Good evening! Partly clear and 53 degrees at the Monongahela National Forest. There is a southeast breeze at 5 mph. 🍃. The dew point is 43 degrees.

It was a beautiful day hiking at Dolly Sods. 🚶Definitely the best day so far on vacation. Dolly Sods was amazing for color, and I had a great campfire back at camp. Tired 😴 after hiking more than ten miles 🔟, it seemed like I barely went that far as with the open sods of the area, you can see a long way. Later on in the afternoon I stopped at Seneca Rocks. If it was earlier I would have climbed the Seneca Rocks but it was 5:45 pm and sunset 🌇 was just around the corner. ⌛I downshifted to first gear and took breaks going down Dolly Sods Road and didn’t have any issues with the brakes. I thought about stopping by Spruce Knob Mountain to watch the sun set from West Virginia’s highest peak at 4,860 feet but I didn’t want to drive back to camp an hour away in the darkness.

There was a Southern Wedding 💒 at the Bear Rocks today in Dolly Sods. Kind of odd to see all those people in suits standing in the Mountain Laurel and Blueberry bushes but it’s certainly a beautiful place to get married in the wilderness. ♥ Looked like a beautiful ceremony in the wilderness. Very lovely, it looked like a real Appalachian couple 👫 not a high priced ceremony.

It was pretty crossing the Appalachian divide on US 33 this evening 🚚 except for the part behind a slow moving truck. US 33 in that part is pretty wide and while there are some hairpin curves ⤵ it’s fairly wide and an easy drive. Harmon WV is a cute Appalachian town nestled in the mountains, I’d eventually want to live in a place like that but not in the village proper but up in the hills. 🏡 Probably with open burning laws more like Pennsylvania though.

Tonight will be mostly cloudy 🌥, with a low of 51 degrees at 1am. 10 degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around September 18th. Maximum dew point of 47 at 6am. South wind 5 to 8 mph. Nice mild evening with the full moon or pretty close. 🌕 In 2018, we had light drizzle in the evening, which became mostly clear by the early hours of the morning. It was somewhat humid. It got down to 45 degrees. The record low of 22 occurred back in 1964.

Had a nice little camp fire 🔥 for a while now that the burn ban is over. Made sure to dig out the pit well before starting the fire and cleared all the leaves nearby, moved the tent further away and made sure to drown the coals and bury them in the pit to make sure that the fire was cold before bed. Probably excessive as this part of the Monongahela National Forest is not sioe dry – there is water in the ditch and digging through the leaf litter you can feel the dampness in the soil. But based on how easy the dry wood I used for firewood is obvious the dead wood is primed to burn. The fire was fantastic and made quick work of the camp trash.

Tonight is the Hunter Moon 🌕 or pretty darn close to it. The sun will rise at 7:23 am with the first light at 6:56 am, which is 59 seconds later than yesterday. 🌄 Tonight will have 12 hours and 38 minutes of darkness, an increase of 2 minutes and 31 seconds over last night.

Tomorrow will be scattered showers, mainly between 10am and 2pm. I’ll probably sleep in tomorrow and if it’s really drizzling in the morning, hot tent with a good book. Mostly cloudy 🌦, with a high of 54 degrees at 7am. Seven degrees below normal, which is similar to a typical day around October 30th. Maximum dew point of 52 at 10am. West wind 10 to 13 mph. Chance of precipitation is 50%. New precipitation amounts of less than a tenth of an inch possible. Doesn’t sound like a a major rain event, should be good enough at least for visiting Blackwater Falls State Park tomorrow. Batteries are well charged from the sun today and driving so it’s not a big concern for me. 🔋 Probably not a torrent going over the falls but the Blackwater Creek looked full enough when I crossed it yesterday. A year ago, we had light rain in the morning, which became light rain by afternoon. The high last year was 61 degrees. The record high of 85 was set in 1954. There was a dusting of snow in 1904.❄

In four weeks on November 8 the sun will be setting at 5:10 pm (Standard Time) in Davis WV,🌄 which is one hour, 35 minutes and 39 seconds earlier then tonight. In 2018 on that day, we had partly cloudy and temperatures between 49 and 31 degrees. Typically, you have temperatures between 51 and 34 degrees. The record high of 75 degrees was set back in 1975.

