The LBL Hike
Day Four

Got up to clear skies once again and I was wondering how long it would last. We heard another elk bugle right at daybreak a little more to the northeast so that made me forget about the weather. We refilled out water bottles then crossed the hill back to the trail. This would be the day we would reach Kentucky Lake and it was something I was looking forward to, some much different views. There turned out to be a lot more ups and downs on this part of the trail, something I really didn't expect. Some of them were pretty steep too and Steve even compared one hill to the Appalachian Trail. The right foot was taking a beating as a hot spot developed on the big toe. I got Dr. Steve to fix that for me and we continued on. We finally made it to the lake and the views were pretty awesome. Some areas gave us a lot of level walking and we made some pretty good time there.
Then we started seeing more critters and this time I did have my camera out. The first was right after I had refilled my bottles right out of the lake (yep the water was good too). Steve and his dad were checking something out by the trail when I looked to the left. All coiled up was this black racer snake that looked like he didn't like us being there. My first thought was why he didn't slide off away from us. He just laid there in this coil with us pretty much standing over him. The only thing we could figure out was it hadn't been too long since he had eaten. After getting home and looking at the pictures of him it was easy to see. About 12-14 inches behind his head was two humps in his belly. I don't know what he had caught but he was definitely digesting something. He stayed coiled up the entire time until we left him alone. Something else odd was this was the only snake we entire the entire hike. We had been warned a few miles back by two workers about rattlesnakes but never saw a one. I guess they didn't want their picture taken either.
A little later I came up on three racoons on top of a hill. One ran off to the right but the two others went scurrying up a nearby white oak tree. They climbed up about 20 feet then peeked around the side of the tree to see what had given them such a start. (This picture isn't very good but at least you can get an idea as to how curious they were.) After a while they kept on climbing until they were high enough to hide in the leaves. We were able to watch them for almost half an hour before losing sight of them in the treetop. Then the fun started as we began to look for the next shelter. We came to a tee in the road and saw that the sign had been knocked down. To the right was a yellow blaze on a tree and that just didn't seem right. We didn't see any side trail like what was supposed to be there. Steve went to the left and found the main trail blaze. We sat and discussed the situation for a few minutes and looked at the map. I suggested we go on to Duncan Lake a couple of miles ahead and if need be just set up the tents. The map, however, said the shelter wasn't that far away, only about a mile, but we would have to do some looking for it. Steve made the call to go ahead and look for the shelter and this was one time I was glad nobody listened to me. We followed the yellow blazes to a side road into a valley. At a stream crossing a yellow blaze went into the woods so Steve went in to search for the shelter. After about 5 minutes he came back and said it was about 200 yards inside the woods so off we went. It was a good thing too. At about 5:30 the skies opened up with heavy rain and lightning. Had we gone with my idea we might have had problems. Fortunately Steve's experience kept us out of trouble. It was really one time I was glad to be wrong.