Appalachian Trail (day 35) - Not Far (from Daleville) to Bryant Ridge Shelter / mile 762

It's amazing how quickly the body can recover after a virus, yesterday I was a walking zombie, today my energy levels were reasonable, food started tasting good as well which was a big relief. Of course the weather and low elevation of the trail helped a lot, along with the electrolytes given to me by Persuasion.

Half of the day the trail was running along the Blue Ridge Parkway and I must admit it was extremely difficult not to step out and just follow the road but I was being a purist so far on the AT and that's how I wanted to keep things going, so the forest path it was.

I've seen another two black rat snakes along the trail, I got quite used to them at this point, I'm almost not jumping when I see one on the trail, they are harmless and kind of cute. I've also spotted another bog turtle, this one was much smaller than the ones I've seen before, it was still giving me a good hiss when I was lifting it off the trail!

I've also seen a couple of Turkey Vultures by the road, here's a short Merlin description of them: "Large raptor. Glides relatively low while sniffing for carrion, or riding thermals to higher vantage points. Also huddles around roadkill and dumpsters." Well, someone has to clean up, isn't it.

At the campsite I've met Forest, he said that he hiked with both Juicy Fruit and Commando, two other guys that (like myself) are trying to finish the AT in 100 days or less. Forest said that both of them started on the 4th of April, one day before me, at this point (especially after losing a day to a norovirus) I had very little chance of catching up to them.

Overall a great day and I'm so relieved that the norovirus is over! Knock on wood of course as there might be different strains of it floating about that I'm not immune to, so it's better to be on high alert for next couple of weeks.