Woke up with the sun again. Around 6:30 Loz and I headed up to Blue Mtn. then on to Tray Mtn. Shelter for a grand total of 14.9 miles. Pretty decent milage for Laura with a bum knee on LOTS of ups and downs. While Loz sent me down a "treacherous" path to find H2O, she went on ahead to find a 6' black snake in the middle of the trail. See if I'll leave her again! Met up with Pink Fire on Blue Mtn. and had a delightful hour lunch break. .........
June 9
To begin - let me recount the evening after my entry last night. Well-we (Loz and I) had just sat down to play a few cards while Pink Fire went to the rocks with a beautiful view of the mts. 5 minutes later, Pink Fire runs back to the shelter and says "guess what I just saw!" of course- bear. So we all quickly packed up our food bags and hung them on the line, grabbed our jackets and tip toed out to the same rocks form which Pink Fire claimed to have seen a bear. Low and behold not 10 minutes after we sit down we see one way off in the woods. We all oooo and ahh and then settle in to watch the reverse sunset. (from the opposite side of the mtn.) A little while passes and we hear cracking twigs in the rocks just below us. Loz jumps back and edges toward the only exit off the rock face. We watch as a bear cub meanders across below the edge of the rock and shortly, we hear birds squawking behind us. We turn and hear sticks crash off into the brush. Both bears were gone. So, adrenaline high, we vote not to go to bed but rather to star gaze on the beautiful rock face. Pink Fire leaves to get a coat and doesn't come back for quite awhile. We hear sticks cracking in the woods behind us and Loz starts to flip out but I point out that it's all coming from the exact same spot. Thanks Pink Fire.
June 10
Wow were those mice pesky last night! When I sat up at 6 am, 2 scampered out from under Loz's head. Pink Fire found at least 4 in his pack before we left the shelter-no observed damage though. We left expecting a real easy 13 mile day-ended up being some pretty rough terrain after all. Stopped at a shelter for lunch where I rekindled a fire to toast our bagels. We pushed on slowly after lunch-met a lot of people at Deep Gap, NC...GA was nice-they had sweet bear cables. Now we have to fend them off our food by ourselves.
June 11
So to begin where I left off last evening, we realized that now that we're in NC, there are no pre-hung bear cables available to hang our food. Not cool, but no big deal, eh? I've hung plenty of bear bags in my short lifetime. So I tie my nalgene to the end of a rope and heave it towards the highest branch I can see. No luck. I guess I need to work on my slowpitch softball skills. Luckily, nearby is pink fire. He agrees to give the bottle a toss into the treetops for me. HA. He got it in the tree alright. Way past our objective branch, wrapped twice around the limb and twisted. Well, that's fine-we still have a hold of the other end of the rope. HA. So we get the bright idea to tie a rock to the free end of the rope and throw it through the limbs of the tree in the exact projectory path that the nalgene took. HA. So now the rock, tied to the other end of the tree is completely twisted in the tree tops, probably 50 feet up. OK then. This is no where near over. Let's find "a really big stick". HA. I found a dead tree-literally-in the woods and we dragged it over. Pink Fire hoists it up the 20-25 feet and attempts to twist the rope around the stick and forcefully pull it down. No luck. That thing is holding tight. Not one to let a tree get the better of him, Pink fire attempts to climb up the tree.. Unsuccessful, he steps on a tree nearby and the culprit tree and wedges himself up between them until he is doing a precarious split and the coveted nalgene bottle is literally 6 inches from his grasp. I hand him a stick but he can't get the right angle or leverage, so down he comes, safely to the ground, sweating profusely in this crazy man vs. tree battle. Next, he grabs the dead tree and tries to flip the bottle over the branch-only to get a barrage of tree bark in his eyes. Meanwhile, I'm laughing and trying to help, Loz in lounging off in the distance in the sun and the gentleman at the shelter with us is trying to add his 2 cents. Finally, Pinkfire successfully twists the rope around the tree enough to literally rip the bottle from the rope. The lid is no longer attached to my nalgene, and our extra rope is high in the tree tops near Standing Indian shelter. But looking at the bright side, I got free entertainment last night and now my pack is lighter, too.
So there were a few other people at the shelter last night-we were in bed by 8:45 though. No mice whatsoever. I finally dreamed-Karina you were in it so ask me about it sometime. Woke up the AM around 6:09-a beautiful morning yet again. Hiked 7 ridiculously easy miles to lunch-met a section hiker-retired military living north of Nashville now (in Johnny Cash's town) and he demanded that we help him lighten his load by eating some food. Loz and Pinkfire got "Zero" bars, but I kept my eyes on the prize: the huge bag of gorp he had! It was simply raisins, peanuts and M&M's but oh man-nothing has tasted better to me as long as I can remember. It was like heaven! After lunch did some easy 4 miles or so-then up "Big Butt Mountain"-yes, that's really its name. To end the hiking day, Pinkfire and I tackled Albert Mountain while Loz took an easier alternate route to save her knees. It was a difficult, but spectacular climb to the firetower at the summit...My observation for the day: Sweat=Sweet.
June 12
...Now-to try to tell the tales of the last 24 hours. Last night after Loz and I had eaten our supper, 3 ladies showed up to the shelter. We had met them breifly earlier in the day when we blew past them. They are 3 middle school teachers from FL, ages 46, 43 and 28. They were so much fun to have in camp last night. Good natured, talkative, extremely generous. They ate their dinners and the one lady decided she couldn't finish hers. Now out in bear country you eat your food-all of it or you find another human that will. There's no tossing food into the woods or burning it to get rid of it. So-she handed over to Loz and I her $8 freeze dried already cooked chicken and rice dinner. She had taken maybe 5 bites. Of course, we devoured it. They relized we were hungry and started forcing food on us-pringles, trail mix, cashews and almonds. Then they promised us dessert too. We were happy and stuffed so we decided to walk back up the back of Mt. Albert to the firetower to watch the sun set. It was delightful but chilly. When we returned at dark, the women called out from their tents that they had left us dessert on the table. By dessert they meant dark chocolate cheesecake and tiraminsu(SP?) Delicious...
Moving on, Loz and I hiked an easy 5 mile downhill section to the next shelter, where pinkfire had stayed last night. When we arrived, a skinny middle aged man was expecting us (Editor's note- Pinkfire stayed at the shelter with this man last night and told him about Loz's knee). As soon as Loz made it to the shelter, he said, "You must be the one with the knee problem." She said yes and we all chatted for a while...anyways, he pulls out a real knee brace and asks Loz to try it on. It fits well and since he's hitching a ride to town today to end his hike, he bequeaths it to her. Amazing...It was an answer to prayer that this man waited for us this morning. He had slept in a hammock all the other nights he was out, but chose last night to stay in a shelter. Pinkfire had stayed with us all the other nights, but last night he pushed on.
So-we made about 16 miles today-we're tenting for the first time...Time flies out here. Everyday there's something new, exciting, different. We have to adapt and make due and push through. We work together and laugh and sweat and though we haven't made it yet-its all worth it. All of it.
June 14
Love to all-keep us in your prayers as we enter the Smokey Mountains-wild boars and bears and lots of wet days...
