The Tropical Storm hit that night. We lay in the Hurricane Shelter and listened to it pour on the tin roof. This made me a little homesick, as I thought of listening to the rain on my own tin roof back in California.
The next morning it was still raining. Undaunted, we packed up and made it our plan to just hike the six miles to Old Orchard Shelter. We didn't have pack covers to keep the rain off of our packs. I did bring garbage bags along to put the packs in, but, once again, my sheer slothfulness kept me from wrapping the packs. "It isn't raining that hard", I thought to myself.
It doesn't take much rain to get a pack soaked. On top of that, Taran's shoes fell apart. The soles separated, making him walk with a flappy shoe. Rain got into it. And given this genetic propensity to overlook the obvious, he also only brought along anklet socks to wear. Cotton. Can you guess the result?
The result will become obvious on Day Four.
Again we climbed up and down a mountain. We made it to Old Orchard Shelter and, once again, made Ramen. I celebrated with Jim Beam. Pringles and SubMan caught up to us at the shelter. They pulled out a few sandwiches from Subway and shared them with us! To each according to need; from each according to ability---the story of the Trail.
SubMan and Pringles marched on; we never saw them again. Taran and I decided to pack it in for the day. Rest. Plan out the rest of the trip. We were horribly behind schedule to make it to Damascus (our ultimate goal). Planning is best done with a bottle of Jim Beam.
Right about then six Grannies came to the shelter. I kid you not. These were six 60 to 70 year old women who were on their first day of an 8 day trip. They had originally planned to stay at Old Orchard shelter for the night. That's when I spilled a second pot full of Ramen. And then dropped several other items.
The sophisticated Grannies took a second look at us; looked at the cramped size of the shelter and the bottle of Jim Beam---and then decided it was in their best interests to continue on another six miles to Hurricane Shelter. They did have M and M's but didn't share with us. I did offer them some Jim Beam. The Grannies didn't wave as they left.
The end of the Third Day. Mileage: 6 miles. Total mileage for the trip: 19 miles.
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