Looking ahead, November 🥧 is in 3 weeks, Veterans Day 🇺🇸 is a month away, Buy Nothing Day 🛍️ is in 7 weeks, Saint Nicholas Day 🎅 is in 8 weeks and Latest Sunrise of the Winter 🌄️ is in 12 weeks.

Never see any New York license plates in West Virginia, even though West Virginia is the best Virginia. It’s more scenic, quieter and generally nicer and less southern, less urban, less traffic and mountainous then the inferior Virginia.

Generally the reaction I get from New Yorkers when I come down here is, “what’s in West Virginia to see and do“. Maybe it’s a good thing it’s a blank space on their map.

Today I hiked about 10 miles back in the Dolly Sods. Distance is deceiving with the open plains. I wish I had worn sunscreen, not much shade. #RedderThanWVRedneck

“Washboarded”

I decided to take Lanesboro Road. This year I used first gear all the way down, kept my foot off the brake and gas, coasting at 10 mph and did not overheat the brakes. #winning #almostheavenwv

Good evening! Clear and 50 degrees at the Monongahela National Forest. There is a east-southeast breeze at 5 mph. 🍃.

It was a long drive down to West Virginia but I enjoyed it and have the most perfect campsite that I love. 😍 It’s a small site but the Mountain Laurel of Cannan Heights makes it amazing. As does the beautiful moonlit evening. The colors were absolutely specular on Mount Davis in Pennsylvania, although honestly the high point of both Pennsylvania and Maryland are a bit underwhelming. I was surprised how many Amish and Mennonite farms there were around Mount Davis and Somerset. The simple life is beautiful, although I’ve heard that the Amish don’t always use the most environmentally sensitive practices with their farm operations.

No campfire for me in West Virginia but it’s not a cold night here and the heater was fine. This being a small site, they’re wouldn’t really be room for a fire 🔥 along with a tent. Northern West Virginia though isn’t bone 🍖 dry after the rain earlier in the week – you could feel the leaf litter moisture 🍂and even see a few puddles around. Down south in the state is much drier and I get with the breeze especially in these higher elevations the authorities are concerned, especially with reckless campers. I set the table up over the fire pit and am saving the burnables for the overnight in Pennsylvania on the way home. They’ll work fine for getting the fire started back up north. Ducks 🐔that there is the fire ban down here.

I took a mostly different route down here then I did in 2015, heading down Pennsylvania 36 through Pennsylvania coal country and Punxsutawney. Yes, I did stop at Gobler’s Knob. You could see the hills of GOB left over from coal mining, 🗻 with their sometimes steep slopes and often free of anything but grasses and a few bushes. Until the 1960s, coal companies didn’t have to do any restoration of the land after doing strip mining. Even now, when you strip the to the top soil, it’s almost impossible to restore anything close to a natural cover – soil compaction, oxygenation and natural bacteria are all destroyed when you strip the land down even if you try to rebuild the surface. 🚜 Farmers know darn well that any heavy equipment run over a farm field can do enormous damage from compaction – and it can take generations of tillage and manure spreading 💩 to bring land back up to its natural fertility.

Driving through Johnstown Penna there was what appeared to be a wildfire on the hill outside of it 💨and a lot of haze. 👀 It also looked like a building 🏢 was on fire, from all the black smoke but it could have been a controlled burn. At any rate, between the fires and the coal fired power plants, 🏭 the was super hazy around there, a brown ozone haze. By the time I got down to Mount Davis outside of Somerset the haze wasn’t bad and the views were excellent.

The Somerset extension of the US 219 expressway is a major time savings over the windy Mason-Dixon Turnpike 🌉 with some really high bridges and deep rock cuts, which weren’t done when I came down here in 2015.

