I emerged from the cocoon of my sleeping bag, had another hearty instant oatmeal breakfast, packed up, and began the climb out of the valley i spent the night in. The sun was struggling to break past the forest canopy in the morning but i was optimistic that the warmth would come to the world soon.
McFadden Cemetery-baffled as to how anyone dragged a hearse out here. the cemetry sign was riddled with bullet holes, but alas what else is there for good ole boys to get up to out here
My boots were still waterlogged and by midmorning my feet were aching again. I made my way to the familiar gravel forest road I'd driven Baby Harold through, and got a call out to Jack and my Mom to tell them I was OK. After a short stretch of crunchy road the path returned to trail and I dropped down into the Cane Creek Valley, near the Rockastle River. I was excited to find Van Hook Falls today, to stand in the mist on this first sun-soaked day of my trip. I took a wrong turn onto the connecting Rockastle Narrows East trail, encountered some bewilderment as blazes eluded me on the path, but by 2:30 I was boiling up another ramen lunch, drying out my feet, and toking up in front of Van Hook Falls. You take a wooden flight of stairs down a turn and there it is, cascading off a ledge in the creek down in front of a rock structure down to a pool flanked by huge slabs of broken earth. By lumchtime i had gone 7 miles, with 8 more to make it to tonight's campsite near Holly Bay on Lake Laurel.
I didn't cross paths with anyone hiking until this day, but in Cane Creek Valley i saw families, mountain bikers, and horse riders.
rock structures in cane creek valley and the blue of the creek illuminated by the sun
The trail then criss-crossed various creeks and streams, which i felt like i was flying past fueled by ramen and the hope of laurel lake coming up. I left cane creek valley when I came up onto the road at KY 192
came to a placard at the KY 192 trailhead, I started up in hazel patch and by that point had made it 28 miles down to where the star was.
Bumbled through some more Laurel County woods until i got my first taste of the Lake. The blue of Ben Branch reflected the afternoon sky beyond the trees ensconcing the trail.
My first look at Laurel Lake, and a perplexing blank trail sign.
By the time I had gotten to Laurel Lake, my pace had slowed down considerably, because I was admiring the vast blue of the lake swallowing the land, but also because my feet hurt like sin. They had spent all day trapped and chafing against wet boots that now smelled like they were culturing some kind of fungal colony. Every step was agony as I followed the trail lakeside, rounding peninsulas and passing multiple side trails along the way. Thankfully the terrain here was not as rugged as the valleys I'd encountered earlier in the day. Passed some day hikers along the lake, as well as mountain bikers enjoying the thrilling slopes and curves of the trail. Men fishing in rowboats bobbed idly on the water, speedboats whizzed by. I passed what I guess was the marina which housed a couple dozen speedboats in the water, and some docked houseboats. Soon I had come up to a side trail leading up to Holly Bay Campground. I tried the privies there--locked, the campground shuttered due to the virus. I drew some water from a campground pump and realized it was murky-looking, a bit of shimmering oil floated to the top. I saved it just in case I couldn't find anything more suitable to drink.
Around 7:30 I finally hobbled to my campsite for the night, a clearing on a finger of earth extending into the lake. Though I was aware of the speedboats leaking oil into the lake and all the pollutants probably floating around in the water, I figured Laurel Lake water probably wasn't any more polluted than the municipal water you'd get in Lexington, filled up Jack's camelback and nalgene with it, dropped in some chlorine tablets and prayed the shits would spare my intestines.
I made macaroni for dinner, and reveled in the sunset reflected on the Lake at the close of this grueling day. I was slowly toasting my brain watching the world dim on the Laurel. It was the first clear night sky I saw on the trail, and I was entranced at the bare branches of the trees reaching up to a luminous half moon and the stars bright away from the light pollution of the city. A lakeside cacophony comprised of gentle waves lapping against the banks, ducks and crickets calling out, and distant speedboats roaring into the night lulled me to sleep. I was vaguely aware of two fishing men dragging their boat up out of the water into the bank around 9:30, and I was swimming in my sleep through the wonder of what Friday would bring me, wonder as vast as the lake beyond my tent. I had my own little corner of the lake to myself, and the moonlight was leaking in through the fabric of my tent, as if the moon was blessing my sleep with its eternal guard.
im naming my firstborn laurel don't @ me
the section i walked on thursday
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