July 8th, 2023. That was the day. It was forecasted to be hot. Oh so very hot. 90 degrees. Plus humidity. It would feel more like 95 degrees. I would make them suffer. I would give them 5000 feet of elevation gain…and 28 miles. Oh yes. It would be fun. I rubbed my hands together devilishly. I laughed. 8 victims. I laughed again. I felt at peace. I felt alive.
Who did they think they were, anyways? Coming out on one of MY hikes. MY adventures. MY backpacking trip. Were they worthy? Could they withstand the heat? The pressure? Did they have the commitment? I would make them prove their worth, that’s for sure. But there was a small problem. The forecast was showing a high chance of rain and thunderstorms and that would cool them off. I couldn’t allow that to happen. I couldn’t let my victims get off that easy. A little…magic was needed.
I drove to the supermarket and purchased some potatoes…8 of them to be exact. They would be my new friends. Oh yes, they would. But they would need names for my magic to work. I started marking them one by one…Mark, Emily, Adam, Abhi, Kylie, Austin, Dmitri, Vera. I could hardly control my excitement. I drooled.
I pulled out a baking sheet and arranged my new friends around and threw them in the oven. I didn’t bother with any cooking spray. They didn’t deserve it. They looked hungry, but they didn’t deserve any food either. I decided to give each of them a quality shower of salt. A lot of salt. I felt bad for a second…no, I didn’t. I was loving this. I laughed again. I added one small drop of water on each of them to simulate dehydration. That would be enough water for them. I think I heard a small cry for help.
I selected bake on the oven and cranked it up to 425 degrees. I heard screams for sure now, but it wasn’t hot enough. I slowly turned it up…430…445…460…480..500 degrees. I kept pushing the button maniacally but it wouldn’t go any higher. “I’ll show them”, I muttered. I opened the oven door, gave them a quick breeze, and slammed it shut again. I drank an ice cold glass of water in front of them and leaned back against the oven door. “Ah…what a time to be alive..” I felt a small push against me from inside the oven. They were desperate. I smiled again. “You’re going to have a great time tomorrow friends”, I said aloud. It was getting late. I stumbled off to bed…and I made sure to leave the oven on.
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For those who don’t know the Tuscarora Trail has 22 sections. The “first” section going northbound is actually section 22. A little confusing. DCUL has hosted the first section of the Tuscarora Trail a few times before, but it’s a bit uncommon. Anyways, when I was planning this trip I noticed that on past trips DCUL would start this hike at the Little Devil Stairs Trailhead instead of accessing the Tuscarora Trail more directly from Skyline Drive. It makes sense. The logistics are easier, you avoid Shenandoah park fees, and you get access to some great trails. But I wanted to be different and hopefully more interesting. I noticed instead of hiking up Little Devil Stairs we could take a slightly less direct route by taking Keyser Run Road to the Hull School Trail, then hiking the piney ridge trail to meet up with the Appalachian Trail and eventually the Tuscarora Trail. The elevation would be slightly more gradual and we would hike some lesser used trails. It seemed like a good idea. Game on.
Of course I always worry if people would be interested in my weird ideas, especially a long hike on a hot summer day, but that wasn’t a problem at all as I found 8 awesome people to go backpacking with. We all met up at Vienna metro and took 4 cars to Elizabeth Furnace. We then piled into 2 cars and drove off to Little Devil Stairs parking to begin our adventure.
On the way Dmitri recounted how on his recent adventure to Trout Run Valley he found some Serviceberries and talked about how juicy and delicious they were. I had never heard of them, and neither had Emily or Kylie. “Do you mean juneberries?” Emily asked. Nobody knew. But the berry talk ensued for most of the ride. After the trip Emily decided to investigate and apparently Serviceberries are also called… Shadbush, shadwood, shadblow, sarvisberry, sarvis, wild pear, saskatoon, sugarplum, wild-plum, chuckley pear, and….juneberry. Well done Emily!
We arrived at Little Devil Stairs around 9:30am and were treated to a lot of Wild Raspberry bushes. At least I think they were raspberries. Anyways, they were red, juicy, and delicious. The first mile up Keyser Run Road was full of them and nobody had ransacked them yet. A nice way to start things off.
