Date: 5/19/04
Starting Location: Lewis Spring
Destination: Pass Mt. Hut
Miles: 19.7
Total Miles: 937
Interesting night last night. A few hours after the thunderstorms passed, the power came back on at Big Meadows Lodge so Footloose and I went down to the taproom to enjoy some always delicious beer while listening to some live bluegrass/folk music. Tons of fun to hear music for a change and sing along with everyone to some familiar songs. Unfortunately for us, the late night got worse when our nice rustic room in the Lodge turned out to be more infested with mice than any shelter I've stayed in so far. We could hear them all night in the walls, ceiling, and crawling over our food that we'd laid out on the floor. So, after watching one mouse try desperately to get out of the waste basket after falling in, we'd had enough of the mouse circus and hung a pseudo-bearbag in the bathroom. All this, yes, inside a lodge, of course.
Well, we survived anyway and after a nice breakfast in the dining room, Footloose and I moved on down the Hamburger Highway (as the trail is often called by thru-hikers in Shenandoah N.P. because of how often you can eat real food) to Skyland for lunch, where we met up with Tortoise. A beer, some chicken, a pork bbq, and some blackberry ice cream later, it was off to put the finishing touches on a long, but very delicious day of hiking and eating.