4AM the alarm goes off. What the hell was I thinking. Why is this a good idea? Its dark. Its too early for a workout or run.
I’ll just go back to sleep. Closed my eyes. About to fall asleep…oh my god…the image of Cat Scratch flashed through my brain. Any chance of sleep is now shot. Good thing since 4 PAX are coming to meet at my house for this run.
So at 4:30 3 PAX arrive. We load up. No Puffs. We decide to roll by his place. No need, we see him on the road and pick him up. Away we go. Matlock warns the vehicle constituents of impending or at least potential GI issues on the run…we all vow not to run behind him.
We arrive at the base of McAfee Knob at 5:00. 3 other PAX are waiting. Lots of other cars. Seems strange at 5AM. Did Dunphy tweet out to all of Roanoke? No one approaches our gaggle of men so we assume they ain’t with us. By 5:10 we take off. In the dark. With headlamps. Up hill.
We ran on the fire road for 2.5 miles and waited for a while to reassemble before the last 1.3 miles (and 1000 feet of elevation gain). We kill time with a few sets of merkins in cadence (it ain’t F3 if there are no merkins). I suggest monkey humpers. No takers.
Still no Glee or SpaceJam so Dunphy and Puffs go on recon mission. New goal is to reassemble at the top.
4 PAX make it to the top right at sunrise. Beautiful. Then Puffs rolls up just after sunrise. We ask about Glee and SpaceJam (who by this point has lost the hoodie. Strange that he choose to start with the hoodie given the heat and challenge of the day). They should be here soon. We talk more. 5 (or more) minutes pass. Puffs asks where Dunphy is. We are confused since we thought he was with Puffs. Dunphy lost on the mountain. We find him wandering beyond the knob and return him to the group.
Shortly after sunrise a dude with a drone sets his drone free above the cliff. Then the excitement happens as a sleeping through-hiker rips into him (as her sleep was disturbed by the buzzing drone). She claims using drone is the worst thing in the world. Matlock disagrees. He suggests that may be a bit overstated and that mass genocide and gassing children are two things he places as “worse” than drones. He raises a valid point. We agree to disagree with the lady in the bush and bid the 2 through hikers good luck on their voyage north (for another 1300 miles, or until they get arrested for murdering a drone pilot).
A good time was had by all!!!! Oh shit. We still have to run back to the cars 3.7 miles……Off we go