Has been a long furlough from hiking because of Parade-the-Circle participation by Wendy and April, but we are back at it! Wendy has planned a 6 mile ‘welcome-back’ hike just to jolt us back into it. Actually I think the break was good to heal up some of my nagging aches. Figured we could do this mileage because was going to be all on-road walking. Despite it spitting rain off/on all day with no sunshine, we had quite a few surprises to make it a great experience. This was perhaps best on-road hike because much of it was on quiet back roads. Overall, though, we seemed to go uphill much more than downhill. Along the way we passed a farm stand where we bought tomatoes, a nice sitting spot to eat our Stone Oven treats for our mid-hike snack break, then turned on Caves Rd and passed Patterson’s Fruit Farm where, of course, we bought more snacks. Shout out to Patterson’s for letting us store our purchases there until we returned after our hike in the car to pick them up- a back saver. Next we had two amazing and unique (to us) hiking experiences. First, a car slowed down next to me and the driver asked if I was hiking the Buckeye Trail! WHOA- that was a FIRST! After I said ‘Yes’ he replied that his son was thru-hiking from Cincinnati and was about a mile ahead of us; called the ladies over and his story elevated our spirits- THANK YOU! Then a ways down the road a women gardening in her front yard waved Wendy over and asked if she was hiking the Buckeye Trail- AGAIN- we were incredulous, twice in one day? Turns out Christine was a trail ‘angel’ and helped hikers in need- we had a very nice talk, a welcome break, and a new sense that a community existed out along the trail- very encouraging. Our last adventure came when we arrived at Chapin Forest parking lot where our car was parked- only to have April tell us that her car keys were 6 miles behind us in Wendy’s car! How did we get back? We used a trick from our kid’s toolbox = Uber! We felt so cool (and only a little bit embarrassed).
