Day 0: June 4,2008

(Dwight) We started hiking out of Pearisburg Va. around 3:20pm. The woman in charge, wasnt interested in what we were doing until it sank-in, we were going to leave the car for 7 weeks.

The hike up Peter mt from the New River was a familiar slap in the face from our friend, tha AT. Up, up, up, rocks and roots. It was humid, till around 5:30pm. We were both beat and needed a break. We ate dinner. The first few days of hike are always awkware. You fumble wih all those tasks you did second nature on past hikes, you can never find anything in your pack. You trip down the trail. Near the ridge line we encounter our first mountain laural. Unfortunately it looks like they are past peek. The May apples have finished blooming and it looks like we have missed the spring bloom in Virginia.

We crossed paths with 6 AT thru hikers. They think they are at the back of the pack.

We walked about 8 miles today and are approx 7 miles from the Allegheny trail. As we walked the AT Susan and I reminissed and talked about how much of this trail we have forgotten. I think this is and indication that we will enjoy walking the ALT in both direction, getting a chance to see things we missed on the first pass.