.

Below are photos taken just as Trevor left Erwin, Tennessee.  If you remember from my earlier posts, Trevor and Finn stayed at Bob and Judy’s and there were torrential rainstorms in the area.  When they resumed their hike the next morning, the trail was like a river at low elevations, but was all snow and ice at higher elevations.

Here is a great picture of Finn taken at Laurel Falls, between Roan Mountain, TN and Watauga Lake, TN.

Here is a picture of Trevor, Finn’s friend Hunter who hiked with them for a few days, and Finn at the Virginia/Tennessee state line.

Here is a picture of Trevor with the wild ponies that tried to eat his pack!

This is a picture showing Trevor’s old and new shoes.  I can only imagine what the old shoes smelled like if they looked this bad!

This is a picture of the Black Rat Snake they came upon after leaving Trent’s Grocery.

Trevor and Finn had planned to continue their hike this morning (Sunday), but Finn was feeling sick and they decided to zero in Blacksburg another day so he can recover.  If things go as plan then they hope to start again Monday morning.  We took this photo of Daniel and Trevor as we said goodbye to the boys.