Day 9 : Friday, June 13

(Dwight) The night on the Greenbrier was nice. The bugs were acceptable. We took a bath in the river, and slept clean. We had a plan for finding our way back-on track. Well the plan wasn't very good. What looked like a good bushwach route on the map, turned us right back down to te river. We thought we had gone off course on a blue blaze trail which was also marked on our ALT map, but the map topography and the lay of the land didnt match. So, our next option was to hike back to last 'good' blaze we found on the trail. This was about a 2 mile walk backwards.

Now, when we got to the location in question, there was the turn we had missed. It was much more obvious from the opposite direction, and at 10am today. So, this morning we logged 3 hrs. of 'bonus miles', otherwise known as miles walked wandering the woods, lost. The remainder of the morning we attempted to get a glimpse of the NRAO radio dish. The leaf cover is so thick and the day hazy but we got a look at two dishes. Hard to tell if they were 'the dish'.

We saw a mother bear and 4 cubs in the afternoon, on Slathen{?) Hollow Rd-a wide grassy trail. They scattered in all directions. One cub up a tree, one cub to the right, mom to the left, and two cubs ran in tandom down the trail in front of us. This made it difficult to follow th golden rule: never get between a bear and her cubs.

Mom bear didn't seem agressive, so we decided to continue down the trail. It was neat to once again watch the pair of cubs motor a getaway as we caught up to them. I dont understand how they will all find each other, I hope they were all reunited.

We spotted a second bear near the NRAO boundary. There are 'no hunting' signs. Maybe it acts as a bear refuge.

For the last 5 miles into Durbin we had trail. The trail had been churned up, and there was a visible foot path. After some discussion, we decided it was horses. Although for miles there were no droppings.

We needed to get the Durbin Post Office by 5pm to get our mail drop.
Susan ran ahead and by the time I arrived she had engaged the post misters and a few town folk. We got the scoop on the town. Groceries at Kindler. Dinner at a bar called Upper Inn Club. Spend the night at a campground on the Greenbeir River. Thats about all this little town has to offer. Showers at the campground were warm, site was bythe river and bug free.