Appalachian Trail (day 51) - Cove Mountain Shelter to Yellow Springs Campsite / mile 1174

Trail got a bit more rugged today but the weather held up really well.

I've hiked out from the campsite at 6 AM with G. he was complaining about an ankle pain, his backpack got damaged yesterday as well. It took us just over an hour to reach Duncannon, town was all set up and ready for the Memorial Day. I went to 7-Eleven to get few snacks and G. went to the laundromat. I've met Packrunner and Freewill by the market having hotdogs for breakfast, they were planning to do their laundry as well and then do another big day, I didn't ask them how far they were going as I didn't want to turn our back and forth into some kind of competition. I haven't seen them for the rest of the day. I went by the laundromat where G. informed me that he decided to take a day off to recover and mend his backpack, we took few pictures together and said goodbye, it was nice to hike with him for a while.

I've carried on and visited Subway for breakfast before leaving the town, a guy in front of me in the queue gave me a discount voucher, so I got the footlong 1400 calories sub called "The Beast", it was very good!

The trail was running along the ridge most of the day with many fun sections where I had to scramble up and down the boulders. At midday I've bumped into a hiker I wanted to meet for a long time Fun Size. I've met her father once during trail magic he was providing, he was basically following Fun Size along the trail picking her up and dropping back every day so she didn't have to camp or stay at the hostels as they had their own campervan. Fun Size was 53 years old, she was from Virginia and it was her first thru hike. She was very organized, her father knew exactly where she was and when to pick her up, she was a petite person and that's where her trail name came from. We walked together for few hours talking about hiking and traveling, she has recently visited New Zealand with her husband to celebrate their 30th anniversary.

I've stopped for lunch, she carried on walking and I haven't seen her again but I've saw her father at the parking lot waiting to pick her up and doing his usual trail magic in the meantime. I've got few snacks and a gatorade from him, he was getting a bit bored of the whole thru hiking business at this point but it looked like he will support his daughter to the end, I had a lot of respect for him, he was doing great job considering he was in his eighties!

It was late afternoon at this point, I've hiked few more miles and stopped at a nice, quiet campsite, no one else was staying here tonight, I could only hear birds singing and an occasional plane flying by.

Oh before reaching the campsite I've saw a porcupine! What an amazing animal it was, it walked away from me and then started to climb a tree and keep on looking at me suspiciously until I left. I haven't taken any pictures of it as I didn't know how it would react if I pursued him, especially as it was kind of trapped on the tree at this point. A very cool encounter!