Day 111-A Deli, and Multiple Trail Magic

July 7-15.1 miles (plus .4 over rocks to the shelter)-Brink Shelter to Rutherford Shelter-AT mile 1336.0

We got up this morning, and hiked our butts off to the Sunrise Deli (average 2.5 miles/hour). 

Along the way, I saw several of my little orange friends. Notice how this one is not so bright orange? According to Sure Foot, they change to a greenish color. 

Here’s a nice bright orange one. 

The lake in the distance is Fairfax Lake. 

Ahhh...approaching the deli!

Sure Foot had a breakfast sandwich. I had a grilled cheese and bacon on Texas Toast (all the breakfast sandwiches had eggs). Then, we both ordered sandwiches to go, to eat for lunch up the trail. I even packed out a Gatorade. When we went to pay for our food, John, the owner, said he and a trail angel named Moose, had a partnership going where Moose gave John five dollar bills to give to hikers as a discount on their food. So, for me, my two sandwiches, Snapple, Pineapple Juice, and Gatorade cost me $9.00 (because John was very reasonable with his food prices)! How nice was that??? He also had a spigot so we could get water. 

All full up on second breakfast, we headed up the trail. Not even a quarter of a mile along the trail, we came to this. 

Well! We had to check it out! It was Moose!

He was just setting up, and asked us if we had eaten at the deli. We told him we had. He asked if we wanted some fresh fruit. No smart thru-hiker ever turns down fresh fruit! I had a banana, and Sure Foot had a nectarine. He also had cold drinks. Knowing the day was short on water sources, I downed a Powerade. Moose put out a ton of food! I packed a small bag of pretzels for lunch with my sandwich. He also offered to slackpack us to the ranger station at Highpoint State Park, but we declined. What a great Trail Angel!

We finally got back on the trail. I was going along when i spotted this little porcupine. 

Awfully cute for a pointy little fella!

It wasn’t too long before we came to another fire tower. This one was the Culver Fire Tower. Of course, I went up. 

Sure Foot down below

A bit overcast for the day (but still warm and humid). 

It was getting close to noon, so I looked at Guthook to see what was coming up that might make a good lunch spot. Sunrise Mtn summit was just .8 away. I thought that would be an appropriate place to eat our lunches from the Sunrise Deli! I just hoped there would be someplace in the shade to sit. This is what I came to at the top. 

I’d say this is a perfect place for lunch!

There was only one bench, but we only needed one! It was so nice to sit comfortably. I took my shoes and socks off (not my toe socks, because they are a pain to get back on when sweaty). 

My lunch. John was kind enough to put the condiments in separate containers so my sandwich didn’t get soggy).

We enjoyed a leisurely lunch of over an hour. Then we figured the trail wasn’t going to hike itself, so we continued on. Just below the summit was a short trail to a parking lot. I told Sure Foot I wondered if there was a trash can there. He didn’t think there would be, but I decided to check anyway. Lo and behold, there was a trash can! I was able to get rid of all my lunch trash! I love it when that happens!

We had scoped out the water situation. There was a shelter before the Rutherford Shelter that we were heading to. In the comments on Guthook, it said there was a water cache (the comment was done on July 3) in the bear box. We were really hoping there was still water there. We would have to carry it 3 miles (Rutherford’s water source didn’t look promising), but that would be better than no water. Sure Foot got there before me, and gave me the double thumbs up! Yay! There was water! Thanks to Trail Angel Alf. It had even just been resupplied. There were four of those big water cooler jugs of water!

This one was also pretty full. We didn’t have to add water to it from the big bottles. 

We hiked the three more miles to Rutherford Shelter. It doesn’t seem to be a very well used shelter (probably because it is .4 off the trail on a pretty rocky blue blaze). We are the only ones here. There are deer in the woods (the shelter is in a mowed clearing), and the fireflies are twinkling. The whippoorwills are doing their over and over “whippoorwill” song. There’s a breeze that is helping lower the humidity. It’s time for me to go to sleep.