The first few miles were fine. I hiked on and off with Adam, Abhi, Mark, and Austin. We crossed a few streams and backcountry campsites. The others were all ahead. It didn’t take long for the heat and humidity to kick in, and by the time we linked up with the Appalachian Trail some of us were contemplating our life choices and covered in sweat. Around 12:30 we caught up with the others and had lunch in the middle of some random access road. Like I said, we were all sweaty at this point and things weren’t getting any cooler…..until Austin amazed us all. He had actually brought frozen grapefruit and passed some around to share. I must say it was amazing. I had never seen that before and on a hot summer day it really hit the spot. Everyone agreed. How could I not include that in the title? I will certainly remember that little trick next time I go backpacking in the heat.
Not long after we took a left on the Tuscarora/Overall Run trail. The official start of the Tuscarora Trail. But you’d hardly know it. Just another one of those hard to read metal trail signs in Shenandoah. Not much after that we arrived at Overall Run Falls. We filled up our bottles and took a small break in the shade.
Abhi and I started the descent down to U.S 340 alone. We saw a small black bear along the way. It was his first bear sighting. Kylie would also see a bear the following morning on the opposite ridge. Dmitri would grumble that he hadn’t seen a bear yet. Thankfully nobody died crossing U.S 340. There wasn’t a shoulder so you just hoped nobody would hit you.
Abhi and I caught up to Adam on the road walk. I thought the walk through the Valley was actually really pretty, but maybe I’m just crazy. We got some great views and the added cloud cover, breeze, and friendly conversation made it enjoyable. Adam and I reminisced about our Appalachian Trail thru-hikes. We crossed over the Shenandoah River and then walked by Low Water Campground. By this point it was around 5pm and we had hiked about 17 miles. Unfortunately the heat and climbs had taken their toll and Abhi and Adam decided to call it a day. Ominously, the moment they got in the car to go back it started raining. I would walk the next few miles alone.
I caught up with Mark and Vera about a mile before camp. It was good to see them. The climb up the east ridge of Massanutten after a long day was pretty brutal and I had to stop and catch my breath a few times. Later I discovered that right as it had started raining down in the Valley Dmitri and Kylie were looking down from above. They were the frontrunners and had dodged the rain. Must’ve been nice!
Mark and I strolled into camp together. Everyone else was already setting up camp. A Whip-poor-will started singing in the distance. Thankfully I had remembered to bring my ear-plugs. For dinner I had a Wawa burrito, Mark went with white chicken tacos (backpacking style), Vera had a beef stroganoff meal, Emily a Chicken Risotto meal, and Kylie went with Ramen. I can’t remember what Dmitri and Austin ate. It was nice having the shelter all to ourselves but we were mostly too tired to enjoy it. We quickly went to sleep.
We were all on trail by 6am. We still had a good climb and around 7ish miles before we got back to the cars at Elizabeth Furnace. Thankfully we had a cooler full of cold drinks and bananas curtesy of Mark. I’ll have to start doing that. I also need to start bringing a pair of dry clothes. Emily and Mark had forgotten theirs so I wasn’t the only one who smelled bad. For breakfast we all went to Queen Street Diner in Strasburg. I’ve always been a fan of diners. Cheap and simple food and perfect for hungry hikers like us. This particular diner was interesting though because they offered a delicacy known as…Puddin’ Meat. Yes, without a G. That’s how you know it’s real. I asked our waitress what on earth Puddin’ Meat was. She explained it was scrapple (a combination of various pork scraps mixed with cornmeal) served pudding style. She was even kind enough to point out a customer who came in every week to have his daily fix of Puddin’ Meat. She even let me try some. It was actually pretty good!
And that was about it. Adam took half the group back to Vienna Metro while I carpooled Emily and Mark back to our cars back at Little Devil Stairs. Congratulations to our newest Veteran Members: Austin and Vera. That was a very honorable and hard way to earn it and certainly is very well deserved. Thank you to everyone who helped with the Shuttle, it definitely wouldn’t have been possible without you guys. Until the next adventure!
– David U (Baseball)
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*Photo Credit to Mark and Austin
DC UL Backpacking 