In front of us was a 5-lane highway full of insane rush-hour traffic. Behind us, there was nothing. After a median and another 5 lanes of heavy traffic, there was a raging river full of floating logs and man-eating alligators. And beyond that our backpacks, the Tuscarora Trail, and freedom. Without saying much, we all knew what we had to do. We would need to cross this madness…frogger style. It was me, Kylie, Austin, Veronica…and somehow even David “Spiderman” had made it here. Where the heck had he come from?
But I guess the real question was…who would go first? We wouldn’t get out of here just standing around.
We all started arguing about who should go first. Pandemonium ensued. Austin started mumbling some nonsense about me going first because I was the one leading the Tuscarora Trail hikes. I said that I was just a “participant” and that he should read the warning statements on my trip details. I started yelling at Kylie to go first because she had been with DCUL longer than anyone, she yelled back that I was stupid and that I should shut up. Veronica insisted that Austin should be the first one to go because he didn’t bring any Puddin’ Meat. Austin retorted that if she had brought honeybuns all this wouldn’t be happening.
It was clear we weren’t getting anywhere, and someone had to do something. I glanced at Spiderman, then I glanced at the oncoming traffic. I smelled an opportunity. He wasn’t supposed to be on my trip, anyways. We would find out, once and for all, whether he was Spiderman or not.
I pushed Spiderman into the road. If he was truly Spiderman, he would have done something fancy. Instead he yelled, and an oncoming semi-truck took care of him quickly. Psssh. I knew he was no true Spiderman. But hey, at least we were getting somewhere now. Me, Austin, and Kylie sprinted for our lives and made it to the half-way point and were safe, but Veronica sadly perished when she failed to see an oncoming car.
We still had some ways to go. I tried to pump everyone up. “IF WE DON’T DO THIS, WE’LL NEVER FINISH THE TUSCARORA TRAIL!”. It seemed to work, and we nimbly picked our way through the remaining 5 lanes of traffic. Now we just had to cross the river with floating logs and man-eating alligators. Things were looking very dangerous. If we timed it right, we might be able to hop across the logs without getting eaten.
If we didn’t survive…then who would eat all those precious honeybuns and gallons of ice-cream?
We went for it. By working as a team and calling out the alligators, it seemed like we were making progress. But there were too many. Too many alligators. We were surrounded. Our only choice was to push onward. Austin was nearly to the other side when an alligator snagged his leg, and Kylie was also bitten. I slipped on a log and fell in the water. We were helpless and the alligators were closing in on us. The end was near, and we all said our last words and wished things would end quickly and painlessly.
As the alligators readied themselves for our demise, a group of backpackers suddenly yelled from the shore that they found some free stuff.
I yelled. “HEY WAIT!! THOSE ARE OUR–“
And then we were nothing but a tasty snack.
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Although the weather wasn’t the best, I was in high spirits. There had been a heavy downpour most of the morning, but by the time we started our hike at Hampshire Grade Road the rain had turned to a light drizzle. I was glad to be back out on the Tuscarora Trail after a long break. Joining me were Austin, Kylie, and Veronica. The previous section from Gore VA was mostly a long series of road-walks, which wasn’t too bad I thought. But I know not everyone enjoys road-walking as much as I do. This time it would be more of a mix of fire-roads and single-track trail…and you know there would be some classic Tuscarora Trail road-walking.
The trail was mostly fire-roads until after Sleepy Creek. Along the way some guys in a pickup truck saw us walking and rightly guessed that we were walking the Tuscarora Trail. I was pleasantly surprised. They said they were just “driving around”, and I kind of envied them for a moment, because I couldn’t remember the last time I just “drove around” for fun. But we were just “walkin around” for fun out here on this lovely fire-road, so that was a nice consolation. Austin and I joked for a while about various Tuscarora Trail nicknames, and I think he won our little contest with his “Tusca-rorgeous/Tusca-gorgeous”.
The section of trail around the Devils Nose overlook was one of the highlights of the trail for me so far. It was this pine tree oasis where you would think one doesn’t belong, but it was there. I’m guessing that’s where the shelter name “spruce pine hollow” comes from. Man, I’m so smart. We got some nice ridgeline hiking for some miles and officially passed the halfway point of the Tuscarora before we descended down to the Spruce Pine Hollow Shelter. We were treated to a World War II battlefield of destruction as a massive tree had fallen down. Somehow the shelter had dodged the worst of it, but we couldn’t say the same for the picnic table and bear pole. I don’t know why there was a bowsaw in the shelter, but we had some time to kill so we all took turns doing some shelter maintenance. Nothing like some impromptu DCUL trail maintenance!
The remaining 11ish miles into Hancock on Sunday weren’t nearly as scenic as the day before, for this was the road walking portion and the more infamous “River Rd” section, which arguably might be the most dangerous? part of the entire trail. There is no shoulder and nowhere to hide for about 4 miles with cars going around 60mph. But it did provide me with the inspiration for the intro, because at times I did feel like we were little frogs trying to dodge traffic. Thankfully most of the drivers were very nice in giving us space. Our timing also helped I think, since most people were going into town so we had one side of the road mostly to ourselves. The PATC has obviously done some work in making the road-walk better in recent times, because a re-route shaved off a bit of the road-walk for us.
Thankfully we all survived the road-walk, finally crossed into Maryland, and got some brunch at Buddy Lou’s in Hancock to finish up the hike. It was a really nice weekend and I really appreciate everyone who came out to join me!
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Photo Credit: Austin
DC UL Backpacking 
What a great trip report! I laughed. I cried. It became a part of me. I particularly loved the cameo appearance of Spider-Man (until the end, of course). That guy always makes a story pop. Well done, Baseball!
— David O (“Spider-Man”)
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