Wednesday, July 1 9:08 pm 20.7 mi
AT 864.3 Rockfish Gap → AT 885.0 Blackrock Hut
Weather: Hot, humid until dinner, rain during dinner
Trail Conditions: Some rocky bits, but overall much less severe terrain and elevation gain/loss compared to last section
My Condition: Happy and incredibly full from the delicious meals catered by Fresh Ground today!
Stanimal (Adam) caught me on my way out for the shuttle today. He said if I’m looking for something different when I’m done with the trail to give him a call – we chatted on the ride over when he picked me up and he seemed impressed by my camp resume. Might be a good way to get my foot in the door of the hostel business. Fresh Ground is supporting a group of 4 of us thru hikers through the Shenandoahs – myself, Toy Story, Gumby, and Puddles. I did a double take when I emerged from the woods to see him set up at Beagle Gap, where we ate watermelon, cajun beans, sausage, rice, and vegetables with toast. It was DELICIOUS! He has an incredible giving heart and I’m truly blown away at his generosity. He’s enjoying the personal touch this year – most years, he might see 20-40 thru hikers on any given day and he’s cooking or cleaning up the whole day, not really getting to connect as much on a personal level. Some JAGOFF came tearing down the mountain, and upon seeing him Fresh Ground invited him over and offered him some watermelon or a plate of food. This jerk just starts going off on Fresh Ground, ranting and raving about how he needs to be wearing a mask and is a vector for infection and has no business doing what he’s doing this year. Fresh Ground quickly put on a mask and began to talk about the Cafe's hygiene and sanitation practices, but this guy interrupted and was having none of it. He went on an odd tangent and claimed to have thru hiked many years ago and said how memorable his trail angels were during his experience, but was adamant that Fresh Ground ought to be ashamed of the recklessness he’s showing putting people at risk. The guy had the nerve, at this point after quite a bit of ranting and raving, to try to engage me in friendly trail discussion about my experience, but by this point he had shown his true colors and I looked at Fresh Ground, shook my head, and said it wasn’t worth it to engage with this guy. “Oh it’s going to be like that is it?” He took a look at the van and then drove off. Later in the day when I saw Fresh Ground again, at Turk Gap, where he had watermelon, hot dogs, and hand sliced, deep fried french fries waiting for us, I found that the jagoff had reported Fresh Ground to the rangers. They showed up while Puddles was there, saying they had heard he was "selling food." He was able to pull up his Facebook and Instagram pages, and other documents, to prove his trail angel credentials and nonprofit status. Puddles vouched that he never takes a dime from hikers. The rangers gladly passed along word up the trail that he is perfectly fine doing what he’s doing, and to see that he won’t be hassled any further. All this stemming from a kind offer of a plate of food. There’s no pleasing some people – they just thrive off of negativity and are constantly looking to start fights and stir the pot. I’ve had some tough days of hiking, but I’ve never had a hike that ended driving me to the level of anger this guy was demonstrating. Clearly he still has a lot of lessons he still needs to learn from the trail. I felt bad for not vocally standing up to the jagoff or verbally defending Fresh Ground, but I stand by my decision to de-escalate and disengage – nothing was going to get through to this guy. Fresh Ground is an absolute trail angel, and today I met my first trail demon. We laughed about it later, but this is the first time I’ve seen the online nastiness within the hiking community bleed into the real world. This guy had a choice ultimately – to accept trail magic or not, to risk being out here or not. Clearly he is pretty concerned about COVID, and if that’s the case maybe he ought to have stayed home or completely avoided engaging with strangers in conversation. Also saw another bear today, about a half mile before dinner. I was spoiled rotten today and am so appreciative of Fresh Ground – I just wish he hadn’t have had to deal with that jerk for his kindness.
Post Trail Analysis
Shortly after filling out our paper permits at the start of the Shenandoahs, Toy Story turned on the jets and flew past me up the trail. This dude could flat out hike – he made it look so easy too! Didn’t spend that much time getting passed by folks during the journey, but Toy Story was one of the few who would routinely fly right by me. I popped out of the woods just past the weather station and saw the familiar white van, seeing Fresh Ground and Toy Story waving and shouting my name. Fresh Ground walked me through his process – we needed to wash up with soapy water before we touched anything. He takes cleanliness quite seriously in normal times, but with the state of the world at this moment emphasized it even more. Everything he makes is delicious, and you better learn to be comfortable being told “no you’re not” when you claim you’re full. He asked if any other hikers were behind us, and we let him know that Puddles would be coming through a little later on.
Ah, the yahoo who gave Fresh Ground a hard time. I didn’t have many negative interactions on the trail, but unfortunately the encounter with this angry fellow was one of them. This event really bothered me, which is pretty evident from the entry. On one hand, the guy’s not entirely wrong – a hiker feed could be a potential vector for disease transmission during a worldwide pandemic. The reality is I’m sure we’ve all been guilty at times of being too quick to judge, making assumptions without having a complete picture of what’s actually going on. On the other hand, there’s the sanitation, hygiene, and food safety practices taking place which this guy didn’t bother to learn about before going off on his tirade. During a thru hike, interacting with strangers and participating in hiker feeds are COMPLETELY optional, non-mandatory activities. Heck, one of the best parts of thru hiking is the freedom to make decisions – you know where you’re going, you know what the blazes look like that will lead you there, but HOW you get there is an incredibly personal journey. I didn’t make my decisions lightly, especially with the circumstances surrounding 2020. Hitting the pause button was a deeply reasoned choice that was right for me to make at the time. Returning to the trail, with a better understanding of what COVID was and how to keep myself and those around me safe, was a sound choice given my circumstances. Partaking in trail magic isn’t something that people normally have to struggle with or consider, but this year it was. In my view, we were outdoors, with fresh air and UV rays and ample room with which to be socially distant. The food was being served on disposable plates, and we used disposable cups and silverware, eliminating potential cross contamination factors. Fresh Ground’s reputation preceded him – he’s an absolute legend of the trail, and you definitely don’t earn a reputation like that on carelessness. Based on his pristine reputation and our previous conversations at the hostel, I trusted the guy and decided that taking all factors into account, I would absolutely, gratefully partake of his trail magic were it to be offered. The reality is I don’t know the angry man’s story – he may have had close personal experience with COVID. He may have had a family member or close friend incredibly sick with it. I don’t know where he’s coming from; however, he’s in that same boat of not knowing our story, and rather than just moving on and letting us make our own thoroughly reasoned decisions, he chose to seek out a confrontation and went out of his way to “put us in our place.” He’s yelling at us about vectors for transmission, all while not owning responsibility for his own actions of interacting with total strangers. The worst part of this story is that he continued to act as a bully by falsely reporting Fresh Ground to the Shenandoah park rangers.
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