Maryland 495 was a nice alternative to US 219 for heading down to West Virginia. 🐮 A lot of dairy farms along there, lots of farmers harvesting crops and a few were spreading manure 💩 including one with an old fashioned belt spreader towed by an open cab old Ford Tractor. I bet he took a shower 🚿 wbn he got home.

Midday on a Wednesday, there wasn’t a lot of Pennsylvania rednecks burning trash 🔥. I did see one garage somewhere burning a pile of debris behind the shop including a tread from a truck tire and a house outside of North Cambria burning something in a burn barrel that was producing a lot of thin black smoke. 💨Amish farm outside of Somerset had two burn barrels right ou front of their door as did some of dairies in Maryland farm country.

Deer were bad in Pennsylvania. I kept seeing young road kill does along PA 36 outside of Punxsutawney, came very close to hitting a small doe in Cook Forest along the Clarion River and had to slam on the brakes again on southern Clarion County when another small one ran out into the road. They really like hiding in the shadows. I swear young doe are a bit like bullhead in some lakes. Hopefully they’ll grow up and produce some big deer.

Tonight will be mostly clear 🌃, with a low of 45 degrees at 4am. Four degrees above normal, which is similar to a typical night around October 2nd. Southeast wind around 5 mph. In 2018, we had mostly clear skies in the evening, which became light rain by the early hours of the morning. It became very sticky as the night progressed. It got down to 61 degrees. The record low of 22 occurred back in 1943.

Tonight will have a Waxing Gibbous Moon 🌔 with 97% illuminated. The moon will set at 4:36 am. The Hunter Moon 🌕 is on Saturday night with a chance of rain showers and breezy conditions up here in the high country of West Virginia. I pitched my tent so I’m ready for that – I’ll go sit by the heater in the tent if it’s truly miserable. The sun will rise at 7:22 am with the first light at 6:55 am, which is 58 seconds later than yesterday. 🌄 Tonight will have 12 hours and 36 minutes of darkness, an increase of 2 minutes and 30 seconds over last night.

Tomorrow will be sunny 🌞, with a high of 63 degrees at 2pm. One degree above normal, which is similar to a typical day around October 9th. Maximum dew point of 47 at 12pm. Southeast wind around 5 mph becoming calm in the morning. A year ago, we had mostly sunny skies. It was humid. The high last year was 72 degrees. The record high of 86 was set in 1949. There was a dusting of snow in 1987.❄

Tomorrow I plan to hike in Dolly Sods. 🚶 I’m hoping the road up there won’t be too washboard. If it is, I’ll probably one back over Corridor H. Probably do one of the bigger loops, I’d like to see upwards of ten miles 🔟 hiking it tomorrow. It would be cool to also drive down to West Virginia High Peak , Spruce Knob Mountain 🗻 but time is limited and that’s quite far south if I remember right. Well see. Saturday it’s Blackwater Falls and Cannan Valley Refuge as long as it’s not pouring. If it rains, I’ll hot tent with a book 📙.

In four weeks on November 7 the sun will be setting at 5:11 pm (Standard Time),🌄 which is one hour, 36 minutes and 11 seconds earlier then tonight. That’s good to know if I decide to go West Virginia after Election Day next year. ⛺ Who knows? In 2018 on that day, we had mostly sunny, shallow fog and temperatures between 59 and 41 degrees. Typically, you have temperatures between 51 and 34 degrees. The record high of 75 degrees was set back in 1938.

Looking ahead, Halloween 🛥️ is in 3 weeks, Average High is 50 🍂 is a month away, Thanksgiving 🦃 is in 7 weeks, Repeal of Prohibition Day 🍺 is in 8 weeks, 7:15 AM Sunrise ⌛️ is in 2 months, Boxing Day 🥊 is in 11 weeks and National Cheese Lovers Day 🧀 is in 15 weeks.

West Virginia in absolutely beautiful tonight. The campsite I am in is the one I got two years ago, surrounded by dense mountain laurel (so thick no light passes through) on three sides, which is over ten feet tall it not higher. The stars are above and the white pines that tower over the sods is outlined by the moonlight that makes it possible to see the road and the land without a flashlight.