(Paul Wolfe Shelter (mile 859.3) - Calf Mountain Shelter (mile 872))

We started hiking at 8:10am with only 5 miles to go until Rockfish Gap. From there, we planned to catch a ride into Waynesboro, home of the legendary Ming Garden Buffet, an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet popular with thru-hikers. Waynesboro would also be our resupply stop before entering Shenandoah National Park this afternoon. The most interesting site of the morning was the ruins of an old homestead marked with a sign that read “W. J. Mayo Homeplace.” We joked that maybe mayonnaise was invented here. Later Googling revealed that W. J. Mayo was actually one of the founders of the Mayo Clinic, although Wikipedia states that he was born in Le Sueur, Minnesota and spent most of his life in Rochester, MN. I am not sure what to make of this conflicting information🤷

We made it to Rockfish Gap with six people, so we knew we would need either a big truck or van to shuttle us into town. Fortunately, Paul Wolfe Shelter featured a list of trail angel shuttle drivers who would offer free rides to hikers from Rockfish Gap. We consulted a picture of the list and decided to call a driver named "Yellow Truck,” who said he could pick us up in 15 minutes. The wait was super cold and windy. As we stood near the road, I felt the wind slowly convection-ing away all the heat I had built up during the morning hiking.

After what felt like an eternity of suffering, Yellow Truck surprised us by showing up in a red truck. We asked him what happened to his yellow truck and his gruff reply was “Broke down!” He struck me as a large, surly gentleman. From inside the truck he shouted “Alright! Girls in the front, boys in the back!” I hopped in the back with Katie, Delta, and Puddin.

The drive into Waynesboro was short but super cold and windy. Katie began the drive perched on top of the truck bed’s spare tire. This seemed to really agitate Yellow Truck who started yelling: “tell that boy to sit down back there!!!” A combination of his gruff voice and the wind made communication difficult, and it took him a few yells before Katie understood the command, which seemed to agitate Yellow Truck even more. I somehow managed to hang on to a bit of my body heat by the the time we reached a Sunoco gas station on the outskirts of town. Yellow Truck stopped unexpectedly at the Sunoco and briefly held court with another local vagabond who seemed equally surprised by the red truck. After our foray at Sunoco, Yellow Truck dropped us at Kroger where we resupplied before heading to lunch at Ming Garden Chinese Buffet.

Ming Garden was everything a thru-hiker could want… endless mounds of greasy food. We all ate until our stomachs reached capacity. After lunch, I stayed at Ming Garden to talk to AC while the other Dinos headed to a coffee shop. AC and I discussed our next chance to meet up, and it was decided that she would meet me somewhere in northern Virginia or southern Pennsylvania and we would make a weekend trip up to Philadelphia. I have never been to Philly, so the prospect of spending time with AC in a cool new city was thrilling.

I met up with the other Dinos and we arranged another shuttle with Yellow Truck, who dropped us back at Rockfish Gap. From the gap, the southern entrance of Shenandoah National Park was only 0.3 miles away. We reached the entrance, which was just a sign next to the trail, and Caroline filled out a hiking permit covering our group. She dropped one half of the carbon copy form in the drop box and kept the other half for the northern boundary. We hiked on into the legendary Shenandoah National Park, and I reflected to myself that this was my first time in the park.

After about 4.5 miles of gradual, mostly uphill climbing, we reached Bear Den Mountain, which featured a set of weather radar towers and a handful of tractor seats sprouting from the ground. The tractor seats looked like some sort of playground feature. A commentor on Guthook claimed to have spoken with a trail maintenance crew who explained that the mountain was once an apple orchard and the family that owned the land (who would eventually grant easements for the AT) installed the seats so they could watch the sunset together. I have no idea if that’s true, but it is certainly a nice story.

After another 0.5 miles, we reached Beagle Gap where we met Katie's parents who brought us BBQ, cold drinks, and plenty of junk food for dinner. Despite our heavy lunch, we were all able to put away some BBQ.

After dinner, we only had 2 miles to get to Calf Mountain Shelter. Our last hour of hiking took us over the summit of Little Calf Mountain, which offered fine views of Shenandoah bathed in golden hour light.

We reached the 0.3 mile side trail to Calf Mountain Shelter just as the afternoon light was starting to fade. Considering our stop in Waynesboro and our stop for dinner, we had still managed to knock out about 12.7 miles. I did not feel like setting up my tent and opted to join the others in the shelter. Jasmine was planning to wake up super early so that she could meet her Girl Scout Troop leader, who was planning to join her for a couple days of hiking. Delta said he would also wake up early, but the rest of us felt good about sleeping in.